Natural Tick Repellent: What Works and How to Use It
The short answer
- Ticks don’t fly. They wait on grass and brush, grab on as you pass and crawl until they settle. So the routine is different from mosquitoes.
- Four parts: treated clothing, repellent on exposed skin with extra attention low down, a tick check when you come in, and ten minutes in a hot dryer.
- Most plant oils do little against ticks. Geraniol is one of the few with more than an hour of protection in testing.
Most of the ticks I hear about weren’t picked up on a hike. They came from the garden, the dog walk, the strip of long grass at the edge of the park. Ticks live in grassy, brushy and wooded places, and they ride in on animals, so the backyard counts.1
Because a tick crawls instead of flying, where you put the repellent matters more than it does for mosquitoes, and what you do when you get home matters as much as the repellent. Here’s the routine we use.
Which plant oils actually work on ticks
Most plant oils that do something against mosquitoes do nothing against ticks. In a 2023 skin test of 20 plant-based ingredients, only four kept blacklegged ticks off for more than an hour, and geraniol was one of them.2 A 2024 CDC review of every minimum-risk ingredient with tick data landed in the same place.3
How long each plant oil keeps ticks off
Geraniol1–2 hr
Cinnamon oil1–2 hr
Clove oil1–2 hr
Thyme10 min–1 hr
Peppermint10 min–1 hr
Lemongrass10 min–1 hr
Citronella10 min–1 hr
Cedarwood10 min–1 hr
Geranium oil10 min–1 hr
Rosemaryunder 10 min
Soybean oilunder 10 min
Complete protection time against blacklegged ticks on skin, each ingredient at 10% in a lotion. The solid bar is the low end of the published range, the lighter bar the high end (Eisen 2024).
Clove and cinnamon oils are known for being harsh on skin, which leaves geraniol as the standout plant-based option. Research on mosquitoes found its protection jumps sharply between 4% and 5%, so look for geraniol named on the label with its percentage, not a blend of unnamed oils.4
Every geraniol study on BugRepellent.GuideHow the other natural repellents compareEverything you need to know about geraniol
BugRepellent.Guide is a repellent research site run by the Notch team.
The tick routine
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Dress for it
Long pants tucked into socks make a tick crawl a long way over fabric before it finds skin. For clothing and gear, the CDC suggests products with 0.5% permethrin, which go on fabric, never skin.1
Then stay on the path: walk the center of trails and skip the tall grass and leaf litter when you can.1
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Repellent on the skin, low first
Apply before you head out, not once you’re already in the grass. Cover all exposed skin, starting with ankles, lower legs and the backs of your knees, because that’s where a tick climbs aboard.
Reapply as the label directs. Plant-based actives evaporate over time; for Notch, that’s every hour for maximum protection.
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Check when you come in
Do a full-body check with a mirror: under your arms, in and around your ears, inside your belly button, behind your knees, in your hair, between your legs and around your waist. Shower within two hours of coming indoors.1
Check the dog, the jackets and the daypacks too. Ticks ride in on gear and attach to someone later. Dogs and cats need their own tick preventive, not a human repellent.
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Ten minutes in a hot dryer
Toss dry clothes in the dryer on high for ten minutes to kill anything that hitched a ride. Damp clothes may need longer.1
A natural repellent made for ticks and mosquitoes
Notch Nourish + Defend Botanical Insect Repellent is made with 5% geraniol, in a hydrating lotion that’s easy to spread over ankles, legs and anywhere else that’s exposed. It repels mosquitoes and ticks, and for maximum protection, you reapply every hour. It’s a good fit for the everyday places ticks turn up: the garden, the dog walk, the backyard.
References
- Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Preventing tick bites.
- Luker HA, et al. Repellent efficacy of 20 essential oils on Aedes aegypti mosquitoes and Ixodes scapularis ticks in contact-repellency assays. Scientific Reports, 2023. Ingredients tested at 10% in a lotion.
- Eisen L. Efficacy of unregulated minimum risk products to kill and repel ticks. Emerging Infectious Diseases, 2024. Ingredients compared at 10%.
- Lopez AD, et al. Repellency of essential oils and plant-derived compounds against Aedes aegypti mosquitoes. Insects, 2025.
