Polysorbate 20: CIR Safety Assessment Summary
CIR safety assessment summary for Polysorbate 20: ingredients reviewed, panel verdict, use concentration context, conditions, and source citation.
Polysorbate 20 appears in a CIR safety assessment covering Polysorbate 20, Polysorbate 21, Polysorbate 40, Polysorbate 60, Polysorbate 61, Polysorbate 65, Polysorbate 80, Polysorbate 81, and 4 more. The panel verdict for the report is Safe as used. The CIR Expert Panel concluded that the polysorbates listed below are safe in cosmetics when formulated to be non-irritating. This conclusion supersedes the conclusion reached in the 1984, 2000, and 2001 CIR safety assessments.
| Field | CIR value |
|---|---|
| Primary ingredient | Polysorbate 20 |
| CIR verdict | Safe as used |
| Report type | Final Amended Report |
| Date | July 10, 2015 |
| CAS numbers | 9005-64-5, 9005-65-6, 9005-66-7, 9005-67-8, 9005-70-3, 9005-71-4, 66794-58-9, 8036-77-9, 8051-13-6, 8051-15-8, 66686-72-4, 68154-33-6 |
| Conditions or carve-outs | When formulated to be non-irritating |
Ingredients Reviewed
The review scope matters because CIR conclusions often apply to an ingredient family rather than a single INCI name. In this report, the ingredient list includes Polysorbate 20, Polysorbate 21, Polysorbate 40, Polysorbate 60, Polysorbate 61, Polysorbate 65, Polysorbate 80, Polysorbate 81, and 4 more.
Safety Conclusion
The conclusion for Polysorbate 20 should be read as a CIR panel conclusion, not a regulatory limit. CIR assessments summarize expert-panel safety determinations for cosmetic use, while legal status still depends on the jurisdiction and product category.
Conditions
When formulated to be non-irritating
Formulation Reading
For formula review, begin with the exact INCI identity and the ingredient group covered by the CIR assessment. If the material is Polysorbate 20, the relevant comparison is whether the intended use aligns with the practices, concentration ranges, and conditions described in the CIR source.
The ingredient hub at Polysorbate 20 should carry the substance-level profile. This page is the report-level summary, keeping the conclusion, ingredient scope, and use-context language attached to the CIR source rather than treating the conclusion as a universal permission.
Why This Page Exists
CIR reviews are long documents, and the practical answer is usually buried in the conclusion and the table of current practices. This summary keeps those CIR facts in one indexable page for Polysorbate 20, with source details retained at the bottom for audit.
Review Notes
The conservative reading is to keep Polysorbate 20 tied to the exact CIR report listed below. The ingredient family, panel conclusion, date, and any use-condition language belong together. A shorter ingredient-page snippet would lose that context.
This page gives the search-level answer while preserving the source-level caveat: CIR safety language is a panel assessment for cosmetic practices of use, not a universal legal permission across every jurisdiction or product category.
Source
- CIR report: Safety Assessment of Polysorbates as Used in Cosmetics
- CIR source file: FR696.pdf
- Extraction JSON: Source documentation archived.
- Conclusion page in CIR extraction: 11