You open your washer after the last load, and a stale smell greets you instead of that fresh-laundry scent. You may already have a cleaning routine in mind, but what should you put in the machine to get it clean? The answer might surprise you.
In short
- Baking soda and vinegar do not clean a washing machine effectively.
- Mixing them neutralizes both ingredients.
- Citric acid is the better choice for cleaning the drum.
- Use 4 tablespoons of citric acid in an empty drum, then run a cleaning cycle.
Why baking soda and vinegar fail
You have an empty washer, a box of baking soda, and a bottle of vinegar under the kitchen sink. You pour them in, see the fizz, and feel as though the machine is getting a deep clean. That bubbling looks busy, but it is the reason the mixture falls short.
“Baking soda and vinegar do nothing to clean a washing machine,” says Diego Fernández, a chemical engineer. Baking soda is alkaline and vinegar is acidic. When you mix them, they neutralize each other. The fizz shows that a reaction is happening, not that buildup inside your washer is being removed.
Using baking soda by itself does not solve the problem, either. Fernández says it does not remove limescale or the detergent residue that collects in a machine. Those are the deposits you are trying to tackle when you clean the washer, so a familiar pantry ingredient is not enough for this job.
Citric acid is the better choice
Fernández recommends citric acid instead. He says it is more acidic than vinegar, so it works better on buildup, while being less corrosive to the machine’s internal parts. You get a cleaning ingredient suited to the job without relying on the fizz of 2 ingredients canceling each other out.
His method is simple: put 4 tablespoons of citric acid directly into the empty drum. Then run the drum-cleaning cycle. A long wash cycle also works, ideally with hot water. There is no need to mix the powder with baking soda or vinegar first.
It is a small change to a familiar chore. Instead of adding something every time you wash clothes, you clean the machine itself during a separate, empty cycle. That puts the attention where detergent residue and limescale build up, rather than on the laundry you have already washed.
Make it a regular chore
Cleaning the washer is not a one-time task. Manufacturers recommend doing it every few months, with the timing depending on how often you use the machine. If yours runs often, it makes sense to keep that empty cleaning cycle in mind rather than waiting until the chore has slipped your memory.
The next time you reach for the baking soda and vinegar, remember what the bubbles are telling you. They show the 2 ingredients reacting with each other. For the washer, Fernández’s choice is citric acid in the empty drum, followed by a cleaning or long wash cycle.
The limit
Check your washer’s manufacturer instructions before using a cleaner, since machines differ. Vinegar alone can clean a washer, Fernández says, though it takes at least about 8 1/2 cups of cooking vinegar or about 4 1/4 cups of industrial vinegar. Regular vinegar use can also damage rubber seals and hoses in some models, potentially causing leaks.
