Black 2

TL;DR. This ingredient is a it colorant used to deepen shade, opacity, and visual intensity in makeup, hair color, nail, and personal care formulas. It does not provide cleansing, moisturizing, or preservation benefits.

What does Black 2 do in a cosmetic formula?

This ingredient is a it colorant used to deepen shade, opacity, and visual intensity in makeup, hair color, nail, and personal care formulas. It does not provide cleansing, moisturizing, or preservation benefits.

Is Black 2 clean?

It sits on many clean-standard restricted lists because purity, particle size, residual PAHs, and inhalation exposure matter, especially in loose powders and aerosols. In regulated cosmetics it must meet color-additive purity specifications and is generally low-reactivity on skin.

Is Black 2 sustainable?

This material is typically made by controlled combustion of heavy aromatic feedstocks, often fossil-derived. It is inert but not biodegradable, so its sustainability profile is limited by feedstock origin and particulate persistence.

Is Black 2 COSMOS-approved?

It is not aligned with COSMOS natural or organic standards in typical form because it is a synthetic, fossil-feedstock colorant rather than an allowed mineral or nature-derived colorant. From a Green Chemistry view, it scores poorly on renewable sourcing and end-of-life biodegradability, though it is chemically inert in finished products.

How does Black 2 work chemically?

It is an insoluble particulate pigment made of fused, graphitic, high-surface-area primary particles that form aggregates rather than discrete soluble molecules. Typical cosmetic use is driven by shade strength, often well below a few percent in pigmented products, and it is stable across normal cosmetic pH, heat, and light because it is nonvolatile and essentially insoluble.

Last updated 2026-05-13