Our Beauty Lab Pros Swear By This $2 Shampoo to Clean Dirty, Greasy Hair

We updated this article in December 2022 to add more information about each featured product. Our original top-rated picks, selected by the Good Housekeeping Institute Beauty Lab, remain the same. We also added new editor and expert-loved picks.

Going days between washing your hair has become quite the conversation topic in recent years — remember when TikTokers started training their hair to be less greasy? Kim Kardashian even famously revealed she only washes her hair every five days. But despite all that, if you feel like you can’t go a day without washing (even with the help of dry shampoo) or often find yourself reaching for a clarifying shampoo for a deeper clean to cut through all the buildup, you may want to switch your go-to shampoo to a specially-formulated one for oily hair.

Shampoos for oily hair typically contain stronger surfactants — the ingredients that cleanse strands — to remove excess sebum (a.k.a. oil). "They are also usually made with very few conditioning ingredients compared to ones for dry, damaged hair," says GH Beauty Lab Chemist Danusia Wnek. The Good Housekeeping Institute Beauty Lab has tested many of the best shampoos on the market, evaluating multiple factors, including testing their cleansing ability in the Lab. Using the swatch-wash station, our scientists dispense precise amounts of each formula onto human hair swatches of various textures and types, which are then washed and rinsed in a standardized process. Finally, thousands of data points are quantified to identify the top performing shampoos.

From shampoo that targets both oily hair and dandruff or a dry scalp to drugstore, natural or sulfate-free shampoos for oily hair, our Good Housekeeping Institute Beauty Lab pros share some of their top-tested and trusted picks. Ahead, expert-loved shampoos for oily and greasy hair to help you get the cleanest (and best-looking!) strands ever.

Our top picks:

You can read more about how we choose the best shampoos for oily hair — plus everything you need to know to get the cleanest hair ever — at the end of this guide. Looking for more ways to improve your hair and scalp? Check out our guides to the best shampoo bars and scalp issues and how to treat them.