Toilet soap is the soap used as a toiletry and the toiletry means - an object or cosmetic used in making up, dressing, etc. Due to the word toiletry, we misunderstood the concept of toilet soap. Cambridge dictionary defines the toilet soap as “a sweet-smelling soap that is intended for washing the body”.
Soap is used to clean the body and it is catagorised as toilet soap and bathing bar. The distinction (toilet soap and bathing bar) is made on the basis on amount of fatty material used to manufacture the soap. The thing to note is higher fatty material soap has better cleaning ability. Toilet soap contains more fatty material than bathing bar, so they soften the skin than bathing bar.
Total Fatty Matter (TFM) :
The soaps are rated in terms of Total Fatty Matter (TFM) contents. Good TFM soap has a good cleaning and nourishing property. TFM is a measure (in %) for identifying the amount of fatty matter present in soap i.e. more the fatty material present in soap, it is good for skin. In ideal saponification process, the ratio of fats to bases is 5:1. If we consider 5:1 ratio then TFM value of soap is 83.3% (but observed max value of TFM is 80%).
According to Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS), there are two types of soap - toilet soap and bathing bar. TFM content in bathing bar should be less than 60% but not less than 40%, while toilet soaps are categorized in three sub-categories depending on their TFM content. The TFM content of Grade I toilet soap should be 76% or above. TFM content of Grade II toilet soap should be less than 76% but not less than 70%. TFM content of Grade III toilet soap should be less than 70% but not less than 60%.
Summary :
*Toilet soap High amount of fatty material and TFM ranging from 60-80%
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Grades TFM%
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GRADE 1 76% or above
GRADE 2 > 70% and < 76%
GRADE 3 >60% and <70%
