How to read a perfume's INCI label

A perfume label reads by three rules. First: ingredients appear in descending order of quantity, down to one per cent, below which the order no longer has to be kept. Second: on a perfume, the first two entries are almost always the alcohol and the fragrance mixture, and that mixture appears as a single word, "Parfum" or "Fragrance", which can cover dozens of unnamed materials. Third: fragrance substances known as sensitisers are exempt from that anonymity and must be named individually once they pass the legal threshold. That is where the technical-looking names at the end come from: Linalool, Limonene, Citronellol, Coumarin. They are not additives and not a bad sign. They are the components the law pulls out of the word "Parfum" so that anyone looking for them can find them.

What INCI is

INCI is the international nomenclature of cosmetic ingredients, a system of standardised names used on labels worldwide. Its purpose is that the same substance carries the same name everywhere, whatever language the packaging is in. That is why a perfume's ingredient list is identical whether you buy the bottle in Bucharest or in Lisbon.

INCI names are not trade names. "Alcohol Denat." is ethyl alcohol with denaturants added so it cannot be drunk. "Aqua" is water. "Parfum" is the fragrance mixture, treated as a single ingredient.

The order tells you something, not everything

Ingredients are listed from most to least, and below one per cent the order becomes free. On a perfume that means the first two or three positions are predictable and say almost nothing, while the useful information sits at the tail, where the declared allergens are.

One thing easy to miss: a long list is not a bad sign, and a short one is not a good sign. A short list can simply mean a fragrance mixture under which almost nothing had to be declared.

The word "Parfum" and what it covers

The law allows a fragrance mixture to appear as one ingredient, to protect the formula. It is a genuine exemption, and it is why most labels on the market effectively read: alcohol, water, a secret, and a few allergens.

The exemption has a limit. Fragrance substances on the European list of declarable allergens cannot stay hidden once they pass the threshold. For products that stay on skin, as a perfume does, that threshold is 0.001% of the finished product. The list was widened by a 2023 regulation and now runs past eighty entries against twenty-six before, which is why perfume labels have grown visibly longer in recent years.

Reading a list in three steps

1. Skip the beginning. Alcohol, Aqua, Parfum: predictable, no information.
2. Read the tail. That is where the declared allergens are, the only named materials in the composition. If you have a known sensitivity, its name is what you look for here. The possible causes of a reaction are in the article on irritation.
3. Notice what is missing. If almost nothing beyond "Parfum" is declared, that doesn't mean the liquid is simple. It means you are not being told.

What we do differently

Every ORYN perfume carries the full list of raw materials in its own formula, not just the legal minimum. The allergen declaration is computed by aggregation: every raw material's contribution across the whole composition is summed first, then compared against the threshold, because an allergen below it in each part can cross it in total. The percentages stay unpublished, because the recipe is ours, but the identity of the materials is not a secret.

Each bottle also carries a code that opens its own perfume's page: the full ingredient list, the declared allergens, and the lot it was made from. The full palette we compose from is public in any case, in the ingredient list, and how a conversation becomes a formula is described on the experience page.