AbstractLinalyl acetate is an unsaturated terpene commonly found in many essential oils, and it is easily oxidized by atmospheric oxygen to form hydroperoxides. The hydroperoxides of linalyl acetate are known to be sensitizers capable of causing allergic contact dermatitis. The standard iodometric titration methods (peroxide value [POV] methods) typically used to measure hydroperoxide levels in essential oils provide only a total level of all oxidizing species, including hydroperoxides. These POV methods are not capable of species differentiation and therefore may not reliably correlate well with the dermatological sensitizing potency of a particular sample. This laboratory has previously reported a high‐performance liquid chromatographic method using a post‐column chemiluminescent reaction to detect hydroperoxides derived from limonene and linalool. Herein we report that this same method is also useful for the detection of hydroperoxides derived from linalyl acetate.