Natural All-Purpose Cleaner (That Works!)

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Once upon a time, I was a single college student in a one-room dorm and it didn’t take much to keep it clean. Fast forward a few years and I had a few kids who weren’t so neat and orderly! I needed an all-purpose cleaner that worked, STAT!

A Natural Way to Clean

As a mom, I soon learned that child is a synonym for “maker of messes while being absolutely adorable.” It’s amazing how fast toddlers can make messes.

I also realized kids put everything in their mouths. So I looked for natural cleaning options that could stand up to toddler messes but wouldn’t accidentally poison them if (when) they licked the floor.

I learned about all the harsh chemicals in most commercial household cleaning products and found I could make healthier ones at home. One of the hardest ones to create was a natural all-purpose cleaner. I finally found one that works well (and my kids have tested it hard!). I’ve calculated that over the years I’ve saved over $200 making this myself!

It has the cleaning power of plant-based essential oils to help with grime, soap scum, and everyday dirt. It also helps to deodorize surfaces without bleach or other harsh cleaners.

Why Make Your Own Natural Cleaner?

Short answer: It takes less than a minute, saves money, and works better!

This all-purpose cleaner is so simple to make that my kids are now old enough to make it on their own!  It’s eco-friendly and free of the toxins found in many conventional household cleaners. Plus you can customize this surface cleaner to your taste by adding your favorite essential oils.

Important note: There is some debate about borax and if it is safe in homemade cleaners. I personally feel it’s safe to use and much safer than most cleaning products. This article has a good breakdown of the information and my thoughts on it.

Don’t agree? Just leave it out or use a natural concentrated cleaner like Branch Basics in place of this recipe.

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4.72 from 7 votes

Natural All-Purpose Cleaner (That Works!)

This natural cleaner is easy to put together and great for hard surfaces around the house.
Prep Time4 minutes
Total Time4 minutes
Yield: 16 ounces
Author: Katie Wells

Materials

Instructions

  • Place borax, washing soda, essential oils, and soap in a spray bottle (preferably glass).
  • Add distilled water until the bottle is almost full. Be sure to leave room for the sprayer. Distilled water is best, but any water that has been boiled will work.
  • Screw on the lid and shake well. Use as needed. I use it as a bathroom cleaner, floor pre-treater, kitchen cleaner, and on toys.

Notes

Store your cleaner away from direct light and heat. It should last for about 3 months when stored properly. 

All-Purpose Cleaner FAQs:

Worried about the chemistry of making your own cleaners? Want to make a substitution? These are the most commonly asked questions about my homemade all-purpose cleaner:

Is Washing Soda the Same as Baking Soda?

No, they’re similar but with some important differences. Baking soda is sodium bicarbonate and washing soda is just sodium carbonate. Washing soda is stronger and more effective in this recipe (but still non-toxic). Don’t have it? Make your own with washing soda using this tutorial.

Is This a Disinfectant?

Technically no, but most home messes don’t need a disinfectant. And using too many disinfectants can cause problems as well. I wouldn’t use this cleaning agent on food-related messes, especially raw meat. However, it’s a great multi-surface cleaner for hard household surfaces like countertops, floors, and cabinets. The essential oils do have mild disinfectant properties in some studies. I’d stick to hydrogen peroxide or food-grade or rubbing alcohol and soap/water to disinfect raw meat messes.

Why Isn’t There Vinegar in this Recipe?

Vinegar isn’t the cleaning powerhouse it’s made out to be. It does have its uses, like for streak-free windows, but isn’t an effective degreaser or disinfectant. Also, vinegar and washing soda (acid and base) will cancel each other out. This whole recipe would be less effective if vinegar was added.

Want to use vinegar in natural cleaning? Save your fresh lemon and orange peels, pour white vinegar over them, and leave for a few weeks. This makes a great citrus-infused vinegar that cleans windows and most smooth surfaces.

Vinegar also un-saponifies the soap in this recipe, leaving a nasty stringy mess. Use vinegar if you want to, just don’t use it in this recipe!

Is Borax Dangerous?

There’s a lot of debate about this. I talk about my opinion here, but I generally feel safe using it on nonfood surfaces. If you aren’t comfortable using it, just omit or use witch hazel or food-grade alcohol in its place.

If you still aren’t a fan of borax and want a completely natural alternative that works at least as well as this recipe, I recommend Branch Basics concentrate.

Does This Actually Work?

Yep. It works really well. But don’t take my word for it… a reader Anne commented:

Ok, I’m a little slow, just found this. Good news – the gunk on the bathroom floor that no other cleaner in the world could get rid of (I have tried at least a dozen over the years) is now gone. I sprayed this, let it soak about 5 minutes and wiped it up with a microfiber cloth. I am astounded! Thanks so much for this!

I Don’t Like Lemon/Lavender/Orange Oil. Can I Use a Different One?

No way. Just kidding!

Use whatever scent you like in this recipe. Peppermint is lovely too and geranium has a mild bug-repelling property if you have flies in the kitchen. Tea tree is another green cleaning favorite for cleaning solutions. You can even omit the oils entirely for an unscented version.

How Long Does This Last?

I haven’t had this last longer than 3 months because I use it up in less time than that. I can vouch for its shelf life for at least three months though.

Does This Need to Be Stored in Glass?

I’m not a fan of plastic and don’t feel it’s good for the environment (or the body). I try not to buy it even for cleaning. Plus, if you use essential oils, it’s important to store them in glass as they can break down certain plastics over time. Glass is always a good idea!

More DIY Natural Cleaning Products

Here are more healthy cleaning recipes with simple ingredients.

Do you make any DIY cleaners? Share your favorite below!

This homemade all-purpose cleaner is natural and much less expensive than conventional cleaners. All natural and it works!
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Katie Wells Avatar

About Katie Wells

Katie Wells, CTNC, MCHC, Founder of Wellness Mama and Co-founder of Wellnesse, has a background in research, journalism, and nutrition. As a mom of six, she turned to research and took health into her own hands to find answers to her health problems. WellnessMama.com is the culmination of her thousands of hours of research and all posts are medically reviewed and verified by the Wellness Mama research team. Katie is also the author of the bestselling books The Wellness Mama Cookbook and The Wellness Mama 5-Step Lifestyle Detox.

Comments

285 responses to “Natural All-Purpose Cleaner (That Works!)”

  1. Sarah Avatar

    Hi. I have citronella, lemon, lemongrass, peppermint, tea tree, clove, and pine needle essential oils on hand. Can you recommend a good mixture of those for the cleaner?

  2. laura Avatar

    Hi I can’t find Dr bronners Castille soap(liquid or bar for your detergent)…just wondering could I use seventh generation dish soap?

      1. Kelley Avatar

        I found Dr, Bonners at Kroger. It was in the health food section. It was much cheaper than our health food store by several dollars.

    1. Linda Miller Avatar
      Linda Miller

      Look on Swanson Vitamins they have Dr Bronners. Every kind, bar and liquid.

      1. Gail Avatar

        Kirk’s Castille Soap would probably work just as well as Dr. Bronner’s soap, is less expensive, and gets excellent reviews. The best price for Kirk’s that I’ve found is at Swanson Vitamins. (I have no affiliation with Swanson’s other than being a long-time customer.)

  3. Dana Avatar

    Good morning. I have a question. Yesterday I put some water, rosemary, and orange peels in a little crock pot to simmer all day (plan to do the same today). I was thinking that somewhere I read that the rosemary would be good at disinfecting the air, anyhow, I was wondering if the strained out liquid at the end of the day would make a good kitchen counter cleaner? Maybe just in small batches that get used up before it would spoil? Do you think it would clean? Be safe? Just seems like a waste to pour out the liquid. Thank you!

    1. Wellness Mama Avatar
      Wellness Mama

      IT would work and be safe, but it might leave some discoloration if you have light colored counters…

  4. Leigh Avatar

    When you say the lemon and lavender and orange, is that all together, or just for scent??

  5. Cindy Avatar

    Alright, I have all the ingredients on my shopping list for this week!  I’ve checked our local store and I can for sure get the Borax  & Washing Soda.  Just wanted to know about the Liquid Castille Soap…when I search for it on google, I get lots of hits on dishwashing soaps and hand soap.  Are those what you mean by liquid castille soap?  Or is there a more natural form I should be looking for that doesn’t have scents/extra chemicals added?

    1. Wellness Mama Avatar
      Wellness Mama

      Dr. Bronners is a good brand and usually the easiest to find

  6. Kay Avatar

    Just wondering how good this is at disinfecting cooking surfaces? I;’m excited about trying it 🙂

    1. Lydia Avatar

      If you need an actual, natural disinfectant may I suggest Hydrogen Peroxide? Just the stuff in the brown bottle.

      If you can’t find it in a spray bottle, try fitting a sprayer to the top of the brown bottle. Keep it in the opaque bottle (light will break it down and make it ineffective fairly quickly). Works better than lysol but with no toxic chemicals. Spray the surfaces down, give it a minute and wipe it up!

  7. Anne Avatar

    Ok, I’m a little slow, just found this.  Good news – the gunk on the bathroom floor that no other cleaner in the world could get rid of (I have tried at least a dozen over the years) is now gone.  I sprayed this, let it soak about 5 minutes and wiped it up with a microfiber cloth.  I am astounded!!! Thanks so much for this!!

      1. Nicolle Avatar

        Hello! Just microfiber and water? I saw you mentioned you weren’t too concerned with germs and promoted building our immune systems. I agree! But what about after handling raw meat, like chicken. I’m trying to get away from my dependency of Lysol wipes. THANK YOU!

  8. Michelle Albanese Avatar
    Michelle Albanese

    I take my lemon peels and soak them in vinegar for a few weeks and use this liquid to clean with. It really extracts the oils from the lemon peels. You can also use orange and grapefruit peels. I also add a couple of drops of tea tree oil to disinfect. 

    1. Wellness Mama Avatar
      Wellness Mama

      I’ve actually got some of this on my counter right now too 🙂

    2. LIZ Avatar

      THIS HAS BEEN VERY HELPFUL, WHILE READING THROUGH THIS ALL MY QUESTIONS ARE BEING ANSWERED, BUT MICHELLE I LIKE THIS IDEA OF LEMON PEELS IN THE VINEGAR, WHAT IS YOUR RATIOS. I LOVE THE SMELL OF ALCOHOL AND VINEGAR (WHAT I’M CURRENTLY USING) BUT HUSBAND HATES IT! DOES THE VINEGAR SMELL TRULY GET MASKED BY THE LEMON? THANKS

      1. Lydia Avatar

        No, I’m afraid it’s still vinegar smelling – just a very lemony vinegar. I like it, but my husband gives me a bit of stinkface when I use it. I’ll be trying this cleanser out!

        1. Meagan Williams Avatar
          Meagan Williams

          I’m having the same problem with my husband.lol. I have a new homemade vinegar cleaner that I’ve been using and I love because I use it in just about everything and it leaves a nice streak-free residue free surface and does a super great job cleaning. But the hubs gets really annoyed with me when I use it. I think it smells fine after I add my essential oils and the vinegar smell goes away in just a few hours. But I guess I need to find some sort of compromise, maybe just using it on the glass surfaces. Or just not spraying it while he is home.

  9. Holly Dispain Avatar
    Holly Dispain

    Doesn’t vinegar natural antibacterial properties? Can you use delisted vinegar as a cleaning agent?

    1. Wellness Mama Avatar
      Wellness Mama

      You can and it works great. I’ve just gotten out of the habit since we have granite countertops and you aren’t supposed to use vinegar on them. A 50/50 vinegar and water mix will clean most hard surfaces though.

      1. caree Avatar

        What do you use on your granite? We have granite and I had no idea that I should not be using vinegar. Thanks!

        1. Pat Avatar

          For my natural cleaner, I shred my own Castile soap (liquid form is expensive) and dissolve that and then put some of that in a spray bottle with water and some drops of tea tree oil. That is safe on granite.

      2. Michael Avatar

        My vinegar has a 10% concentration of acetic acid. Can I use it in the 50/50 cleaning recipe?

        Thank you.

        Michaël.

  10. Anitra Sweet Avatar
    Anitra Sweet

    I have heard recently about how borax isn’t good to use. Is this true? I love this all purpose cleaner but wanted to ask you. I will try to find the article someone sent me.

    1. Wellness Mama Avatar
      Wellness Mama

      A lof of the research on this looks at boric acix and in a different concentration than what is used in borax. Borax is sodium tetraborate, which is a different chemical structure. In general, i don’t use borax on areas where food will be directly prepared and consider it safe everywhere else…

    2. Conny Baumann Avatar
      Conny Baumann

      You could always try witch hazel instead of borax… I use the one with Alcohol in my cleaner and it seems to work a treat? Just add a few teaspoons. Beats the vinegar smell. And we still seem to be living well after using it on all counters 🙂

    3. Donna Klaver Avatar
      Donna Klaver

      Bob Vila has an amazing grout cleaning recipe! 1/2 cup baking soda, 1/4 hydrogen peroxide, 1 tsp of dish soap. I have used this for grout, stain remover, wall spots, soles of running shoes. It’s amazing. Use it right away. It will build up pressure in a container and explode.

  11. Amanda Avatar

    Is there a reason your recipe does not use white vinegar? I noticed that most other recipe’s call for it. I still have not made my own cleaner and am looking for input from several sources before I do.  Thanks! Amanda

    1. Wellness Mama Avatar
      Wellness Mama

      I’ve found it isn’t needed in this one, and while it does clean very well, I’m not a huge fan of the house smelling like pickles all day 🙂

      1. Vonda Rochelle Avatar
        Vonda Rochelle

        love that! I don’t care for the pickled house myself

      2. Anna Avatar

        If I don’t have essential oils, could vinegar be used in place of them in this recipe? If so, how much would you suggest to put? Thank you!!

      3. Leah Walker Avatar
        Leah Walker

        Wellness Mama,

        Can you share with me on your discovery that White Distilled Vinegar is not a disinfectant?

        Thank you!

    2. Sakinah Avatar

      You don’t use vinegar with this recipe because you are using castile soap. if you use the vinegar it will cancel out the effects of the castile soap because one is a base and one is an acid. The vinegar “unsaponifies” the soap, by which I mean that the vinegar takes the soap and reduces it back out to its original oils. So you end up with an oily, curdled, whitish mess. And this would be all over whatever it was you were trying to clean – your laundry or counters or dishes or whatever. Also what is great about this recipe is that you have the same strong cleaning power as vinegar without the smell. 🙂

    3. Michelle Avatar
      Michelle

      I have read through your article and I can’t see , How much of this would I put into a 5 litre bucket of hot water to mop my tiles in my bathroom ?
      l love your blog lots of great ideas to become toxic/ plastic free

  12. Sharon Avatar

    Made this today (after months of thinking about it) and so far very pleased.  Thank you Wellness Mama

  13. Sika Avatar

    Hi! Wonderful blog with great tips.

    One thing I worry about is the disinfectant capacity of this mixture. Is this really effective in killing germs in kitchen/bathroom areas? Thanks!

    1. Wellness Mama Avatar
      Wellness Mama

      The essential oils are effective in killing germs, though you could always up the amount if you were especially worried about the germs. In my own opinion, we focus to much on killing germs rather than just having a strong immune system to be able to resist them. At least for kids, it seems that a lot of the recent research is showing that exposure to some germs can actually help prevent allergies and such.

  14. Lois Avatar

    Hi, is Vitamin E a safe oil to use in homemade cosmetics? It uses wheat germ I believe…

  15. Lois Avatar

    Hi, is Vitamin E a safe oil to use in homemade cosmetics? It uses wheat germ I believe…

    1. Wellness Mama Avatar
      Wellness Mama

      Unless you are officially a celiac, you shouldn’t have any trouble
      with it, especially just topically.

      1. Kirsten Avatar

        Which food grade alcohol do you buy as the substitute for the borax? Is rubbing alcohol the same thing?

    2. Wellness Mama Avatar
      Wellness Mama

      Unless you are officially a celiac, you shouldn’t have any trouble
      with it, especially just topically.

      1. Maria Avatar

        You can make washing soda with baking soda. There are lots of links you can ‘Google’ that show you how to do that. All it is, is baking the baking soda in the oven until the consistency changes.

          1. Eriana Avatar

            Can not buy Washing soda in Canada at all. Two years ago i bought Procyon Dye from a fella in Colorado – and he wanted to save me cost (nice guy) and recommended i buy washing soda to set the dye. I could not find it at all. So i bought it from him. Then i found out that my “supposed to be safe laundry soap’ had bleach in it – and i’m seriously allergic to bleach. I was nervous about trying the baking soda in the oven thing. But again- the fella in Colorado said it was totally safe – he tried it out with a class of school kids when i told him about it. So -ever since then i’ve been making my own washing soda. 400F in the oven in a glass casserole dish – – – only one hour is needed – stir it around with a fork half way through – – -when it looks “soft’ and smooth – instead of ‘grainy’ like baking soda does – it’s done it’s transformation.

          2. Helen Avatar

            If you are on the west coast of Canada, London Drugs has washing soda under the Arm & Hammer brand in the laundry aisle! Even my husband found it when I sent him out looking.

          3. Jacinda Avatar
            Jacinda

            Home Hardware in Canada carries washing soda.

    1. Wellness Mama Avatar
      Wellness Mama

      It is sodium carbonate and you can find it in most laundry aisles in
      grocery stores. Arm and Hammer makes the most popular one and it is
      just called “washing soda”

        1. Dianne Avatar

          Yes, it’s baking soda that has been baked. If you can’t find it in the laundry section, you can make it yourself. I found the instructions by googling but it isn’t expensive, so I wound up buying it.

          1. Kat L. Avatar

            To get washing soda, take baking sodaI have baking soda & just bake it 400degrees for 2 hrs. I used this method to make my own laundry detergent:-)

        2. Michael Avatar

          There are two things:

          Sodium bicarbonate and baking powder.

          Sodium bicarbonate is also known as “baking soda” or “washing soda” or whatever. The bottomline is that it is pure.

          Baking powder on the other hand contains aluminium and is not safe to ingest.

          Michaël.

          1. Amit Avatar

            Baking Soda = sodium bicarbonate and is different from Washing Soda
            Washing Soda = sodium carbonate

          2. Janet Avatar

            There are some aluminum free baking powders out there. Rumford brand is one. Keep reading those labels!

  16. Tara Avatar

    Does this work with semi-hard water? (I mean, I hope it does not leave a deposit… and I hope I used the right word, as English is not my first language 🙂 )

    1. Wellness Mama Avatar
      Wellness Mama

      It does, I’ve used it when we lived in places with hard water and it
      worked just fine.

  17. Reforma Avatar

    I love this stuff! It works just as well as the store bought stuff at a fraction of the cost!

    1. Tracey Avatar

      For the DIY laundry detergent, what essential oils would you reccomend to use with your recipe and how many drops?

      1. Lori Avatar

        For me it depends on what i’m washing, some I use a germ killing blend, others a more refreshing blends, sheets lavender, just my preferences.

      2. Sheila Avatar

        I use a blend of lemon, eucalyptus, lavender, and peppermint. I make a dry laundry soap with finely shredded coconut soap (I often use Kirks), washing soda, and borax in equal amounts, plus a half measure of pure oxygen cleaner or peroxide powder. The last time I made it I think I used a cup of each, and a half cup of the peroxide. Then I typically add a couple of teaspoons of EO to the lot. It gives it a nice fresh scent. I don’t measure my EO for this, just shake lots of drops into a glass cup or bowl until I like the way it smells. Star with your lemon and eucalyptus. Then add maybe half to 2/3 that much lavender. I do the peppermint last because it can really overpower the rest if you add too much. If things are really stinky, a little Thieves oil will help. Add a few drops to just that load.

        1. Linda Romaya Avatar
          Linda Romaya

          I love this stuff so much. I’ve made it several times. I really just want to make a gallon of it. Would you be able to give me the scaled up measurements for one gallon of this APC?
          Thanks.

4.72 from 7 votes (4 ratings without comment)

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