We all know WD-40 works for making things move when they’re seized, but it also works better than anything for getting rid of all traces of adhesive left behind after peeling off stubborn stickers from things you buy.
It works on nearly all surfaces* – even coated paper! (just be sure not to leave it to soak into the paper.)
Instead of peeling slowly for ages with your fingernail or doing that peel-stick-peel-stick thing for half an hour, soak a paper towel in WD-40 and dab it on the offending sticker remains, wait a few minutes, then wipe off. (*if on coated paper, don’t let it soak, just gently rub it.) Clean the item afterwards to remove the oil left behind.
*it’s best to test a small area first if the object is painted or porous, and be careful with items meant to be food safe, because WD-40 is obviously not food safe.
This is something I wish more people knew, because soooo many manufacturers and retailers put stickers in the worst places and with near-permanent adhesive. I hope this helps you!
Alcohol is far more aggressive and will ruin many plastics, rubber, painted surfaces, finished wood, and coated paper.
Be really, really careful using alcohol on anything other than bare metal and some plastics. Many plastics and rubber will be made eternally sticky with alcohol (I made this mistake earlier today, which was why I posted this).
It is not a matter of more or less aggressive, some materials dissolve more easily in one type of solvent than in others. You can try, dissolving a teaspoon of salt in water is much easier than in oil. Have you ever eaten chocolate or drunk water while chewing bubblegum? Here the opposite happens, the fats in the chocolate dissolve the bubblegum rubber and make it softer while water doesn’t, it just chills it which makes it firmer.
Now plastic, rubber, or paints, finishings… can be many different things. IPA is safe to use on natural rubber while oils will make it swell and degrade, or even melt it. But most rubbers are synthetic, basically rubbery plastic. These plastics and other engineered materials can have all kind of different properties, while looking exactly the same. So the only thing you can do, other than research on that particular material and solvent, is trying it on a safer or hidden part of the thing.
In my experience: oil isn’t good on most rubbers, IPA is ok. For metals (iron, steel, mechanical parts…), contrary to you I usually advise to clean them with oil/grease, alcohol is appropriate if you don’t want it to be oily, only in rust resistant metals. Consumer/industrial products paints and finishings are usually fine with both ipa and oil if applied swiftly and dried quickly– acetone, kerosene, toluene… will strip them away probably. For wood, almost everything will fuck it up.