PerfuMate › IFRA limits › Citronella oil

How much Citronella oil can you put in a perfume?

1.4%

of the finished perfume, at most

By its typical composition, Citronella Essential Oil can make up at most 1.4% of a finished perfume: its Citronellal content meets that IFRA limit first. At 18% that is at most 7.77% of your concentrate.

Check your own formula in the free IFRA calculator

Grade by grade

Each grade in PerfuMate's catalog, read through its typical composition by the calculator's engine:

Material	Held by	At most, of the perfume	At 18%, of the concentrate
Citronella Essential Oil	Citronellal 35%	1.4%	7.77%

Shares are the catalog's typical values. A real batch varies with origin and season, and your supplier's analysis (GC-MS or certificate of analysis) is the real figure.

A worked example

A 100 g concentrate, bottled as an eau de parfum at 18%:

Material	Weighed
Citronella Essential Oil	12 g
Ethylene Brassylate no IFRA limit	88 g

Citronella Essential Oil brings 0.756% Citronellal to the finished perfume, against a limit of 0.49%: 1.54 times the limit. To bring it inside on its own, the calculator cuts Citronella Essential Oil from 12 g to 7.422 g. Or keep the formula and bottle it weaker: the highest strength inside every limit is 11.66%.

Open this example in the IFRA calculator

Or paste these lines into the calculator:

Citronella Essential Oil  12 g
Ethylene Brassylate  88 g

Questions

Why is Citronella oil limited if it is natural?

Because IFRA limits molecules, and a natural is a mixture of them. Citronella Essential Oil typically carries 35% Citronellal, which has its own Category 4 limit of 0.49%.

How much Citronella oil can I use in an eau de parfum?

At 18%, Citronella Essential Oil may be at most 7.77% of the concentrate, if nothing else in the formula carries Citronellal. Every other source of Citronellal counts toward the same total.

Does this limit apply to candles or soap?

No. This is Category 4, fine fragrance on skin. Other products sit in other IFRA categories with other limits, which these pages and the calculator do not cover.