How Often Should You Clean Your Bathroom?
7 minute read
Some things just happen like clockwork. Like our daily need for a mid-afternoon nap, a midnight craving for salty snacks, and that weekly podcast episode you can’t wait to listen to. When it comes to keeping your bathroom clean, however, there’s no built-in timer to tell you when or how often it needs a solid shine.
That brings us to the question: how often should you clean your bathroom?
In general, you should clean your bathroom thoroughly about once a week to help you maintain a baseline level of bathroom cleanliness. However, there are other factors to consider, too—like how often you touch different surfaces and how many people live in your household. Using these factors to plan the perfect bathroom cleaning schedule can help you keep your family safe and achieve that clean bathroom bliss.
When to Clean Specific Areas of Your Bathroom
Stepping into an odor-free, uncluttered bathroom to complete your skincare routine, take a relaxing bath, or relish in a spare moment of alone time can be downright restorative. There’s also reason to believe it’s good for your health too. Studies show that a clean living space can significantly reduce your cortisol levels.1
While other factors can influence your personal cleaning plan, taking a look at the specific areas of your bathroom can help you identify what might require a little extra attention.
#1 Sinks and Countertops
Whether your bathroom sink and counter serve as a stage for your 12-step morning skincare ritual or a self-directed pep talk before work, they likely get a lot of use each day. Water splashes, toothpaste spatters, and product residue from your everyday hygiene routine can quickly build up in these areas.
When it comes to how to clean a bathroom to keep your sinks and counters clean, follow these tips:
- Daily – Spot-clean with a plant-powered all-purpose cleaner and dry your counters with a towel after each use.
- Weekly – Spray and wipe down your countertops and sinks with a safer bathroom cleaner to remove any soap scum and buildup.
However often you clean your bathroom sinks, countertops, and other parts of your bathroom, be sure to use products that contain safer ingredients and won’t wash harsh chemicals down the drain. ECOS cleaners use safer ingredients like hydrogen peroxide. These cleaning solutions can help disinfect your bathroom without harming the environment.
#2 Cabinet, Drawer and Door Handles
Handles might seem like a small accessory to your bathroom’s overall components, but they’re one of the most high-touch areas in the room.
Consider that you touch your exterior and interior door handles every time you enter the bathroom—and you usually touch the exterior handle before washing your hands. Plus, you use a cabinet handle or drawer pull every time you retrieve a stored object for your routine.
To that end, we recommend cleaning your handles:
- Weekly – To keep your handles clean and shining, disinfect these areas at least once a week.
To disinfect your door handles in a safer way, use a safer, hydrogen peroxide-based product like ECOS One-Step Disinfectant Cleaner.
#3 Showers and Bathtubs
We may step out of our shower and bathtub feeling squeaky clean, but our bathing areas deserve some cleaning action themselves.
Since they’re in close proximity to the area where you clean yourself, these items can get grimy fast. Hard water stains from shower and bath splashing, as well as soap scum from your shower and bath routines can cause buildup over time.
In better news, a few routine steps make it easy to keep these areas clean:
- Daily – Mist a plant-powered bathroom cleaner onto your shower wall tiles and fixtures, like the shower head and handles. With a product like ECOS Bathroom Cleaner, you don’t even need to wash it away. Just let the shower water rinse it off next time you bathe.
- Weekly – Wipe down any glass bath or shower enclosures with a window cleaner to remove germs and unsightly stains. Follow up with your bathroom cleaner to remove any soap scum or buildup.
If you use a shower curtain, you should also clean it regularly. Shower curtains and liners can grow mold and mildew if they don’t dry out quickly. If you notice any mold or mildew growth, spray it with ECOS One-Step Disinfectant. Allow the product to sit on the liner for 10 minutes and then wipe it (and any mildew or mold) away with a cleaning cloth. If your shower curtain is washable, you might want to toss it into the washing machine when you start to notice stain buildup to maintain health, cleanliness, and prevent odors.2
#4 Toilets
Like many other chores, toilet bowl cleaning takes less time the more often you do it. Consider lightly cleaning your toilet bowl often and working in a deep clean if you notice tough stain buildup.
When it comes to how to clean a toilet, here are a few steps you can take to make toilet cleaning simple:
- Daily – Spot-clean the outside with an all-purpose cleaner.
- Weekly – Use a plant-powered toilet cleaner to clean the inside of the bowl with a toilet brush. Follow up with a disinfectant to clean the toilet seat, lid, and handle.
Taking these steps routinely and using a high-quality toilet cleaner frequently can:
- Prevent long-term stain buildup from germs and hard water
- Decrease bacteria and mold growth
- Improve the lifespan of your toilet hardware
When you’re cleaning your toilet, don’t forget to clean the outside, too. While the toilet bowl is an important focal point, dust and splashes that collect on the outside of the toilet can stain grout, discolor your toilet, and damage your hardware.
#5 Floors
Between product spills, sopping wet bath towels, and general bathroom germs, our bathroom floors do a lot of heavy lifting. Keeping these areas clean can help eliminate slippery or sticky spots and cut down on dirt and grime that can accumulate over time.
This doesn’t mean you necessarily need to mop every day. Instead, a few bathroom floor-cleaning tips and strategies can help you keep your floors shining even in between deep cleans.
These steps include:
- Daily – Spot clean any spills with your all-purpose cleaner. To avoid slippery areas, be sure to towel-dry any water spots after showers and baths.
- Every 1–2 weeks – Clean your floors using ECOS bathroom cleaner to fights soap scum and product buildup.
#6 Trash Cans
Your schedule for emptying the bathroom trash can may depend on several factors. Some variables that might increase your bathroom trash can emptying and cleaning frequency include:
- The number of people in your family
- The volume of disposable self-care products you use (like cotton swabs)
- Allergy, cold, or flu season—which can load your bathroom can with tissues
- The number of people using menstrual products in your home
- The size of your trash can
Luckily—and despite the circumstances above—your trash management schedule can still be pretty straightforward:
- As needed – Empty the can when it’s full or if you notice an odor.
- Weekly – Take your trash out at least once weekly. Use this opportunity to clean and disinfect the inside of your trash can, too. The best way to do this is by using a safer disinfectant.
Other Considerations for Bathroom Cleaning Frequency
While some people might need to show their bathroom some extra TLC every day, others might be able to get away with a weekly clean. Let’s break down some examples.
How Many People Live in Your Home?
The number of people living in your home can dramatically impact your bathroom cleaning schedule.
If you live in a one-bathroom home by yourself—or with a pet or two—you might make fewer messes than a family of four would in the same space. While messes certainly aren’t guaranteed, increasing bathroom traffic does increase the possibility of dirt and germ introduction.
If you live in a household with more than one or two people, consider increasing your weekly routines to two or three times a week. You can bump up any daily cleaning routines as needed.
Do You Host Guests Regularly?
Even if your current bathroom cleaning schedule is more sporadic than regular, you might be more likely to clean your bathroom before you have company.
If you live alone and clean the bathroom before your weekly book club meeting, family dinner, or girls’ night, that once-a-week clean might be all you need to maintain bathroom nirvana. For a quick spritz before your event starts, use ECOS One-Step Disinfectant Cleaner.
Do You Have Children?
If you have young children at home, you may find yourself chasing down rubber duckies and wiping up watermelon-flavored toothpaste more often than a family without kids. But bathroom cleaning is about more than keeping a tidy space.
It’s also about:
- Preventing grime buildup, which can lead to bacteria and mold growth
- Decreasing your exposure to germs that can make you (and your children) sick
- Eliminating hazardous situations like slippery floors
To combat these issues and keep your family healthy, you may find that you need to spot-clean more often. For everyday bathroom wipe-downs, try ECOS All-Purpose Cleaner.
No Matter How Often you Clean, Keep it Eco-Friendly
Whether you clean daily, weekly, or can only squeeze in a full-bathroom clean once a month, effective products can help you maintain your bathroom—and your entire home.
To ensure your cleaning supports your health and our planet, check to ensure they avoid harsh chemicals and harsh ingredients, as these can harm people and ecosystems alike.
A few common culprits to avoid include:
- Chlorine bleach
- Phosphates
- Phthalates
- Formaldehyde
- Ammonia
Instead of using products that contain harsh chemicals, opt for safer, plant-powered cleaners. Luckily, the ECOS product line ticks all of those boxes:
- Our foundational ingredients are safe for use in your home.
- We carry over 150 Safer Choice products. To earn the Safer Choice label, products must pass rigorous health, safety, and performance trials set by the EPA.3
- Our climate-positive facilities make products with readily biodegradable formulas, and environmental action is a cornerstone of our business model.
To meet your bathroom cleanliness goals, choose products that keep you safe, protect the environment, and (most importantly) work.
Use ECOS Products to Keep Your Bathroom Clean Every Day
ECOS is making it easier than ever before to maintain a clean home—and a sparkling clean bathroom.
Our effective formulas and commitment to ditching nasty chemicals make ECOS the perfect product line for your home cleaning needs. Our entire line of household cleaning products is designed with you and your family in mind.
Find ECOS in a store near you, and give your home a toxin-free shine.