Do I need pH neutral glue for bookbinding?

No. There, I’ve given you permission* to use that Elmers in your hand.

If not having "archival quality" adhesive is preventing you from starting, get over it! You can experiment with glue types on your 4th or 5th book.

But I’m afraid my book will be eaten alive by acid and turn to dust before my very eyes if I use school glue! Won’t the chemicals burn a hole through my spine like alien blood?

It will do no such thing. In fact, standard white PVA (yes, even the one with the cow on the bottle or the wood glue from the garage) is chemically very similar to the fancy stuff. It will remain "gluey" for years and years.

Two things that will happen: (1) In about 50 to 80 years, the glue might yellow slightly. (2) In about 100 years, it might become a little brittle.

Unless you are currently commissioned to restore a 14th-century illuminated manuscript for the Louvre, or you expect this specific grocery-list notebook to be studied by historians in the year 2300 as a pivotal artifact of Western Civilization, you are safe.

(Just in case, though, each of Bindery Library's kits does use pH neutral glue...)

But I’m a perfectionist, and I want my work to last forever!

In that case, you are going to make a perfect test prototype.

Just like with your paper, the book you are making right now is likely not an artifact that needs to survive the apocalypse. This one is for learning how much glue to put on a brush without making a mess.

It would be wasteful to use expensive, imported, pH-neutral jade adhesive on a prototype where you are mostly just trying not to glue your book to the table.

I just don’t trust this crusty old bottle I found.

That is a very different matter. If your glue is separated, smells weird, or has dry clumps in it, get new glue.

You should enjoy yourself during the process. Trying to spread lumpy glue is miserable. HOWEVER, the new bottle you pick up from the craft store still doesn’t have to be "Archival."

It’s for a gift. I don’t want to give them something that degrades.

I promise you, your recipient does not carry a pH testing pen in their pocket. They will cherish the thoughtfulness of the gift. By the time the acid content of the glue becomes a structural issue, you will have been binding books for decades and can make them a replacement copy with your master-level skills.

So there you have it. Standard White Glue is a perfectly good option. You have my permission* to use it!

*If you were NOT looking for reassurance that your book wouldn’t dissolve into dust and were instead looking for someone to give you an excuse to splurge on a tub of fancy professional bookbinding adhesive because it makes you feel like a legitimate artisan... then you definitely need it and you should definitely get some.