A chemical is any substance consisting of matter. This includes any liquid, solid, or gas. A chemical is any pure substance (an element) or any mixture (a solution, compound, or gas). They can either occur naturally or can be created artificially.

What Is Not a Chemical?

If anything made of matter is made up of chemicals, which means that only phenomena that aren’t made of matter are not chemicals: Energy is not a chemical. Light, heat, and sound are not chemicals—nor are thoughts, dreams, gravity, or magnetism.