Which Hydrocarbons are soluble in water?

I once did an experiment that strongly supports Rob's answer: - in a sealed test tube. - a carefully built three layer system of carbon tetrachloride (bottom layer, non polar), water (middle layer, polar) and pentane (top layer, non polar),. - when left at rest in the dark. read more

Hydrocarbons do not dissolve in water because they are nonpolar compounds and water is a polar solvent. The general solubility rule is"like dissolves like," meaning polar solvents dissolve polar solutes and nonpolar solvents dissolve nonpolar solutes. read more

Hydrocarbons, because of their lack of polarity, are badly soluble in very polar water. But even though the enthalpy for dissolving a molecule is bad, there is still a little that still dissolves because of a gain in entropy. read more