How to Clean a Shower Head with Just 2 Ingredients
Here’s how to clean a shower head with ease!
Spring cleaning starts in the bathroom with this DIY.
We recently showed you a DIY shower cleaner that focused on three areas of your bathroom but we wanted to go more in-depth with a tip on how to clean your shower head. The best part? The majority of you probably already have the ingredients at home!
The shower head collects some mineral build-up and bacteria over time since we constantly use it, but it also seems like a very difficult object to clean. As intimidating as it looks, with this method, you do not have to worry because it’s about the easiest cleaning method ever!
Here’s how to clean a clogged shower head without removing it:
BHG provided two solutions to clean your shower, and I decided to tweak the easier method since I didn’t want to remove my shower head. Frugally Sustainable also uses this simple method to clean a shower head without removing it!
The stars of this DIY are white vinegar and baking soda. Each is a naturally powerful cleaning ingredient, and there’s nothing better than a non-toxin DIY cleaner, especially for a hard-to-clean area like the shower head!
Vinegar acts as an acid that will disinfect and break down minerals and any water-related stains. Baking soda will dissolve away dirt. The two ingredients are basically opposites, which is why they make such a great team! There’s no need to worry about your shower head smelling like vinegar, because the smell of vinegar goes away once it dries.
Should you mix vinegar and baking soda?
Some of you may have reservations about mixing white vinegar and baking soda, which is entirely valid, but scientist Stacy Kish of LiveScience.com reminds us this cleaning mix is completely safe as long as you don’t use equal amounts of the two. On the pH scale from acidic to alkaline, you want to stay in between the acidic and neutral areas. For this reason, we’re using significantly more vinegar than baking soda.
Hip Tip: If you’re still unsure about this, through the experience of some of our team members and readers, we have heard this DIY works without baking soda as well, so feel free to opt out of baking soda but follow the rest of the directions!
What surfaces are damaged by vinegar?
While the majority of shower heads should be good to go for this mix, make sure you avoid any waxed surfaces, marble, granite, cast iron, and aluminum. Waxed surfaces will most likely be stripped with vinegar interactions, and similar damage would occur with both marble and granite. Cast iron and aluminum can also be damaged by vinegar.
These types of surfaces probably won’t be affected when cleaning your bathroom, but it’s important to mention as it’s always better safe than sorry!
How to Clean a Shower Head
PrintSupplies Needed
Directions
1
To avoid overflow from bubbles, slowly fill the freezer bag with 1/3 cup of baking soda and 1 cup of white vinegar. It’s best to do this in a sink to contain and rinse away spills.
2
Place this bag over your shower head, submerging the fixture in the mixture (Ha! We made a rhyme). Secure the bag with a rubber band or hair tie to hold the bag in place. Use more than one rubber band if necessary.
3
Let the shower head soak for about 2 1/2 hours. Then remove the bag, wipe the shower head with a cloth. Let the water run to clear out nozzles, and enjoy a clean shower head!
Want more DIY vinegar and baking soda cleaning hacks?
You can use this mixture on so many other cleaning projects! One Crazy Mom mentions tons of different methods.
Our favorite ways to clean with vinegar and baking soda:
- Dip a toothbrush into the mix to scrub and remove grout on tiles.
- Clean out a clogged sink; it’s safe to go down the drain!
- Clean your pans with it to remove stubborn burnt food.
- Add it to your laundry detergent to freshen up your towels during your next wash!
No matter what you use it for, enjoy your shiny, like-new shower head! 😍
Have leftover vinegar? Here’s how to use it to clean your Keurig!
So, vinegar works because it’s an acid, and baking soda works because it’s a base. Combine them, and you get…water. If it still cleans your showerhead, it’s because there’s still vinegar left in the mix. Instead of mixing baking soda and vinegar, just use vinegar – it breaks down the minerals that hard water leaves behind, which is what causes that white scale, and kills bacteria, which are usually behind orange or pink stains.
So: yes rubber band a bag over the showerhead is a great cleaning hack, but only put vinegar inside it if you want it to work effectively.
That’s what I always use, just white vinegar. Works everytime. No need for baking soda.
Thank you so much for the useful post. I am starting my spring cleaning today!
A word of caution, when I used vinegar and left it sitting on my brushed nickel faucets it discolored them, permanently, unless someone can tell me how to reverse the “staining.”
Same thing happened with me discoloration happened.
I would be scared this would happen to my oil rubbed bronze as well…