Both are sold as unrefined salt, and that's where the resemblance ends. One comes from the Atlantic, gray and moist to the touch. The other comes from a closed lake in the Middle East and is white, dry, and fine-grained. If you have both in front of you and don't know which one to choose, this will clarify it for you.
Where each one comes from
Celtic sea salt is hand-harvested in clay salt pans along the Atlantic. Seawater enters shallow basins, the sun and wind do the work, and the salt worker removes the crystals with a wooden tool. This contact with the clay at the bottom is what gives it its gray tone and the moisture it never quite loses. If you're only interested in this one, we have an entire guide dedicated to Celtic salt.
Dead Sea salt doesn't need salt pans. The Dead Sea is not a sea: it's a closed lake more than 400 meters below sea level, with no outlet to the ocean, and water has been evaporating from it for thousands of years. The salt crystallizes by itself on the shore. It is collected, dried, and ground.
Two different processes, one common point: in neither of them is anything refined. No one bleaches the salt or adds an anti-caking agent to make it flow freely from the salt shaker.
How to distinguish them at a glance
Gray versus white. Moist versus dry. Irregular grain versus fine and even grain.
Celtic salt clumps together and forms lumps. This is not a defect: it's seawater retained between the crystals. Many people end up taking it out of the salt shaker and putting it in a bowl to pick it up with their fingers, which is also a way to control how much you add.
The Dead Sea salt we have is ground to 0.1 mm, so it behaves like everyday fine salt: it falls from the salt shaker, dissolves instantly, and spreads without thought.
Which one is healthier?
Neither of them. And anyone who tells you otherwise is trying to sell you something.
Both are salt, and the sodium content is practically the same in both and in supermarket salt. The World Health Organization recommends not exceeding 5 grams of salt per day, which is roughly a level teaspoon, including the salt already present in bread, cheese, and preserves. This recommendation applies to any salt, including these.
What does change is what has been done to it before it reaches your kitchen. Ordinary table salt is refined until it is almost pure sodium chloride and anti-caking agents are added. An unrefined salt retains what the water brought with it and comes with only one ingredient on the label. If you buy one of these, buy it for that reason, not because someone promised you it lowers blood pressure.
Which one to use in cooking
Celtic salt works well where you want to taste it. On a tomato with oil, on top of meat freshly removed from the heat, on grilled fish. The irregular crystals crunch and dissolve slowly, and that burst of flavor is half a chef's trick.
Dead Sea salt is for working with. Being fine, it dissolves quickly, so it's good for pasta water, for stews, for salting dough, or for finishing a dish without noticeable crystals. Cupplement, which packages it, suggests a tablespoon spread over the food.
If you cook daily and only want one, stick with the fine one. If you like to finish the dish at the table, the Celtic one.
Outside the kitchen
Here, Dead Sea salt plays at home. It has been used in baths for decades: the manufacturer recommends one or two cups in a hot bath, stirring until dissolved, and soaking for fifteen to twenty minutes. One kilo makes about four baths. It is also used in a foot basin.
Celtic salt is also used in homemade scrubs and immersion baths, mixed with a vegetable oil. But its natural place is the table, and for hot water, the fine one dissolves much better.
What to look for on the label before paying
Three things, and you'll have it in less than a minute.
The ingredient list. If it's more than one line long, something has been added. An unrefined salt just says "salt." Anti-caking agents appear as E-535, E-536, or E-554, and if they're there, they're there.
Who analyzes it. The manufacturer saying their product is pure doesn't mean much. A certified independent laboratory saying so, especially within the European Union, is a different conversation.
The format. 250g bags are very expensive per kilo. If the salt will last you months and doesn't expire, the whole kilo is worth it.
So, which one should I get?
If you're looking for a salt to finish dishes, with texture and that noticeable mineral hint, the 1 kg Celtic sea salt is for you. You can find more details about it in its complete guide.
If you want a fine salt for everyday use, which you can also put in the bath on a Sunday afternoon, check out the 1 kg fine Dead Sea salt.
And if you get both, that's not a bad idea either: they serve different purposes and neither expires. You can find them together in unrefined natural salts.
Quick questions
Can Dead Sea salt be eaten?
The one we sell is packaged by Cupplement with instructions to use it in food, and it has only one ingredient. Scented or colored bath salts also sold as "Dead Sea" are a different thing and those should not be used in food: always check the ingredient list.
Why is Celtic salt moist?
Because it retains seawater between the crystals. This is normal for hand-harvested salt that is not machine-dried. It has not gone bad.
Which one is saltier?
By equal weight, almost the same. By equal spoonful, fine salt is saltier because more fits in the same volume. If you switch from one to the other, use less at first and taste.
Do they expire?
Salt does not spoil. The only thing that happens over time is that it absorbs moisture, so store them in a dry place with the container tightly closed.
Is any salt suitable for bathing?
For bathing, it's important that it doesn't have anything added. If the label mentions fragrance or colorant, it's no longer just salt.