If you make homemade products to use around the house, you get to choose the ingredients, do your bit to save the planet, and save you money. Sounds like a win-win, right? Well, not always.
Some homemade products are awesome—like cakes and clothes, for example. But if you want to make a laundry product that’ll be suitable for your family and perform in a washing machine, it’s a different story.
This quick read explores the myths about homemade laundry soap and its so-called “natural” status compared to commercial laundry detergents. It also offers some great suggestions about what you can use as an alternative.
What Is Homemade Laundry Soap?
Homemade laundry soap is just that: soap made at home using store cupboard ingredients like bleach, baking soda, and white vinegar. You'll probably already have a lot of these in your kitchen pantry.
Most soaps are made into cakes or bars and then grated for use with washing machines or for hand-washing garments.
Why Should You Not Use Homemade Laundry Soap?
It Can Ruin Your Clothes
Homemade soap might work well on your floor, but your floor is likely made of just one material. When it comes to laundry, the simple fact is that our clothes are complex, with different fabrics, colors, and uses.
One homemade laundry soap can't tackle delicates like linen and silk or lift tough stains on work garments or sports gear. Not to mention, abrasive cleaning ingredients may damage some fabrics.
Don't make the common mistake of adding your homemade soap to commercial laundry products. Most pre-prepared laundry detergents are meticulously formulated and can react with additional ingredients. At best, they won’t work, and at worst, they could damage your clothes or washer.
Ultimately, new clothes are more expensive than paying more for your laundry detergent, even if you have to buy multiple products to suit different garments.
It Can Damage Your Washing Machine
It's not something most people give any thought to, but in a testing suite, engineers spend a lot of time and money on developing machines that produce the best results with commercial laundry products.
While your homemade soap may be tempting, it might not suit your machine.
Washing machines are designed and endlessly tested to produce the best results using commercial laundry detergents. It's no coincidence that manufacturers recommend specific brands for their machines.
Damage can be incremental and unseen but occurs over time. Using homemade soap could even void the warranty and cause problems with the washer.
Homemade Soap Won't Work as Well as Laundry Detergents
There's a reason scientists spend hours in the lab developing laundry detergents—they work! Making a product in your kitchen is unlikely to produce anything nearly as effective, especially at lower wash temperatures. Homemade doesn't equal effective.
Homemade laundry soap cannot compete with a laundry detergent tested to the nth degree, with data on volume, temperature, and wash cycles nailed down to the last detail.
Your clothes might look clean with homemade soap, but they're probably not as clean as they could be.
How Do You Know Your Ingredient Measurements Are Accurate?
Well, you don't. Plus, how the ingredients mix is just as crucial as the quantities. Almost every online recipe for homemade laundry soap has different or vague measurements, like “a cup of.”
Laundry soap and detergent are about how the product performs during the wash cycle and at different temperatures. Commercial washing machine detergents are the subject of precise and rigorous research.
Matching the performance testing of a commercial laboratory is almost impossible in your home kitchen.
Soap and Detergent Are Two Different Things
The names often appear interchangeably, but soap and detergent are poles apart. You'll need a science lesson to understand the difference.
Detergents perform differently from soap products. Many traditional laundry detergents are designed in their ingredients and performance to work in a washing machine, with features like low suds levels and several active agents. Homemade laundry soap isn’t.
Homemade Laundry Soap Can Trigger Allergies
It's easy to be misled into thinking that homemade products are fine for people with allergies and skin conditions.
But it's hard to make a homemade soap product for your laundry if you're trying to avoid allergies. You may not know the ingredients that trigger a reaction or the level of sensitivity for that family member.
On the other hand, there are laundry detergent products that cover these bases and are designed to avoid skin irritation and other health issues. Focus on companies that are happy to provide a full ingredient list.
Homemade Laundry Soap Could Be Dangerous
Almost every homespun recipe online is relatively untested compared to the rigorous research and legal testing that commercial laundry products undergo.
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) regulates laundry detergents with stringent performance and safety criteria in its Safer Choice Program, ensuring commercial products are suitable for humans and the environment.
Some home products can be dangerous if not used correctly. No one needs much warning about bleach, but did you know it can also be harmful if mixed with the wrong things, like vinegar?
Essential oils, while appealing, aren’t ideal, either. These oils can be dangerous if used in the wrong quantities. However, they're popular in homemade soap recipes because they make clothes smell nice.
In reality, many essential oils are unsuitable for use on the skin and can cause burning or allergic reactions.
Homemade Laundry Soap is Not Great for the Environment
Just because you make something in your kitchen doesn't mean it’s good for the environment. Plus, these days, you don't have to worry so much about chemicals in commercial laundry products.
Many traditional laundry detergent manufacturers were oblivious to health and environmental issues two decades ago. However, plenty of companies now create well-researched, carefully formulated products free of harmful chemicals that still wash well.
Homemade Laundry Soap Is Not Always a Friend to Hard Water
If you live in an area with hard water, you may find that homemade laundry soap is a waste of time compared to a branded detergent. You'll already know from hand-washing and washing up that creating a lather with hard water is difficult.
A quality detergent product should already optimized to work in hard water or water containing high levels of minerals and still provide excellent results. This is especially important if you use cool or cold water washes.
Handmade laundry soap won't dissolve properly in hard water, and you can end up with a residue in the water pipes, which washes back into the machine when you set a new program. Ugh! It can also block drains.
Homemade Doesn't Always Equal Better
Homemade can mean better sometimes, but not always. In the case of laundry products, it's easy to vilify manufacturers for commercial profit and the overuse of harsh chemicals.
However, not all DIY products are friendly to humans or the environment. This is an easy mistake to make, especially when crafting your own laundry products.
Laundry products are subject to strict regulation, but excellent alternatives that don't use ingredients that could negatively impact people and the planet are easy to find.
Frequently Asked Questions
Does Homemade Laundry Soap Ruin Washers?
Homemade soap can damage washers because it commonly doesn't dissolve as well as commercial products designed for machining. The difficulty is that damage can be incremental and unseen, and you may not notice it until there's a problem with your washer, the drains, or both.
Final Thoughts
Making homemade laundry soap is not a great idea and could even be dangerous to your family and the environment. What's more, you don't need to.
Years ago, there were few alternatives to commercial laundry detergents and little ethical behavior among manufacturers. Many people were forced to rely on homemade recipes to avoid harsh, toxic chemicals. Well, it's all changed now.
Consider switching to Freddie’s laundry detergent sheets, which work in all washing machines, dissolve properly even in hard water, and offer robust cleaning solutions without chemicals like bleach.
Now, you can have the best of both worlds: a product that’s free of harmful chemicals such as phosphates, brighteners, parabens, or dyes, and 1,4-dioxane and has the qualities of homemade soap without the drawbacks.