Lime
Sharp, juicy citrus peel with a tart, slightly bitter green freshness.
You may know it from Freshly grated lime zest
Where it comes from
Pressed or distilled from lime peel; also recreated with aroma chemicals.
Worth knowing
It means the citrus fruit, not calcium lime used in building materials.
IFRA rules
IFRA restricts Lime oil expressed to 0.7% in fine fragrance, citing phototoxicity.
From the IFRA Standards, 51st Amendment. A perfume that lists this note may use a synthetic version the Standard does not cover.
About lime
Most citrus oils are cold pressed from the peel. Lime oil is usually steam distilled instead, and the two methods give different materials. One producer compares expressed key-lime oil to key lime pie, and distilled oil to a lime lollipop or the lime in a lemon-lime soda. Cold-pressed oil keeps the fresh, green top notes and the bitterness of the peel. The distilled oil is paler, sweeter and less fresh, with a cooked edge.
Key lime is a natural hybrid of a wild papeda and citron. It began in Southeast Asia and travelled west through the Middle East and Spain to the Caribbean. Persian limes are grown and exported mostly from Mexico, and a supplier calls Mexican Key lime the highest-quality source, sharp and complex. Peru sells a distilled Key-lime oil too; another supplier puts the country's lime crop at about 400,000 tonnes a year, with roughly half used at home.
Distilled oil is dominated by gamma- and alpha-terpineol, which gives it a softer, rounder character than the pressed kind. Limonene, pinene and citral are in the oil as well. One flavour-industry guide gives citral at 5 to 10% in Key lime oil and 2 to 5% in Persian lime oil. Perfumery sources describe the smell as sharper than lemon, greener, with a metallic bite.
Natural lime oil is short-lived on skin, according to the blog Fragrenza, so perfumers reach for isolated or synthesized citral, limonene and linalool to build or boost a lime accord. The same blog points to Acqua di Gio, Cool Water and Jo Malone Lime Basil & Mandarin as fragrances where lime stands out. The IFRA rules above apply to lime oil. Outside perfume, it is a popular flavour in ginger ale and cola.
Accords it shows up in
How many of the fragrances listing Lime in our catalogue also carry each accord. We counted this ourselves.
Often paired with
The notes that appear next to Lime most often in our catalogue.
Well-known fragrances with Lime
Fragrances that list it in their notes, most-rated first.
Houses that use it most
Ranked by how many of their well-known fragrances list Lime.