If pressing the soap is the hardest thing you do at the sink, you are not doing it wrong and the pump is not broken. Here is what is actually going on, and five things that help — cheapest and easiest first, four of which have nothing to do with us.
The quickest fix: a foaming dispenser. It mixes soap with air, so it needs noticeably less force than a lotion pump. An empty foaming bottle is about two pounds and you dilute ordinary hand soap into it, roughly one part soap to four parts water. Try that before you buy anything else, including anything of ours.
On this page
Why a soap pump is hard to press
Three separate things are happening, and they are worth separating because they have different answers.
1. The spring
Every pump has a return spring that lifts the head back up. You compress it on every push. Spring strength varies a lot between brands — and between a new bottle and a nearly empty one, because the liquid has further to travel.
2. What is in the bottle
The liquid has to be forced up a narrow tube and through a small nozzle. Thick soap resists more than thin. Cold soap resists more than warm. The same pump in an unheated bathroom in February is genuinely harder to press than it was in July, which is not imagination.
3. The top — and this is the one people miss
The head of a pump is usually a flat disc somewhere between 15 and 25 mm across. That shape only really invites one grip: a fingertip, pressing down. So all of the force, whatever it is, goes through the tip of one finger and the small joints behind it.
Pressing with a flat palm is unremarkable. The identical push through one fingertip is a different experience entirely, because the load lands on the smallest and least-supported joints in the chain. If your difficulty is more pain than strength, this is usually why — and it means the fix is not necessarily a lighter pump.
Five things that help
In order of what costs least and works soonest.
1. Switch to a foaming pump
A foaming dispenser mixes soap with air on the way out, so it moves a much thinner liquid and needs noticeably less force. Empty foaming bottles cost a couple of pounds in most supermarkets and online, and you refill them with ordinary hand soap diluted roughly one part soap to four parts water — which also makes the soap last around four times longer.
This is the cheapest and most effective single change most people can make, and there is no version of this page that does not say so first.
2. Stop using a pump at all
Decant into a squeeze bottle you can press against the side of the basin, or into a wide pot with a flip lid that you scoop from. A pot needs no grip and no force whatsoever — just a hand going into it. It is less tidy and it is completely free.
3. A wall-mounted lever or elbow dispenser
The kind used in clinics and hospital scrub rooms. Two things make them easy: the bottle is fixed to the wall so it cannot slide away from you, and the arm is long, so pressing near the end gives you leverage the bottle itself never had. You can work one with a forearm or an elbow and never touch it with a hand.
They cost more than everything else here, need mounting to a wall, and stay in the room you fit them in. If the sink you struggle at is the one you use most, that trade may well be worth it.
4. Press with something bigger than a fingertip
Palm, heel of the hand, fist, forearm, elbow. These are not workarounds; they are how anybody presses something that is stiff. The catch is that a 20 mm plastic disc on a bottle that slides across the worktop does not let you. Two things have to be true: the surface has to be wide enough to take a palm, and the bottle has to be stable enough not to skate away when you lean on it.
You can get some of the way there for nothing — put the bottle in a corner, or on a non-slip mat, and use the heel of your hand. Our guide to pressing things without your fingers goes through every technique and where each one fails.
5. Try a different bottle
Pump stiffness varies more between brands than most people expect. If one bottle in the house is easier than another, that is real. Before spending anything, it is worth pressing a few in the shop — nobody minds — or trying whatever a friend has.
What PALM does, and what it does not
Since you may well have arrived here from a shop page, here is the honest version.
What it does. PALM is a small printed part that slides onto the pump head you already own and gives you a wider, flatter surface. That lets you press with your palm, your fist or your forearm instead of a fingertip pinch. It slides off again, moves between bottles, and costs £9.99.
What it does not do. It does not change the spring. A stiff pump is exactly as stiff afterwards. You are spreading the same force over a bigger area and a stronger part of your body, not reducing it. If the problem is that you cannot produce enough force at all, points 1 and 3 above are better answers than we are, and we would rather you spent two pounds on a foaming bottle than ten on us and were disappointed.
It does not fit everything. It comes in three shapes for the pump tops that are common, and there are heads it will not fit. The size guide has a printable gauge, and if you would rather just ask, send a photo of your pump from the side to [email protected] and I will tell you honestly whether it will work.
When it is worth mentioning to someone
Adapting around a difficulty and getting the difficulty looked at are not alternatives, and it is easy to spend a year doing only the first.
It is worth raising with a pharmacist or a GP if the trouble is new, getting worse, worse first thing in the morning, in both hands at once, or if you are dropping things you did not used to drop. None of that is a reason to panic and all of it is a reason to mention it.
Where to get proper help, most of it free
Nothing on this website is a substitute for any of the following, and all of it is better than a website.
- A pharmacist. No appointment, no referral, and they will talk to you about hand pain and about what is worth trying. The most under-used free advice in the country.
- Your GP. Particularly if the difficulty is new, getting worse, worse in the morning, or in both hands at once.
- An occupational therapist. This is the profession whose actual job is the problem this page is about — they look at your hands and your kitchen, not at a category page. In England you can ask your council for a needs assessment for equipment and adaptations, and much of what they recommend is provided at no cost. Ask your GP, or your council's adult social care team directly.
- Arthritis UK — the charity that was Versus Arthritis until its 2026 rebrand — and NRAS both run free helplines staffed by people who know this subject properly.
- Living Made Easy, run by the Disabled Living Foundation, is an impartial database of daily-living equipment. It lists products from everyone, including our competitors and including things that would replace PALM entirely. If you want to compare options without being sold to, start there.
PALM is a daily-living aid, not a medical device. It makes a soap pump easier to press. It does not treat, prevent or improve any condition, and nothing here is medical advice or a diagnosis. If your hands hurt, the people in the list above are the ones to ask.