How to Make Your Own Laundry Detergent: A Journey Into DIY Cleaning That Changed My Perspective on Household Chemistry
I never thought I'd become the person who makes their own laundry detergent. For years, I walked past those bright plastic jugs at the grocery store without a second thought, trusting whatever marketing promised the "deepest clean" or "mountain fresh scent." Then my daughter developed eczema, and suddenly those ingredient lists started looking less like cleaning solutions and more like chemistry experiments I wasn't comfortable running on my family's skin.
That's when I fell down the rabbit hole of homemade detergent. What started as necessity became something of an obsession – and honestly, a revelation about how simple effective cleaning can actually be.
The Chemistry Behind Clean (Without the PhD)
Before diving into recipes, let me share what transformed my understanding of laundry. Detergent isn't magic; it's just helping water do its job better. Water alone is terrible at grabbing onto oils and dirt – they literally repel each other. Soap and detergent molecules have split personalities: one end loves water, the other loves oil. They act like tiny mediators, convincing oil and water to play nice long enough to rinse away together.
Commercial detergents pack in dozens of ingredients, but most are there for shelf stability, fragrance, or to make you think those bubbles mean extra cleaning power. (Spoiler: they don't. Some of the most effective cleaners barely foam at all.)
The real workhorses in any detergent are surprisingly basic: something to break surface tension, something to soften water, and something to lift stains. That's it. Everything else is window dressing.
My Go-To Recipe (And Why It Works)
After testing probably two dozen variations, here's what I use for 90% of my laundry:
- 1 bar of soap (grated)
- 1 cup washing soda
- 1 cup borax
- ½ cup baking soda
Now, before you run to the store, let's talk about why each ingredient matters, because understanding this changed how I approach all my cleaning.
The soap provides the surfactant action – that's the technical term for breaking water's surface tension. I use Fels-Naptha because my grandmother did, but honestly, any real soap works. I've used everything from Dr. Bronner's to hotel soap I hoarded during a conference. Just avoid beauty bars with added moisturizers; they'll leave residue on your clothes.
Washing soda (sodium carbonate) is the muscle of this operation. It's more alkaline than baking soda, which means it's better at breaking down acidic stains like sweat and food. Fun fact: you can make your own by baking regular baking soda at 400°F for an hour. The heat drives off water and carbon dioxide, leaving you with a more concentrated alkali. I learned this during a washing soda shortage in 2020, and now I make my own half the time just because I can.
Borax softens water and helps maintain the pH level that keeps everything else working efficiently. Yes, there's internet drama about borax safety. I've read the studies. Used normally in laundry, it's no more dangerous than table salt. Don't eat it, don't inhale clouds of it, and definitely keep it away from kids and pets, but don't lose sleep over using it in your washing machine.
The baking soda is honestly optional, but I find it helps with odor control, especially for workout clothes and towels. Sometimes I skip it, sometimes I double it. This isn't precision chemistry.
The Process (And My Hard-Learned Lessons)
Grating soap sounds quaint until you're on your third bar and your knuckles are raw. Get a food processor. Seriously. I resisted for months because I didn't want soap residue in my kitchen equipment, but a thorough wash with hot water and dish soap clears it right out. Some people use a dedicated processor from a thrift store, but I've never had issues using my regular one.
Mix everything in a large container – I use a old protein powder tub because the wide mouth makes scooping easier. The first time I made this, I mixed it in a narrow jar and spent ten minutes trying to extract compacted detergent with a butter knife. Learn from my mistakes.
Here's something nobody tells you: homemade detergent doesn't dissolve the same way as commercial stuff. In cold water, you might find residue on your clothes. I solve this by either dissolving the detergent in hot water first (I keep an old mason jar by my washer for this) or just washing in warm water. The energy cost is minimal, and it's still cheaper than buying detergent.
Liquid Version for the Powder-Averse
My husband hated the powder leaving residue in the dispenser, so I developed a liquid version:
- 1 bar soap, grated
- 1 cup washing soda
- 1 cup borax
- 4 cups hot water
- 10-12 cups cold water
Dissolve the grated soap in 4 cups of boiling water, stirring until completely melted. Add washing soda and borax, stir until dissolved. Pour into a large container (I use a 2-gallon bucket), add the cold water, and stir. It'll thicken as it cools into a gel-like consistency.
The texture weirds some people out – it's not smooth like store-bought detergent. Sometimes it separates and needs a shake. But it works just as well, and my husband stopped complaining about powder residue, so I count it as a win.
Special Situations and Stubborn Stains
Here's where homemade detergent shows its limitations. For serious stains, you need to pretreat. I keep a spray bottle with equal parts dawn dish soap and hydrogen peroxide for protein stains (blood, sweat, grass). For grease, straight dish soap applied directly works better than any commercial stain stick I've tried.
Cloth diapers deserve their own mention. When my nephew was born, my sister-in-law asked if my detergent was cloth-diaper safe. Turns out, most homemade recipes are actually better for cloth diapers than commercial detergents because they don't contain fabric softeners or optical brighteners that can affect absorbency. Just skip the borax for baby items if you're concerned.
For whites, I add half a cup of hydrogen peroxide to the wash. It's a gentler alternative to chlorine bleach and doesn't make my bathroom smell like a public pool. Some people swear by adding lemon juice, but I found it didn't make enough difference to justify squeezing lemons every laundry day.
The Money Talk (Because It Matters)
Let's be real about costs. My basic recipe makes enough detergent for about 40 loads and costs roughly $3 to make. That's 7.5 cents per load. The cheap commercial stuff runs about 15 cents per load, and the fancy eco-friendly brands can hit 50 cents or more.
But here's what those calculations don't capture: the time investment. Grating soap and mixing ingredients takes me about 15 minutes per batch. If you value your time at $20/hour, that adds another 12.5 cents per load. Still cheaper, but not the dramatic savings some blogs claim.
For me, the savings aren't really the point anymore. It's about knowing exactly what's touching my family's skin, reducing plastic waste, and honestly, the satisfaction of self-sufficiency. There's something deeply satisfying about solving a household need with basic ingredients I understand.
What Nobody Warns You About
Homemade detergent has quirks. Your clothes might feel different at first – not worse, just different. Commercial detergents leave residues that make fabric feel softer. Without them, cotton feels more... cottony. Towels are actually more absorbent, but they're also scratchier. I've grown to prefer it, but it's an adjustment.
White clothes might look dingier over time. Commercial detergents often contain optical brighteners – chemicals that reflect UV light to make whites appear whiter. Without them, whites are just... white. Not glowing, supernatural white. Regular white. Adding washing soda or hydrogen peroxide helps, but your shirts will never look like a toothpaste commercial.
HE washers can be finicky with homemade detergent. Use less – about 1-2 tablespoons instead of the ¼ cup I use in my old top-loader. Too much and you'll get residue or excessive suds. Yes, even though this recipe is low-sudsing, HE washers are designed for ultra-low-suds formulas.
The Scent Situation
If you're used to "mountain breeze" or "lavender fields," homemade detergent smells like... nothing. Clean nothing, but still nothing. Your clothes smell like clothes, not perfume.
I've learned to love this, but I know it's not for everyone. If you need scent, add 10-20 drops of essential oil to your powder mixture or liquid batch. Lavender is classic, tea tree adds antimicrobial properties, and lemon smells clean without being overpowering. Just know that the scent won't be as strong or lasting as commercial fragrances. Those are designed to stick around; essential oils are designed to evaporate.
Some people make scent crystals with epsom salt and essential oils, adding them to the wash separately. It works, but feels like extra steps for something I've learned to live without.
Beyond Basic: Variations and Experiments
Once you get comfortable with the basic recipe, experimentation becomes addictive. I've tried adding:
- Oxiclean (or generic oxygen bleach) for extra whitening power
- Citric acid for hard water areas
- Salt for setting colors in new clothes
- Vinegar in the rinse cycle as fabric softener (though never with the borax – they neutralize each other)
My most successful experiment was a enzyme cleaner addition for workout clothes. I dissolve a tablespoon of meat tenderizer (plain, unseasoned) in water and add it to particularly smelly loads. The enzymes break down protein-based odors. It sounds weird, but it works better than any sport-specific detergent I've tried.
My biggest failure? Trying to make detergent pods with the powder mixture and a bit of glycerin. They never dried properly and turned into a gummy mess that had to be chiseled out of my washing machine. Some innovations aren't worth pursuing.
The Bigger Picture
Making my own detergent led me down a path of questioning all my household products. Now I make my own all-purpose cleaner (vinegar, water, and dish soap), glass cleaner (vinegar and water with a drop of dish soap), and even dishwasher detergent (though that's still a work in progress).
It's not about rejecting modern conveniences or pretending I'm a pioneer woman. It's about understanding what I actually need versus what marketing tells me I need. Most cleaning comes down to water, agitation, and time. Everything else just speeds up the process or makes it smell prettier.
There's also something to be said for the environmental impact. Every batch I make is one less plastic jug in a landfill, one less truck shipping water disguised as detergent across the country. My ingredients come in cardboard boxes that I can recycle or compost. It's a small thing, but small things add up.
Final Thoughts from the Other Side
Two years into making my own detergent, I can't imagine going back. Not because homemade is dramatically superior – honestly, for pure cleaning power, some commercial detergents probably edge out my recipe. But because I've learned that "good enough" is actually good enough, especially when it comes with benefits like cost savings, ingredient transparency, and reduced waste.
Will you save enough money to retire early? No. Will your clothes be cleaner than they've ever been? Probably not. But will you gain a sense of satisfaction from creating something useful with your own hands? Will you sleep better knowing exactly what's in the products your family uses? For me, absolutely.
Start with a small batch. See how it feels. Adjust the recipe to your needs. Or decide it's not for you – that's valid too. But at least you'll make that decision from a place of knowledge rather than assumption.
The truth is, laundry doesn't have to be complicated. We've been convinced it requires special formulas and proprietary blends, but people have been getting clothes clean for millennia with much less. Sometimes the old ways, with a few modern tweaks, are all we really need.
Authoritative Sources:
Bajpai, Dharm, and V. K. Tyagi. "Laundry Detergents: An Overview." Journal of Oleo Science, vol. 56, no. 7, 2007, pp. 327-340.
Environmental Protection Agency. "Safer Choice Standard and Criteria for Safer Chemical Ingredients." EPA.gov, United States Environmental Protection Agency, 2015.
Friedman, Mendel. "Chemistry, Biochemistry, and Safety of Acrylamide. A Review." Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry, vol. 51, no. 16, 2003, pp. 4504-4526.
Lange, K. Robert. Detergents and Cleaners: A Handbook for Formulators. Hanser Publishers, 1994.
National Center for Biotechnology Information. "Sodium Tetraborate." PubChem Compound Database, U.S. National Library of Medicine, 2021.
Smulders, Eduard. Laundry Detergents. Wiley-VCH, 2002.
University of Illinois Extension. "Stain Solutions." Extension.illinois.edu, University of Illinois Board of Trustees, 2019.