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15 Detox Bath Recipes to Remove Toxins & Feel Refreshed
February 28, 2023
Carving out alone time to de-stress, unwind and meditate in our busy schedule can be tough. Balancing family, work and relationship obligations leaves little time to “indulge” — enter the detox bath.
Allowing our bodies (and minds!) time to rest and rid themselves of toxins is essential to staying healthy. After all, if you’re not feeling your best, you can’t give anything — or anyone else — 100 percent.
Toxins are poisonous substances that negatively affect our health. We expose ourselves to toxins on a daily basis from sources like pollution, processed foods and pesticides, and when we don’t release these toxins, it’s reflected in our health and the way we feel throughout the day.
That’s why I’m such a fan of detox baths, and there are plenty of detox bath recipes to try.
Benefits
While there are many ways to detox — such as detox drinks, a liver cleanse, heavy metal detox, brain detox and more — one of the easiest and most relaxing is through a detox bath. The best part? Detox baths are insanely easy to make at home.
You’ll get all the benefits you’d find in a high-end spa bath at a fraction of the price and in the comfort of your own home.
Using essential oils, which provide antioxidant, antimicrobial and anti-inflammatory benefits, along with common household items like baking soda, Epsom salts and honey, can help flush impurities from the body by allowing it to sweat out toxins.
Ready to try your own detox bath? Try one of these homemade recipes.
They’ll help your body get back into tip-top shape in no time.
I recommend doing a bath for about 40 minutes to an hour for best results. The first 20 minutes will give your body time to remove toxins from your system while the last 20 to 40 minutes will allow you to absorb the minerals in the water and help you emerge from the bath feeling rejuvenated.
Make sure to use hot water — it’ll help you sweat out impurities.
Bonus: Make a homemade present out of each of these recipes. Store the ingredients in a mason jar, add a personalized label, and give to family and friends for a homemade gift they’ll love.
Detox Bath Recipes
1. DIY Bath Bomb Recipe with Wild Orange and Rose Oils
While those conventional bath bombs are loaded with chemicals, you can make your very own DIY bath bomb recipe easily at home. Even better, you can tailor the bath to your needs by using certain essential oils.
Here wild orange and rose essential oils are used. Wild orange is very uplifting to the body and mind, while rose essential oil can help with depression and anxiety.
2. DIY Eucalyptus and Vanilla Bath Salts
Especially perfect around the holiday season, these vanilla and bath salts are ridiculously easy to prepare and will leave you feeling relaxed, moisturized and at ease. This recipe uses baking soda in addition to eucalyptus oil and Epsom salts, helping relieve dry, itchy winter skin while detoxing.
Photo: DIY Eucalyptus and Vanilla Bath Salts / She Knows
3. Ginger Detox Bath + Body Scrub
If you’re looking for a new way to incorporate ginger into your routine, this detox bath is a great option. Not only does ginger help with indigestion and nausea, but it promotes regular digestion and helps alleviate bacterial infections.
This super simple scrub recipe requires only fresh ginger, Epsom salt and lemon, but it’s powerful — and leaves you with silky skin! Try sipping on ginger tea beforehand to really enhance the effects.
Photo: Ginger Detox Bath + Body Scrub / Hello Natural
4. Homemade Back Pain Bath Salts
The staple of detox baths, Epsom salts hold their own in nourishing benefits. Because of its high magnesium and sulfate contents, Epsom salt helps relieve sore muscles and fight inflammation.
Combined with a variety of essential oils — this recipe uses peppermint, eucalyptus, rosemary, lavender and cinnamon — and dried herbs and flowers, your body and mind will both thank you.
Photo: Back Pain Bath Salts / Om Nom Ally
5. Calming and Detoxing Bath Salts
This soothing mix combines dead sea salts (you can find these at natural health food stores, but if you can’t track it down, feel free to eliminate; you’ll still get great results); Epsom salts, which are loaded with magnesium; mineral-rich real salt; detoxifying bentonite clay; and lavender and frankincense essential oils.
Lavender will help calm and relax your mind and body, while frankincense helps ease anxiety. The result is a deliciously relaxing bath.
Photo: DIY Calming & Detoxing Bath Salts / Recipes to Nourish
6. Homemade Lemon Rosemary Bath Salts
Fresh rosemary, lemon essential oil and fresh lemon zest make these bath salts great-smelling to detox and refresh at the same time. Plus, rosemary oil has its own special powers: It helps improve memory, ease the digestive system, and relieve aches and pains in your muscles.
Photo: Homemade Lemon Rosemary Bath Salts / Tidy Mom
7. Homemade Oatmeal Bath
An oatmeal bath is great for you skin, and simply by adding some Epsom salt, it becomes a detoxifying bath to boot. To make a full-body oatmeal bath, use milk, raw honey, lavender, apple cider vinegar and avocado oil, in addition to the oatmeal and Epsom salt.
8. Relaxing Bath Recipe with Lavender Oil & Epsom Salt
In addition to soothing lavender, this detox bath recipe includes frankincense, myrrh, bergamot and chamomile oils as well. Combined with Epsom salt and bentonite clay, it’s a perfect relaxing combo that pulls away toxins and makes you feel fresh.
9. Lavender Eucalyptus Bath Soak
Eucalyptus oil has a variety of health benefits. It helps:
- fight colds, respiratory problems and the flu
- treat sinus and allergy symptoms
- and has antimicrobial properties
Enjoy its therapeutic benefits in this eucalyptus and lavender soak. Draw this bath on a cold day when you have the sniffles.
With just four ingredients, it’s perfect for an evening pick-me-up.
Photo: Lavender Eucalyptus Bath Soak / Primally Inspired
10. Simple DIY Almond Milk Bath
You likely have all the ingredients you need for this easy, soothing bath. The coconut oil will make this smell divine, and if you don’t have almond milk on hand, substitute coconut milk instead.
I love the idea of using peppermint oil and wild orange for a bath that will leave you feeling not only relaxed, but refreshed and ready to take on the day!
11. DIY Detox Foot Bath with Epsom Salts & Apple Cider Vinegar
If you aren’t looking for a full-body bath, a foot bath can be detoxifying and soothing all the same. This recipe calls for Epsom salts, Dead Sea salt, bentonite clay, ACV and your choice of essential oils. Better yet, it’s ready in just 10 minutes!
12. Homemade Bubble Bath with Lavender & Chamomile
The essential oil stars in this one are chamomile and lavender. Simply combine those with a blend of almond oil, an egg white, honey and Castile soap, plus some Epsom salts for the detox effects, and you have a quick and easy bubble bath to relax and detoxify.
13. DIY Foot Soak to Soothe Feet & Prevent Fungus
Another foot detox bath recipe that’s ready in just five quick minutes, this one is a mixture of Epsom and sea salt, baking soda, olive leaf extract and essential oils — namely peppermint, orange and tea tree.
14. Soothing Sitz Bath Recipe with Frankincense and Tea Tree Oils
Like many of the other detox bath recipes above, this one is a combo of salts and essential oils. In addition, this five-minute recipe utilizes the skin-soothing herb witch hazel.
15. Homemade Milk Bath
Milk baths have been shown to help soothe and hydrate skin, exfoliate skin, ease tension and stress and promote sleep, among several other benefits. By adding Epsom salt, like this recipe calls for, also makes it detoxifying.
Best of all, you can customize a milk bath with your choice of milk — coconut, oat, almond, goat, breast, cow or even buttermilk — and essential oils. This particular recipe opts for buttermilk, salts, baking soda, jojoba oil, and lavender and rose essential oils.
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Thank you for featuring my Back Pain Bath Salts recipes! Loving this round-up, I’ve got so many more detox bath recipes to try now :D
my favorite detox bath helps with the pain from lupus:
2 bottles of peroxide + 2 cups of epsom salts
If you have a large tub, use large bottles of peroxide; if tub is small, use smaller bottles but use the same 2 cups of epsom salts in hot water. Stay in for 20 minutes and don’t rinse off before toweling dry. Supposedly, this bath kills off mycoplasma which are the “bad guys” in lupus.
p.s. really enjoy your info, Dr. Axe!
Where can I find the instructions with the amounts of each ingredient to make these?
Each detox recipe should link out to the actual recipe with ingredient amounts and directions
My favorite detox bath is
1 cup baking soda
1 cup hydrogen peroxide
1 cup Apple Cider Vinegar
2 cups Epsom Salts
20 in tub
20 out of tub laying down
Drink plenty of water:-)
Dear Dr. Axe,
I just found you and your site. Thank you for the recipes and the super food information. I was unable to download the shopping list and thought that you would like to know this. I would like to have access to it, if possible. Merry Christmas! (I am an older RN who now works as a massage therapist. I am probably too much of a rebel and interested in natural things to work in allopathic medicine anymore. I realize that it does have its place. (If I break my leg or have a heart attack I will go to the hospital, etc.)
Sincerely,
Susan Hansen
Thanks for letting me know, if you haven’t gotten it yet, please email [email protected]
Also, welcome to our community! Great to have you :)