Cheese Squishy 
Jellyfish Squishy 
Jumbo Lips Squishy 
Mummy Squishy 
Pop-Eye Rhino 
Salted Butter Stick 
Pink Lychee 
Slime squishies and slime stress balls, or squishies with slime inside, are sold under the same few words, but they are two different builds. In one, the slime is the toy: you open a cup or pod and handle it bare. In the other, a slime-like or gel filling is sealed inside a skin and you only ever touch the outside. That single difference decides whether it can dry out, whether it can end up in the carpet, and how you should store it.
Two things share the name slime squishy
On September 30, 2026 we searched the text of all 1,076 active listings in our shop for the word slime. Four listings use it, and they do not describe the same kind of toy.
| Build | Listing | What the listing says | Price |
|---|---|---|---|
| Open slime in a cup | Fluffy Cloud Dough Squishy Slime | scooped out of the cup, stretches into soft peaks, “packs back down” | $17.99 |
| Open slime in pods | Alien UFO Spaceship Squishy Slime Pods | pop the lid of each saucer; stretchy slime with a tiny alien inside; random colours | $17.99 |
| Slime in a lidded tube | Sparkle Star Squishy Tube | crystal stars in deep blue slime; “the lid seals tight between sessions” | $17.99 |
| Filling sealed in a shell | Realistic Waffle Squishy | a thick, creamy filling “that moves like slime” under a lifelike shell | $17.99 |
Only the last one is a slime stress ball in the sense most shoppers mean: something you squeeze without the filling touching your hand. The first three are slime you play with directly, packaged so it can go back in its container.
A lot of what gets called a slime stress ball is really a gel-filled one. Our listings that name a gel filling include the Fluid Potato Squishy (“a soft gel core under a stretchy skin”, $17.99), the Animal Gel Ball Squishy 3 Pack ($22.99) and the Glow Gel Ball Squishy 4 Pack ($29.99). None of these listings says what the gel is made of, so we can’t tell you whether it is chemically slime. What we can say is how it is built: it is sealed in.
Slime and gel filling are not the same material
Classic homemade slime is “made of water, PVA-based glue, and borax”, and the borax forms a borate that cross-links the glue’s polymer chains (Wikipedia, Flubber (material)). The same article calls slime a non-Newtonian fluid: it flows when you handle it gently and breaks apart when you pull or hit it hard. That is the stretch-then-snap behaviour people buy open slime for.
The original shop-bought Slime, launched in 1976, was different again: guar gum and sodium tetraborate, sold in a small plastic trash can (Wikipedia, Slime (toy)). So “slime” already covers more than one recipe, and a listing that says gel, jelly or fluid-filled tells you even less about the chemistry. Judge these toys by build, not by the word on the label.
Does a slime stress ball dry out?
Open slime can. The Slime (toy) article notes that leaving the slime outside its container can make it dry out or get stuck in fabric or hair. Because the recipe starts with water, every session with the lid off exposes it to air.
A filling sealed inside a skin is not exposed while the skin is intact. Its failure is different: a leak. A cut, a puncture or a split seam lets the filling out, and at that point you have a small open-slime spill on your hands. So the two builds need two different habits:
- Open slime (cups, pods, tubes): the risk is drying and mess, and the fix is the container.
- Sealed slime or gel balls: the risk is a torn skin, and the fix is keeping sharp things away from it.
How to store slime squishies so they don’t dry or leak
For open slime:
- Put it back in its own container after every session. The UFO pods, the cloud dough cup and the star tube all come with one. The star tube’s listing makes the point itself: the lid seals between sessions.
- Close the lid fully. A lid that is resting on top rather than snapped shut still lets air in.
- Play over a hard surface. Wikipedia’s Slime article describes the substance as “extremely difficult to remove from soft furnishings”, so a table or a tray is a better spot than a sofa, a bed or a rug.
- Keep it away from hair. The same article lists hair alongside fabric as a place slime gets stuck.
For sealed slime and gel balls:
- Keep keys, nails and pen tips away from the skin. A sealed ball can’t dry out, but one small hole starts a leak.
- Check the seam now and then. A damp or tacky patch on the outside is the first sign the skin has opened.
- Don’t pull it far past its normal shape. The skin is the only thing holding the filling in.
If a sealed toy does tear, our post on glue for a ripped squishy covers which repairs match which skin material. For cleaning the outside of a sealed squishy, see how to clean a squishy without wrecking it.
Making a slime stress ball versus buying one
When we checked the search results for “slime stress ball” on September 30, 2026, half of the top ten organic results were how-to pages and videos, with Instructables in first place and wikiHow among them; the other half were shops and marketplaces. The homemade method wikiHow describes pushes slime into a small balloon through a funnel, which gives you the sealed build with a balloon wall as the skin.
That tells you what the homemade version is: sealed slime in a thin wall. A bought gel ball has a skin made for squeezing; a balloon was made to hold air. We have not tested how long either lasts, so we can’t give you a lifespan for one or the other.
If one arrives leaking
A pod or ball that shows up split or leaking counts as arriving damaged. Damaged, incorrect or incomplete orders can be replaced or refunded, and the request needs to be made within 30 days of delivery; a photo of the damage speeds it up. The full terms are on our refund page. For the difference between a stress ball and a squishy more generally, see stress ball vs squishy.
FAQ
What is a slime stress ball?
It is a squeezable ball with a slime-like or gel filling sealed inside a skin, so the filling never touches your hand. That is different from open slime squishies such as slime in a cup or pod, where you handle the slime itself.
Do slime squishies dry out?
Open slime can dry out if it is left outside its container, because it is made with water. A sealed slime stress ball or gel ball does not dry out while its skin is intact; its problem is leaking if the skin is cut or split.
Is a gel stress ball the same as a stress ball with slime?
Not necessarily. Homemade slime is glue, water and borax, and the original shop-bought Slime used guar gum. None of our gel-filled listings names the ingredients, so treat gel and slime as two different fillings unless the listing says otherwise.
How do you store slime squishies?
Put open slime back in its own container with the lid fully closed after every session, and play over a hard surface. Keep sealed slime and gel balls away from sharp objects and check the seam for damp patches.
