Three commercial exfoliating reagents, product A (main components: citric acid and vitamin C), B (herb) and C (nicotinamide), were used to study their exfoliation effect on abalone, Haliotis discus hannai from the substrate. The exfoliating reagents A, B, C and oxytetracycline (OTC, control) of 6-31.25 g/L and 12-37.5 g/L exfoliated 81.2-84.8% and 90.3-95% of abalone, respectively. Post-treatment recovery time for the abalone was similar for all the reagents except product C. Recovery period for the abalone immersed in OTC for 5-20 second was slightly shorter than the reagents A, B and C; however, no mortality was observed in any group except with the reagents B (concentration: 20 g/L, immersion time: 5 sec) and C (12 g/L, 10 and 20 sec) that showed negligible mortality of 3.3%. Higher concentration and longer treatment with the reagents resulted in longer recovery time of the detached abalone. Although abalone exposed to the reagents needs slightly longer time to recover than that to OTC, the exfoliation effect is much similar. These results indicate that the commercial exfoliating reagents can replace OTC to detach abalone, though they need to be cautiously handled.