2021 Toilet Paper Rankings: The Best Tissue For Your Tush
At Flush we’re all about your right to choose the best, most unique toilet paper in the world. So with a few more squares to spare this year than during the Great Toilet Paper Shortage of 2020, we felt it was the perfect time for a round-up of our top TP picks. Scroll on for the list of the softest toilet paper.
We’ve saved you the hassle of finding the absolute best, pillowy soft toilet paper that won’t fall apart in your hands by putting top brands through rigorous testing. We subjected our behinds to the best and worst in toilet paper today so you don’t have to. You’re welcome!
We laid the smack down on the downiest of toilet tissue brands and came up with a list of our faves. After all, when it comes to the only thing standing between you and your poo, you want the best blend of durability and softness.
So who are the winners?
The Best, Softest Toilet Paper Brands of 2021, Ranked
We put several toilet paper brands (including our own) through rigorous lab-testing and blinded user tests, as well as a thorough scouring and compilation of internet reviews. Our users rated the brands based on five criteria: softness, durability, safety for plumbing, lint factor, and how customizable the toilet paper is.
1. It’s Flush, obviously.
Enjoy the super snowy soft feel of the Arctic Boreal Forest with our Boreally Plush offering. We combine the latest in toilet paper technology with the oldest trees in the forest to provide the max cush for your tush with max customization.
Pros: fully customizable— choose your own forest! ultra-soft feel, durable, breaks down quickly, lint-free
Cons: we can’t think of any!
2. Other leading TP brands
There are some decent backup options that offer softness and durability, though less comfortable than Flush, probably because they don’t use single-origin trees from the world’s forests like we do.
Pros: comfortable, 3-ply for durability
Cons: no customization – they don’t let you choose the forest, enthusiastic wipers may find it tears, might not break down (avoid using if you have plumbing issues)
You’re probably thinking: ok, Flush. That’s great and all, but you did pick your own toilet paper in this smackdown. How do I know I can trust you?
Read on, Flushie. We invite you on a tour of our toilet paper world and our commitment to being the world’s best toilet paper.
How Do We Make Flush Toilet Paper?
The toilet paper-making process starts in the world’s forests. Simply put— there’s no TP without trees. The world’s best toilet papers come from the oldest forests on the planet. These trees make the ultra-plush fluffy softness we all need while providing enough strength not to fall apart in your hand.
Today, over 7 billion rolls of toilet paper are sold in the US every year. That’s a little over 141 rolls per person per year. Globally, companies transform 27,000 trees a day into toilet paper!
At Flush, we work directly with governments across the world to source the finest trees. The Canadian government has given us exclusive access to the Boreal to clear-cut single-origin white birch and Scotch pine.
The Tree-to-TP Process:
- The trees are stripped of bark using a machine that leaves as much wood as possible
- A wood chipper breaks the logs down into small bits
- The wood chips take a dive into a huge pressure cooker mixed with chemicals and water. After a few hours, the moisture has evaporated and what’s left is a mass of pulp, containing lignin, cellulose, and fibers. This pulp is the basis of all paper products.
- The wood pulp is thoroughly washed and bleached, using chlorine and other chemicals.
- The bleached pulp is then mixed with a massive amount of water— 99.5% water to 0.5% pulp. Large hoses spray the pulp-water mixture onto mesh screens to drain out the water.
- The pulp is pressed and then dried to a final moisture content of about 5%.
- After it’s dry, the paper is embossed. Basically, it’s stamped together (sometimes with a design embedded) to make it stronger.
- Metal blades scrape the paper off of the screens and send them into a press that perforates them into squares and then rolls them into huge cardboard tubes.
- The long tubes are cut into your standard toilet paper roll, and the rolls are packaged and sent to consumers around the world.
It takes about one tree to produce 200 rolls of toilet paper. If the average American uses 141 rolls a year, that means they’re flushing one standard 40-foot tall tree down the toilet every year!
How Did We Get Our Boreally Plush Toilet Paper So Soft and Durable?
There’s a lot that goes into making the best toilet paper in the world. We spent countless days and nights working with our manufacturer to hit on the right blend of old-growth wood and the latest in toilet tissue manufacturing techniques.
Old-growth wood fibers form the backbone of our toilet paper
The softest toilet paper starts with virgin trees. Flush seeks out the best, oldest trees in the forest to make the softest toilet tissue. Most companies use a ratio of 70% hardwood to 30% softwood. Hardwood trees include deciduous varieties such as oaks and maples. Softwood trees, like spruce, pine, and Douglas fir, provide strength and softness to toilet paper.
At Flush, we use 100% old-growth softwood. Why’s that? The long fibers of old-growth trees like Douglas fir are crucial to getting the right amount of softness into toilet paper. They’re easier to lay out and puff up for the right pillowy-soft feeling Americans love. No hardwood filler here!
For our luscious Boreally Plush toilet paper, we use only the best single-origin Scotch pine. This Boreal beauty offers the strength of a centuries-old tree and those long fibers that fluff for days.
Crêping makes toilet paper soft and stretchy
First, a large machine called a Yankee dryer removes excess moisture from the above-mentioned pulp. Then a crêpe blade scrapes the dried pulp, which adjusts the stretch and thickness of the tissue. Basically, the crêping makes the paper a little flexible but decreases the strength and thickness. This ensures that the paper will disintegrate after use.
Our top-of-the-line Hergen Yankee Smart Dryer ensures the best crêping due to the superior heat transfer and smooth rolling of the steel-constructed cylinders.
Bleaching achieves an ultra white look and further softens the toilet paper
Have you ever noticed that old books have yellowed pages? That’s caused by lignin, a polymer that provides rigidity and structure to trees.
Lignin also provides stiffness and structure to wood, which isn’t what we want in cushy-soft toilet paper. So we bleach the wood pulp using chlorine, which removes the lignin and whitens and softens the pulp.
No fancy techniques here. Just straight up chlorine bleach for the whitest of white and the softest of soft toilet paper.
A hot air treatment creates thousands of fluffy air pockets
The same Yankee machine that crepes toilet paper also blows hot air into the tissue. This 450-degree blow-dry helps puff the tissue up, creating air pockets that contribute to the softness of the paper.
The turbulence bars on our Hergen break up condensation on the pulp faster which means more evaporation, and ultimately more puff.
A final coating adds to the softness of the tissue
One final option for creating silky soft toilet paper is to coat the tissue. Common substances used are aloe, wax, or lotion. This coating makes the final feel smoother on the bottom. The downside is that coating toilet tissue can cause major drain problems.
At Flush, we opted out of coating our tissue. We think you’ll find the Boreally Plush TP is plenty soft while remaining septic-safe.
Flush’s Commitment to Choice and Quality Makes Us the Best, Softest Toilet Paper for 2021
At the end of the day, toilet paper preference is highly personal. But we can all agree that softness, durability, and customization rank highly on the quest for the best TP. And Flush provides all of these at competitive prices.
Click here to check out our toilet paper offerings— browse for your favorite forest and snag yourself some ultra-soft TP today!
