This list of Russian chemists includes the famous chemists and material scientists of the Russian Federation, the Soviet Union, the Russian Empire and other predecessor states of Russia.

Alphabetical list

A

• Aleksandr Arbuzov, discovered Arbuzov reaction.

B

• Alexander Baykov, an academician of the USSR Academy of Sciences.
• Ernest Beaux, inventor of Chanel No. 5, "the world's most legendary fragrance"
• Nikolay Beketov, inventor of aluminothermy, a founder of physical chemistry
• Friedrich Konrad Beilstein, proposed the Beilstein test for the detection of halogens, author of the Beilstein database in organic chemistry
• Boris Belousov, chemist and biophysicist, discoverer of Belousov–Zhabotinsky reaction, a classical example of non-equilibrium thermodynamics

  

• Alexander Borodin, chemist and composer, the author of the famous opera Prince Igor, discovered Borodin reaction, co-discovered Aldol reaction
• Aleksandr Butlerov, discovered hexamine, formaldehyde and formose reaction (the first synthesis of sugar), the first to incorporate double bonds into structural formulae, a founder of organic chemistry and the theory of chemical structure

C

• Dmitry Chernov, founder of modern metallography, discovered polymorphism in metals, built the iron-carbon phase diagram
• Aleksei Chichibabin, discovered Chichibabin pyridine synthesis, Bodroux–Chichibabin aldehyde synthesis and Chichibabin reaction
• Lev Chugaev, discoverer of Chugaev elimination in organic chemistry
• Karl Ernst Claus, chemist and botanist, discoverer of ruthenium

  

• Valeriy Chernyshev, chemist, honourable inventor of Russia, major specialist in nitrogen chemistry

D

• Nikolay Demyanov, discoverer of Demjanov rearrangement in organic chemistry
• Aleksandr Dianin, discoverer of Bisphenol A and Dianin's compound

F

• Constantin Fahlberg, inventor of saccharin, the first artificial sweetener
• Alexey Favorsky, discoverer of Favorskii rearrangement and Favorskii reaction in organic chemistry
• Alexander Frumkin, a founder of modern electrochemistry, author of the theory of electrode reactions
• Evgraf Fedorov, first to enumerate all of the 230 space groups of crystals, thus founding the modern crystallography

  

G

• Andre Geim, inventor of graphene, developer of gecko tape, Nobel Prize in Physics winner
• Igor Gorynin, inventor of weldable titanium alloys, high strength aluminium alloys, and many radiation-hardened steels

H

• Germain Henri Hess, (1802–1850), Swiss-born Russian chemist. Namesake of Hess's Law.
• Victor Henri (1872–1940), French physical chemist of Russian parents.

I

• Vladimir Ipatieff, inventor of Ipatieff bomb, a founder of petrochemistry
• Isidore, legendary inventor of the Russian vodka

J

• Boris Jacobi, re-discovered electroplating and initiated its practical usage

  

K

• Pyotr Kapitsa, discovered superfluidity while studying liquid helium, Nobel Prize in Physics winner
• Salambek Khadzhiyev, petrochemist who specialized in the production of low-pour, high-density petroleum fuels transformations of hydrocarbons on zeolite
• Morris Kharasch, inventor of anti-microbial compound thimerosal
• Gottlieb Kirchhoff, discoverer of glucose
• Ivan Knunyants, inventor of poly-caprolactam, founder of Soviet school of fluorocarbon's chemistry, a developer of Soviet chemical weapons

L

• Sergei Lebedev, inventor of polybutadiene, the first commercially viable synthetic rubber
• Mikhail Lomonosov, polymath, coined the term physical chemistry,

  

  re-discovered smalt and founded the scientific study of glass, proved that the phlogiston theory was false, the first to record the freezing of mercury
• Aleksandr Loran, inventor of fire fighting foam

M

• Vladimir Markovnikov, author of the Markovnikov's rule in organic chemistry, discoverer of naphthenes
• Yurii Sh. Matros, Russian-American chemist and chemical engineer, developer of Matros reactor, founder of Matros Technologies Inc.
• Dmitri Mendeleyev, invented the Periodic table of chemical elements, the first to predict the properties of elements yet to be discovered, invented pyrocollodion, developer of pipelines and a prominent researcher of vodka

  

• Nikolai Menshutkin, discoverer of Menshutkin reaction in organic chemistry

N

• Sergey Namyotkin, prominent researcher of terpenes, discoverer of Nametkin rearrangement
• Konstantin Novoselov, inventor of graphene, developer of gecko tape, Nobel Prize in Physics winner

O

• Anatoly V. Oleynik, researcher in photochemistry.

P

• Ilya Prigogine, researcher of dissipative structures, complex systems and irreversibility, Nobel Prize winner

R

• Sergey Reformatsky, discoverer of Reformatsky reaction in organic chemistry

S

• Nikolay Semyonov, chemical physicist, author of the chain reaction theory, Nobel Prize winner
• Carl Schmidt, analyzed the crystal structure of many biochemicals, proved that animal and plant cells are chemically similar

  

• Vladimir Shukhov, polymath, inventor of chemical cracking
• Mikhail Shultz, physical chemist and artist; one of the creators the glass electrode theory; author of several thermodynamic methods.

T

• Nikolai Trifonov, chemistry professor mentioned in The Gulag Archipelago
• Mikhail Tsvet, botanist, inventor of chromatography

V

• Victor Veselago, first researcher of materials with negative permittivity and permeability
• Vera Bogdanovskaia, first woman to have died in the cause of chemistry due to a laboratory explosion

W

• Paul Walden, discovered the Walden inversion and ethylammonium nitrate (the first room temperature ionic liquid)

Z

• Alexander Zaitsev, author of the Zaitsev's rule in organic chemistry
• Nikolai Zinin, discovered benzidine, co-discovered aniline, the first President of Russian Physical-Chemical Society
• Nikolay Zelinsky, inventor of activated charcoal gas mask in Europe during World War I, co-discoverer of Hell–Volhard–Zelinsky halogenation, a founder of petrochemistry
• Anatol Zhabotinsky, discoverer of Belousov–Zhabotinsky reaction, a classical example of non-equilibrium thermodynamics