DIY Bubble Recipe

DIY Bubble Recipe

Make Your Own Super Bubbles

Have you ever wondered how bubbles are made? Bubbles are generally made with soap and water. The soap breaks the surface tension of the water to form a sort of elastic! Follow our recipe below to use the "secret ingredient" to making even bigger and stronger bubbles!

What You Need to Make Super Bubbles Recipe
  • Liquid dish soap/dishwashing liquid (Joy or blue Dawn brands work best. Try to find one that doesn't say "Ultra"
  • Warm water (distilled is best for bubble making)
  • Clean container with lid
  • Glycerin or light corn syrup
  • Bubble wand or straw (or make your own with our easy-to-follow instructions!)

How to Make Super Bubbles

  1. Measure 6 cups of water into your container, then pour 1 cup of dish soap into the water. 
  2. Slowly stir until the soap is mixed in, being careful to not let foam or bubbles form.
  3. Measure 1 tablespoon of glycerin or 1/4 cup of corn syrup and add it to your container.
  4. Stir the solution until it is well mixed. For best results, let your solution sit overnight. (Note: if you used "Ultra" dish soap, double the amount of glycerin or corn syrup).
  5. Dip your bubble wand into the mixture. Wait a few seconds, then BLOW!


How big of a bubble can you make? How many bubbles can you make in one breath?

What Happened to the Bubble Mixture?

The soap mixture on the outside of a bubble is made of three very thin layers: soap, water, and another layer of soap. This "sandwich" on the outside of a bubble is called soap film. A bubble pops when the water that is trapped between the layers of soap evaporates.

When you mixed the glycerin or corn syrup with the soap, it made it thicker. The thicker bubble keeps the water from evaporating as quickly making them last longer. It also makes them stronger, which means you can blow bigger bubbles!

Breaking the Tension

Breaking the Tension

How Does Dish Soap Break Surface Tension?

What You Need
  • 2 short glasses of water
  • A pie plate or tray
  • Liquid dish soap

How to Break Surface Tension

  1. Place the first glass of water in the center of the pie plate.
  2. Slowly, pour some water from the second glass into the first glass until it is very full and the water forms a dome above the rim of the first glass. Set the second glass of water aside.
  3. Carfully stick your finger straight down through the dome of the water in the full glass. Watch what happens, then remove your finger.
  4. Add a small drop of dish soap on the tip of your finger and repeat step 3. What happens this time?


What Happened to the Water?

Before we begin, let's define molecule. A molecule is two or more atoms bonded together. An atom is the smallest piece of a chemical element that is still that element.

In this activity, the water molecules are attracted to each other and stick together. At the top of the water, the molecules stick together very closely to make a force called surface tension. Surface tension is what caused the water to rise up above the rim of the glass in the experiment and form a dome instead of spilling over the side.

What happened when you put your soapy finger into the water? The soap broke the water's surface tension and some of the water molecules stopped sticking to each other causing them to be pushed out of the glass.

The force of surface tension also created bubbles. In plain water, the surface tension is strong and the water might make some bubbles but they will be small and won't last for very long because the other molecules in the water will pull on the bubbles and flatten them. When you made bubbles, you added soap to the wter. This made the water become flexible and appear elastic. This allowed the bubbles to hold their shape when you blew into your bubble wand.

Boost Your Bubble Game

Boost Your Bubble Game

Tips and Bubble Tricks

Bubble Trick #1
  • Bend a pipe cleaner into a square.
  • Wrap the ends around the sides of the square to hold it together
  • Using a second pipe cleaner, fold it in half and loop it around one sdie of the other pipe cleaner square. Twist the ends to make a handle.
  • Dip the bubble blower into your Homemade Bubble Solution. Slowly, blow a bubble through it until the bubble comes loose from the wand. What shape is the bubble?

Bubble Trick #2
  • Set a lid on your table with the lip facing up. Fill the lid with Homemade Bubble Solution.
  • Dip a straw into the container of Homemade Bubble Solution getting half of the straw completely wet.
  • Touch the straw to the lid and blow a bubble on the lid. Slowly, pull the straw all of the way out of the bubble.
  • Dip the pointed end of a pair of scissors (or any pointy object) into the container of Homemade Bubble Solution making sure it's completely wet.
  • Poke the pointy object through the wall of your bubble. Watch what happens.
  • Try this with other pointy objects, even your finger. Make sure that anything touching the bubble is wet with Homemade Bubble Solution. Can you pop the bubble?

Bubble Tricks Explained

Bubble Trick #1 Explained:

In this trick you created a square bubble wand. Even though it came out of a square, the bubble was still round! Bubbles are always in the shape of a circle when they detach and float through the air because the soap always tries to take up the least amount of space possible while keeping the same amount of air inside of the bubble. Since a circle takes up less space than a square, the bubble will remain round. Pretty cool, huh?

Bubble Trick #2 Explained:

You tried to pop a bubble with different pointy objects in this trick. Were you successful? You should have been able to push a pair of scissors through the wall of the bubble without popping it as long as there was bubble solution on the scissor blades. When something wet touches a bubble, it doesn't poke a hole in the wall of the bubble. It just slides through and the bubble forms right around it.

The Homemade Bubble Solution on your scissors filled the hole that would have been made. If you try poking dry scissors through the bubble, it will pop instantly!