Sunflower Seed Oil
Sunflower seed oil is rated Clear — one of the very few oils Fulton's 1989 rabbit assay scored a flat 0, and one of the even fewer he singled out in the paper's text as naturally less comedogenic; but that reassurance rests on a single legacy reading, carries his "depends on source of raw material" asterisk, and does not cleanly cover the high-oleic grades now common on labels.
One of the few oils rated genuinely non-comedogenic (high linoleic content).
What it is
The oil pressed from the seeds of Helianthus annuus, the common sunflower. On a label it is Helianthus Annuus (Sunflower) Seed Oil. It is used as a plain emollient and carrier oil — a light, low-odour liquid fat that spreads easily and is cheap at food grade — and it turns up as the bulk oil phase in facial oils, moisturisers, cleansing oils, baby products and lip balms. One detail matters more than the rest, because the rating's rationale leans on it: what "sunflower seed oil" contains is not fixed. The Cosmetic Ingredient Review's 2023 safety assessment describes the oil as primarily triglycerides of linoleic and oleic acids — conventionally about 59% linoleic, 30% oleic, 6% stearic and 5% palmitic, with vitamin E, sterols and some squalene. But it records oleic acid running as low as 14–39% in conventional seed and as high as 75–90.7% in selectively bred "high-oleic" seed, with linoleic falling correspondingly. So two oils with the same INCI name can have nearly inverted fatty-acid profiles. The label does not tell you which one is in the bottle.
Why we rate it Clear
We rate it Clear at Low confidence, and the confidence is the honest part. The only direct exact-material comedogenicity result we can find is one legacy score. Fulton's 1989 rabbit-ear survey — the paper nearly every comedogenic number in circulation descends from — scored "Sunflower oil" a 0 on its 0–5 scale, in Section VI, "Oils." Read off a 400dpi render of the journal scan, the row is there and it is genuinely sunflower's: unlike coconut oil, which has no row in the paper at all, sunflower oil was actually tested. On Fulton's own key a 0 sits in the 0–1 band he called "not considered significant." The method was the standard one: the ingredient diluted to roughly 10% in propylene glycol, applied to the inner ear of three New Zealand albino rabbits, follicles scored for keratosis. Two things sit alongside that row, and only the first is reassuring. First, Fulton did not only score sunflower oil — he named it. The paper's text reads: "Among the natural oils such as sesame oil, avocado oil, and mink oil, the results are improved when a more refined oil is used. However, it seems easier to use safflower oil and sunflower oils, which are naturally less comedogenic." A printed 0 with an author's sentence behind it is more than most rows on the site carry. Second, Fulton used the oil as apparatus: his Table III, on how the vehicle changes a fatty acid's comedogenicity, ran each acid in ether or acetone and in sunflower oil. Those numbers do not reinforce the 0. Every acid scored the same or higher in the sunflower vehicle — palmitic 0 then 2, stearic 0 then 2, lauric 3 then 4, myristic 1 then 3, capric 2 then 3 — which is a finding about the acids and their vehicles, not a second reading of the oil. There is a mechanistic reason the low score is plausible, though it is a reason and not a measurement of this oil. Sunflower oil is high in linoleic acid, and a relative shortage of linoleic acid in follicular sebum has long been linked to the abnormal keratinisation behind comedones. Letawe and colleagues tested that idea directly in 1998, in a double-blind, placebo-controlled, randomised cross-over study read by digital analysis of cyanoacrylate follicular biopsies: topically applied linoleic acid shrank existing microcomedones by roughly 25% over a month, with no change at placebo sites. That is real human evidence — but it tested linoleic acid, a component, not sunflower oil, and it measured whether an application shrinks comedones that are already there, not whether the oil creates them.
What the evidence doesn’t tell you
The score is a single rabbit-ear reading from one laboratory in one year, and it should be held that loosely. We hold no second comedogenicity number for sunflower oil. Fulton's own earlier 1984 rabbit paper has no sunflower row; Nguyen, Dang and Maibach's 2007 rabbit-ear study names its fourteen test materials in its abstract, and sunflower oil is not among them; and Morris and Kwan's 1983 rabbit assay — the paper that openly contradicts Fulton on other materials — has no sunflower row either. It scored safflower oil 1–2 on the same 0–5 scale, but safflower is a different plant (Carthamus tinctorius), and reading its number across to sunflower would be the exact neighbour-substitution error this site exists to catch. So there is one number, not two agreeing ones. Fulton's Section VI carries a footnote on the heading itself — "Results depend on source of raw material" — which governs every oil row in it, sunflower included. A 0 from that section is a 0 for whatever sunflower oil he happened to test, and he never states which grade that was. This is not a quibble. The rating's stated rationale is the oil's high linoleic content, yet the CIR's 2023 figures show commercial sunflower oil ranging from high-linoleic to high-oleic, the latter carrying up to about 90% oleic acid and little linoleic. Oleic acid is the fraction most often implicated in barrier disruption, and we hold no measure of how much of the sunflower oil on sale is the high-oleic grade. We identified no comedogenicity assay of high-oleic sunflower oil. The mechanism that makes the low score plausible may simply not describe the oil in a given product. The human studies that exist are not comedogenicity studies, and it would be an endpoint substitution to present them as ones. Danby and colleagues (2013) applied sunflower seed oil to the forearms of 19 adults for four weeks and found it preserved stratum-corneum integrity and hydration while olive oil weakened the barrier — but the endpoints were transepidermal water loss, hydration and erythema, not comedones, and the site was the forearm, not the face. Letawe (1998), above, tested a component and measured shrinkage of existing microcomedones. Neither asked whether sunflower oil plugs follicles. We identified no human comedogenicity study of sunflower seed oil itself. Finally, the assay under all of this has been contested for decades. Frank asked in 1982 whether the rabbit ear was prophetic of human acnegenicity; Draelos and DiNardo (2006) found finished products testing non-comedogenic on human backs despite containing ingredients the rabbit assay had flagged; a 2025 review concluded that no standardised comedogenicity test exists and that the label "non-comedogenic" is unregulated. And unsaturated oils oxidise: a rancid bottle is not the fresh oil a rabbit-ear test measured, and nothing here speaks to that.
Where you’ll see it
On a label it appears as Helianthus Annuus (Sunflower) Seed Oil. Per the CIR's 2023 assessment it is used across facial and body moisturisers, cleansing oils, sunscreens, lip products and baby-care products, usually as the bulk emollient or carrier oil rather than an active. The one thing the label will not tell you is the grade: high-linoleic and high-oleic sunflower oils share the same INCI name, and only the first is the material the "high linoleic" rationale describes. Keep it separate, too, from safflower oil (Carthamus tinctorius), a different plant: Fulton 1989 scores safflower 0 as well, the same as sunflower, and Morris and Kwan's 1983 assay scored safflower 1–2 on a 0–5 scale.
Sources
Each source says what it actually is. Several widely-cited “sources” for comedogenic ratings are republishing the same 1989 assay, and counting them as independent agreement is how a thin evidence base gets made to look thick.
- Fulton JE. "Comedogenicity and irritancy of commonly used ingredients in skin care products." J Soc Cosmet Chem 40:321–333 (1989) The primary source of nearly every comedogenic score in circulation, and the only comedogenicity measurement of sunflower oil we hold. Read off a 400dpi render of the journal scan rather than a list quoting it. Method: ingredient at roughly 10% in propylene glycol, applied to the inner ear of three New Zealand albino rabbits, follicles scored for keratosis on a 0–5 scale (0–1 "not considered significant"). Table I, Section VI "Oils," scores Sunflower oil 0. The section heading carries the footnote "Results depend on source of raw material," so the 0 is not an unqualified one. The paper's text also names sunflower (with safflower) as "naturally less comedogenic," and its Table III uses sunflower oil as the vehicle against which ether and acetone are compared — a table in which the fatty acids score no lower in sunflower oil than in the solvents. One reading, one lab, one year — cited as the evidence for the rating, and as its own main limitation.
- Becker LC, Boyer IJ, Bergfeld WF, Belsito DV, Hill RA, Klaassen CD, Liebler DC, Marks JG Jr, Shank RC, Slaga TJ, Snyder PW, Gill LJ, Heldreth B. "Safety Assessment of Helianthus annuus (Sunflower)-Derived Ingredients as Used in Cosmetics." Int J Toxicol 42(1_suppl):93S–116S (2023) An independent expert-panel safety review, not a comedogenic assessment and not downstream of Fulton. Cited here only for composition and use: primarily triglycerides of linoleic and oleic acids (conventionally ~59% linoleic, ~30% oleic, ~6% stearic, ~5% palmitic), with oleic ranging 14–39% in conventional seed and 75–90.7% in bred high-oleic seed — the source of the high-linoleic versus high-oleic distinction on this page. It concludes the ingredients are safe as used; it assesses safety, not comedogenicity, and says nothing about pores.
- Danby SG, AlEnezi T, Sultan A, Vergou T, Cork MJ. "Effect of Olive and Sunflower Seed Oil on the Adult Skin Barrier: Implications for Neonatal Skin Care." Pediatr Dermatol 30(1):42–50 (2013) A randomised, forearm-controlled human study — 19 adults, sunflower seed oil versus olive oil, twice daily for four weeks. It found sunflower oil preserved stratum-corneum integrity and hydration while olive oil weakened the barrier. Characterised narrowly on purpose: its endpoints were transepidermal water loss, hydration and erythema on the forearm, not comedones on the face. It is real human evidence about the barrier and it is not comedogenicity evidence — a barrier benefit is not the absence of follicular plugging.
- Letawe C, Boone M, Piérard GE. "Digital image analysis of the effect of topically applied linoleic acid on acne microcomedones." Clin Exp Dermatol 23(2):56–58 (1998) A double-blind, placebo-controlled, randomised cross-over study in mild-acne patients, read by digital analysis of cyanoacrylate follicular biopsies. Topical linoleic acid reduced the size of existing microcomedones by roughly 25% over a month versus placebo. Cited for the mechanism the low sunflower score is usually explained by — but it tested linoleic acid, a component, not sunflower oil, and it measured shrinkage of comedones already present, not whether an oil produces them. Included so the mechanism is neither ignored nor overstated.
- Draelos ZD, DiNardo JC. "A re-evaluation of the comedogenicity concept." J Am Acad Dermatol 54:507–512 (2006) A Current Issues and Opinion piece in JAAD that tested finished products on human upper backs and found products testing non-comedogenic despite containing ingredients the rabbit assay had scored comedogenic. Cited only for the field-wide caveat that a rabbit-ear score does not transfer cleanly to skin. It is not a head-to-head validation of the rabbit model against human skin, and the earliest such challenge is older still — Frank, J Am Acad Dermatol 6:373–377 (1982).
Others in the same family
Oils behave similarly enough that the evidence for one is often wrongly read across to the others. These are its structural relatives, not a guess. What the evidence says about oils as a family ›
Last reviewed 2026-08-12 · How we decide