The company can brag that their formulation has a special blend of herbs and spices, but someone who wants to can obviously make their own special formulation and say that theirs is secret too.
More importantly, the proof of the pudding is in the eating. And there is nothing particularly special about WD-40's formulation anymore. WD-40 consistently performs worse than nearly any other available penetrating oil. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xUEob2oAKVs It's a terrible long term lubricant (because it's designed to evaporate, it actually concentrates gunk and grime).
WD-40 themselves have come out with improved "Specialist" formulations that mostly just copy other, superior products.
WD-40 works great for its intended purpose. The problem is that they've marketed it the way that the dad from My Big Fat Greek Wedding raves about Windex. It's not a good lubricant, as many people have noted, as it evaporates and concentrates contaminants. It's not a good protective coating because again, it evaporates. What it is good at is drying off metal parts, and as a mediocre and cheap rust remover.
If I accidentally leave some pliers or my socket set out in the rain, I soak them with WD-40, scrub off the rust with a wire brush, and wipe off the excess with a towel. It does a decent job of preventing further damage. If I have some rusty parts sometimes I'll throw them in a glass jar, soak 'em with WD-40, shake them around, let them sit for a day or so, and then scrub them with a wire brush. Gets most of the rust off.
If you want a lubricant, just buy the correct one for the job. Silicone oil, lithium grease, graphite, all will do a better job in the long run than WD-40 if you use them in their intended role. My goto "universal lube" personally is "Super Lube", a PTFE-based lubricant which is NSF rated for incidental contact with food and dielectric.
I'd be very interested to know how they produce it if the formula is so tightly held. At some point people need to be purchasing the ingredients and mixing them together.
As an alternative for better lubrication of two-metals-rubbing together (door hinges, simple tools, etc) I use Tri-Flow because it has PTFE that stays as a white powder. If you have a stuck bolt, PBBlaster wicks into the threads better. And if you have sticker glue, use GooGone.
I think that outside of narrow engineering circles, most use of lubrication is based on a mixture of trial-and-error, folklore, and marketing. One reason is that most lubrication needs are actually quite low performance, and you could probably use practically anything. People use WD-40 because they have it around, and this adds to the list of its uses.
It's essentially a mixture of mineral spirits and oil. Used as a lubricant, the mineral spirits evaporate, leaving the oil behind. It might be enough oil to keep a mechanism working for a while, or it might not be.
It's a "water displacer." Oil displaces water, who knew?
It comes in a spray can, so you can get it into things like a bike shift lever. And you can get the over-spray on things like the garage floor.
Bicyclists tend to get really worked up about WD-40.
I really don't get how most comments don't get that "wd" stands for "water displacement". I buy and use it not for lubrication but for eliminating moisture and cleaning. What would you use in a distributor? Motor oil or penetrit?
Maybe I'm just a fuddy-duddy but my eyes about rolled out of my head reading this. The same article could probably be written about multiple companies and it'd be just as uninteresting. It's my understanding that there isn't anything special about WD-40, as in alternatives exist that can work just as well. Now, I think WD-40 is a brand name that can be trusted to work well more often than most alternatives but that is more about process than recipe (I would think).
I've long thought that every restaurant/bakery/etc could publish their full internal cookbooks and not see a drop in sales. People don't buy it because they are incapable (or think they are) of making something, they do it because it's faster, they don't have all the ingredients, they don't have the time, they don't have the skill, the list goes on. I bet I could give the instructions, the equipment, and the ingredients to people and they'd still choose to buy it. Sure, you might lose a tiny bit of sales to "home bakers" [0] but I think it'd be eclipsed by people that saw/read/heard about the cookbook (maybe never even saw it) and that was enough "marketing" to get them in the door.
I've always found "secret knowledge" to be a little silly. A sort of, security through obscurity. Knowing a recipe doesn't make you special, being able to build/run a company around it and make it consistently good does.
[0] I love to cook, I sometimes like making copy-cat recipes. I cannot think of a copy-cat recipe that I made more than 2-3 times. While it's fun to do, it's never exactly the same, and I also believe that "food tastes better when someone else makes it". Also it can sometimes be just-as or more expensive to make some food items due to needing a bunch of ingredients that they don't sell in exactly the quantity the recipe calls for.
A germane chemistry story but not about lubricants. I grew up in Atlanta. My mom was a scientific librarian and for a while she worked in the chemistry department at Coca-Cola. She worked with the guys who knew the syrup secret formula ("7x"). She told me she had to burn her carbons (this was before duplicating machines). She could take shorthand and perfectly type organic chemistry expressions using just a regular typewriter; truly lost skills, anymore.
FYI: none of the "penetrating oils" actually work. They don't wick into threads on stuck fasteners. Heat is the only thing that really works. Causes expansion of the metal followed by shrinking which mechanically disrupts the oxide jamming whatever is stuck.
WD-40 is great for machining aluminum, cleaning grease/other oils, and if you want a mild temporary lubricant not something that will make a massive mess or irritate your skin.
How is it legal to have a chemical product on the market with not publicly disclosed contents in 2026?
There is no scarcity of the products. Capital, means of production, labor and innovation are all abundant now.
The most valuable thing now is access to customers. We should demand a lot from the business for the privilege of having access to customers. A lot more than we do now.
A bakery I used to go to had highly excellent marzipan puff pastry. When the bakery closed because the master baker who owned it went into retirement, I asked for the recipe so I might be able to replicate the enjoyment. The answer was that he will take this recipe to his grave. I'd call that a secret.
I thought it was a good lawnmower carb boost to start one, until I used the real "start your lawnmower with one spray" and then I realised, WD40 was possibly just a placebo and gave my tired pull arm time to recover.
It requires a special key, nondisclosure agreements, passage through a bank vault and, typically, an executive title. The drinks don’t flow, members don’t rub elbows with notable people and chefs aren’t filling plates with tasty bites. The only perk is knowing the secrets of the world’s most famous lubricant. And yet, for those in the know, there’s no greater privilege.
In the PNW at least there's a cult application of WD-40 as a fish attractant (applied to lures). Not sure if anyone's done any sort of controlled trial but lots of folks have sworn by it for decades.
People who know the formula for WD-40
(wsj.com)205 points by fortran77 26 January 2026 | 311 comments
Comments
The actual ingredients are literally on the safety data sheet: https://files.wd40.com/pdf/sds/mup/wd-40-multi-use-product-a...
The company can brag that their formulation has a special blend of herbs and spices, but someone who wants to can obviously make their own special formulation and say that theirs is secret too.
More importantly, the proof of the pudding is in the eating. And there is nothing particularly special about WD-40's formulation anymore. WD-40 consistently performs worse than nearly any other available penetrating oil. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xUEob2oAKVs It's a terrible long term lubricant (because it's designed to evaporate, it actually concentrates gunk and grime).
WD-40 themselves have come out with improved "Specialist" formulations that mostly just copy other, superior products.
If I accidentally leave some pliers or my socket set out in the rain, I soak them with WD-40, scrub off the rust with a wire brush, and wipe off the excess with a towel. It does a decent job of preventing further damage. If I have some rusty parts sometimes I'll throw them in a glass jar, soak 'em with WD-40, shake them around, let them sit for a day or so, and then scrub them with a wire brush. Gets most of the rust off.
If you want a lubricant, just buy the correct one for the job. Silicone oil, lithium grease, graphite, all will do a better job in the long run than WD-40 if you use them in their intended role. My goto "universal lube" personally is "Super Lube", a PTFE-based lubricant which is NSF rated for incidental contact with food and dielectric.
It's essentially a mixture of mineral spirits and oil. Used as a lubricant, the mineral spirits evaporate, leaving the oil behind. It might be enough oil to keep a mechanism working for a while, or it might not be.
It's a "water displacer." Oil displaces water, who knew?
It comes in a spray can, so you can get it into things like a bike shift lever. And you can get the over-spray on things like the garage floor.
Bicyclists tend to get really worked up about WD-40.
Unless they have own refining facility, and it is more like a recipe of temperatures/pressures.
I've long thought that every restaurant/bakery/etc could publish their full internal cookbooks and not see a drop in sales. People don't buy it because they are incapable (or think they are) of making something, they do it because it's faster, they don't have all the ingredients, they don't have the time, they don't have the skill, the list goes on. I bet I could give the instructions, the equipment, and the ingredients to people and they'd still choose to buy it. Sure, you might lose a tiny bit of sales to "home bakers" [0] but I think it'd be eclipsed by people that saw/read/heard about the cookbook (maybe never even saw it) and that was enough "marketing" to get them in the door.
I've always found "secret knowledge" to be a little silly. A sort of, security through obscurity. Knowing a recipe doesn't make you special, being able to build/run a company around it and make it consistently good does.
[0] I love to cook, I sometimes like making copy-cat recipes. I cannot think of a copy-cat recipe that I made more than 2-3 times. While it's fun to do, it's never exactly the same, and I also believe that "food tastes better when someone else makes it". Also it can sometimes be just-as or more expensive to make some food items due to needing a bunch of ingredients that they don't sell in exactly the quantity the recipe calls for.
Mineral oil
Decane
Nonane
Tridecane and Undecane
Tetradecane
Dimethyl Naphthalene
Cyclohexane
Carbon Dioxide"
https://www.wired.com/2009/04/st-whatsinside-6/
Relevant video on someone reverse engineering the formula for coca cola
WD-40 is great for machining aluminum, cleaning grease/other oils, and if you want a mild temporary lubricant not something that will make a massive mess or irritate your skin.
There is no scarcity of the products. Capital, means of production, labor and innovation are all abundant now.
The most valuable thing now is access to customers. We should demand a lot from the business for the privilege of having access to customers. A lot more than we do now.
I think it’s okay to share the gift link as canonical. It’s the usual practice of sharing articles from LWN here, for example.
Fuck me, these people get paid millions just for existing and they don’t have a clue what they’re doing.
The whole point of “the 40th formula” and this nonsense is fooling customers to keep buying a commodity
In other news, WD-40 is not a lubricant.
Rust prevention: marginal. Use proper coatings or a flash rust prevention compound that sticks around.
Penetrating oil: terrible. Use 1:1 acetone:ATF instead.
Toxicity: terrible. It's petroleum distillates.
It's popular only because of missile hype and marketing, but that doesn't mean it's any good.
Are you absolutely, positively kidding me?