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Lip balms are a staple of healthy lip care. When your lips are dry or chapped, a good balm brings instant relief. A lip balm covers your lips in a protective layer, protecting them from drying out, as well as sealing in moisture. Because lip balm is put on our lips, we want to make sure we are choosing natural and organic lip balms. Otherwise, we will be ingesting potentially toxic chemicals such as parabens, petroleum, and synthetic flavors and fragrances.
When choosing the best organic lip balm, there are some things we need to consider. Ingredients are the main thing you want to look at, but you also need to decide if you want a tint of color, sun protection or a certain scent. Some key ingredients to look for are:
- beeswax or candelilla wax (if you are vegan). These are the best bases for a lip balm.
- butters such as shea or cocoa butter.
- oils such as coconut, jojoba or argan oil.
- honey is a great ingredient because it acts as a humectant, which means it attracts and holds water.
There are also some ingredients you will want to avoid:
- Camphor, Menthol, and Phenol may temporarily soothe and cool, but they actually dry out your lips over time.
- Fragrances and artificial colors. Instead, look for essential oils and natural mineral tints.
- Alcohol (labeled OL). It dries out the skin.
- Parabens, and other nasties. (see a list here.)
The Top 5 Best Organic Lip Balms
I have narrowed down a selection of some of the best organic lip balms available, these balms are all-natural with no chemicals in them.
Best Vegan Lip Balm
Soapwalla – Organic / Vegan Lip Locked Lip Balm
This lip balm comes in 3 flavors – Citrus + Ginger, Coconut + Lime, and Lavender + Mint. It is handcrafted in Brooklyn, with cruelty-free and vegan ingredients – no beeswax!
The price is higher on Amazon than on Soapwalla’s website ($9 each vs $12.50 on Amazon), but you get free shipping with Amazon. You can also buy all 3 lip balms for $32, making each lip balm cost you just over $10.
Best Unflavored/Unscented Lip Balm
Organic jojoba and avocado oils, hemp oil and beeswax moisturize and protect the skin. This lip balm is fragrance and flavor-free. No essential oils.
Best Flavored/Scented Lip Balm
Pangea Organics Lip Balm, Pyrenees Lavender With Cardamom
A smooth and creamy lip balm with a lovely scent and taste. The scent is a light lavender and the taste is slightly spicy and nutty. This lip balm has plenty of amazing reviews on Amazon, proving that it is an excellent lip balm.
Best SPF Lip Balm
Hurraw! Balm, SPF 15 Sun Lip Balm
This lip balm offers sun protection as well as hydration. Tangerine, roman chamomile and a hint of vanilla nourish and calm your lips. This lip balm is vegan, organic and made with cold-pressed oils. The SPF is provided by non-nano zinc oxide.
Best Tinted Lip Balm
Hurraw! Balm, Tinted Lip Balm, Black Cherry
Another Hurraw! product, this one has a lovely dark red, sheer tint. This lip balm has an organic cherry flavor and is made with cold-pressed oils to nourish and protect your lips.
Conclusion
Remember to apply your balm 4 to 6 times a day, or whenever you feel irritation or dryness. If you are having to apply more frequently, your ingredients may be drying your skin.
Keep one lip balm in your purse, one in your car and one at home, that way you will always have relief close by.
These organic lip balms are sure to soothe and hydrate your lips, every day. They are all highly rated with many positive reviews, click the links above to read these reviews.
What is your favorite lip balm? Do you like a particular scent or flavor? I love a lip balm with a slight vanilla flavor and a citrus scent.
Yours In Beauty,
Andrea
I love all things Organic and in particular I love the benefits of al things coconut.
I love that you have included coconut oil in this article as a good lip balm.
My partner just uses coconut oil with a drop of vanilla essence.
I don’t use it myself and really don’t mind any flavour on my partners lip 🙂
Great Site
Tim
That is a great idea, coconut oil with a little vanilla in it would be an excellent lip treatment.
Really enjoy coming to your site. Organic is huge right now and so is anti-aging. Everyone wants to look young and natural. Lip balm season is right around the corner with fall or autumn approaching fast. This article should pick up a lot of steam in the soon to come months. Thanks for another great and helpful post.
Thanks Chris, you are so right, lip balm is going to be more important in the coming months. I have found that it is best to take a preventative approach with your lips. If your lips are already chapped, it is harder to reverse the damage, but if you use a lip balm before your lips are chapped, they will stay hydrated and not dry out. I have an article about winter lip care if you want to check it out 🙂
thanks, I was looking for lip-balm, as I always have chapped lips living in a dry and often cold climate. I never considered getting organic lip balm, and now I see it’s important. Wow, parabens sound nasty. Which one is better: beeswax, butters, or oils? Or does it matter at all?
Thanks for your comment.
To answer your question, most lip balms contain a mixture of beeswax, butters and oils. But if I were to say one ingredient is the most important I would say either beeswax or shea/cocoa butter, as these ingredients form a protective barrier on your lips and hold moisture in.
Wow, this is interesting – I had no idea of the toxic chemicals I will have been ingesting with my normal choices… I realise things such as Vaseline are petroleum jelly, but had no idea they were actually toxic to us since so many people use it!!
Can you recommend the dr.organic brand at all? This is the one I’m currently using!! The pomegranate flavour smells yummy!! 😛
It is so crazy how many chemicals we are all ingesting on a daily basis, it is no wonder cancer rates are sky-rocketing. I have not heard of dr.organic, I looked them up and found their website. I browsed some of their products but they don’t include ingredients lists so I have no way of knowing if they are truly natural or just claim to be. On the surface they seem to be a good company. Look for “fragrance” on your product’s ingredient list, this is one ingredient you really want to avoid.
the ingredients list does say “(..something…) acetate” and “Aroma”. . . Could these be potentially harmful ingredients?
The terms “aroma”, “fragrance” and “parfum” can hide toxic ingredients. Artificial fragrances are one of the worst ingredients in personal care products. Artificial scents are made from synthetic chemicals, and there are thousands of different scent chemicals. Some of these chemicals disrupt hormones and can cause allergic reactions. An example of a scent chemical is diethyl phthalate, a chemical found in 97 percent of Americans and linked to sperm damage in human epidemiological studies.
It would be better to find products that use essential oils as their fragrance.
I like the idea of the black cherry tinted lip balm.
My lips have been so dry lately and my chap-sticks have been missing somehow.
I’ve had some of the beige colored chap-sticks before that came out coloring my lips an ugly beige color. Do any of these ones do this, or do they just come on clear?
I don’t actually know if these create a beige tint. I don’t think that they would. Maybe the one with SPF protection would, because it contains zinc oxide.
LOVE your site!
This is what we need more of – natural, organic products sourced from nature itself and not some white-coat lab folks who put together concoctions that do God knows what to our skin and bodies.
Coconut oil, butter shea and similar natural ingredients are excellent on so many levels – they are good for the skin as well as being terrific moisturizers and lubricants.
Thanks so much! We love that you stopped in and enjoyed your stay!
I must say you scared me a little with all that information about what I put on my lips. Parabens and petroleum is not something I want to put on my lips, so I am going to look for the organic lipstick, though they are not easy to find, and they are not cheap either. But the lip balms that you are writing about are really inexpensive on Amazon, which is great.
Hi Sandy,
Organic lipsticks can seem expensive, but they will last you a long time. You just can’t have as many shades of lipstick, you would need to stick with one or 2 shades. Often, you need to buy organic lipstick online, as it is hard to find in stores. You can read about my favorite lipstick brands here. You can also read about why organic is more expensive here.
Great information! I’m an organic/natural skin care junkie. It’s so scary to think about all of the chemicals and foreign substances that are allowed into products and are causing reactions that are unexplainable in certain people. I actually use the Pangea lip balm and I love it! I’ll be trying the others as well. Thanks for the article!
Awesome Kristin, I am glad to hear it 🙂
How about Burt’s Bees lip products? My daughter and I have to stay away from products that trigger acne. Any advice?
Hi Debbie, thanks so much for stopping in! Burt’s Bees makes good lip balms 🙂 As for products that don’t trigger acne, I would say stay away from lip balms that contain cocoa butter or coconut oil. Look for shea butter instead. Have a look at our non-comedogenic oils list for oils that will not clog pores, and head over to our acne page for some helpful information for you and your daughter. I hope that helps, let me know if you have any other questions.