If you like to keep your clothes, linen, and towels clean and stain-free, then you probably take really good care of them when doing your laundry. However, sometimes it’s really hard to get the stains out of things without using something heavy-duty. Bleach is often a great option, particularly for white garments, but can you mix it with laundry detergent?
You can safely mix bleach and laundry detergent. The two will clean your clothes very well and remove stains, spills, and marks. There are some things that you can’t mix with bleach, but laundry detergent isn’t usually one of them.
The rest of this article will explain in detail why it’s safe to use bleach and laundry detergent at the same time when washing and cleaning your clothes. If you’re interested in learning more, please keep reading, and I hope this will be of great help to you!
Laundry Detergent’s Ingredients Are Compatible With Bleach
The first and perhaps most important point to note is that laundry detergent is composed of ingredients compatible with bleach.
Therefore, it’s safe to use detergent and bleach together. There’s no need to worry or fret when you mix the two together in your washing machine.
If you have heard otherwise, it is not true because detergent is made in a way that makes it perfectly safe to use with other products like fabric softener or bleach.
It’s good to know that detergent can be used alone to clean your clothing, linens, towels, and other items, but if you want an even deeper clean, then using bleach is an excellent option.
The detergent will clean your clothes, but bleach gives it that deeper polish that everyone wants. You know that shiny, brand-new look people just love?
Yep! Bleach will give your clothes that exact look!
While detergent is essentially soap, bleach is the product that’ll dig deeper to remove stains and blemishes. If you’re washing white clothes, then it’s 100% okay to use both products simultaneously. So don’t sweat it!
White clothing, as well as any other light-colored garments, will wash just fine when you mix laundry detergent with its bleach counterpart.
Another good reason to use both laundry detergent and bleach at the same time is that you can do fewer loads, therefore conserving more energy. Since both products are very strong, you don’t need to use them separately, which would lead to you doing many unnecessary loads of laundry.
I’m sure you’d be more than happy to save even just a few bucks from conserving the energy that is used for your washing machine.
Who wouldn’t be happy about that, right?
Let’s carry on!
A Few Things to Be Mindful of When Combining Bleach and Detergent
Before taking the risk of washing your clothes and other items like linen with both laundry detergent and bleach, you just want to make sure that you don’t ruin your beautiful things.
Let’s be honest. No one wants to go and buy more linens and sheets at the store when you have perfectly good ones at home!
Some of your items may even be your favorites, so it’s important that you don’t ruin them. Here are the steps to safely use both bleach and laundry detergent on your clothes:
- The first thing you can do is to get a measuring cup and a measuring spoon.
- Measure ¼ cup (60 ml) of water with 2 teaspoons (10 ml) of bleach. You can do this in the measuring cup itself; just add the teaspoons into the cup of water.
- Use this mix on a small piece of the clothing or garment you want to wash. Wait a short while, then take a wet rag and use it to apply pressure on the small area.
- If that area isn’t damaged, you know it’s safe to use the bleach and laundry detergent with which you experimented.
What Happens When You Mix Bleach and Laundry Detergent?
When you mix bleach and laundry detergent, you will create a more powerful cleaning solution. You won’t notice any physical changes to the mixture; they won’t bubble up like a science experiment, for example. But you will notice the difference in the cleanliness of your clothes.
Since it is perfectly safe to mix the two solutions, the combination will result in clothes that have minimal to no stains and marks.
So, you should consider mixing bleach and laundry detergent in order to get the freshest clothes or linens.
Can You Mix Bleach and Fabric Softener?
You should definitely not mix bleach and fabric softener because it will result in clothes that are not properly cleaned. Furthermore, doing so could potentially do harm to the washing machine.
It may seem as though you can mix the two solutions since it is okay to mix bleach and laundry detergent, but fabric softener has different ingredients that will not result in perfectly clean clothes or other items.
Also, your washing machine can become damaged over time if you make a habit of mixing bleach and fabric softener.
Make sure you keep these things in mind, and don’t make this mistake.
Other Things You Should Not Mix With Bleach or Laundry Detergent
Now that you’re comfortable knowing that you can use detergent and bleach together to clean your clothes and other items, let’s make sure you know which products you can and can’t mix.
Don’t mix bleach with other cleaning products that have ammonia. Laundry detergent doesn’t have ammonia, so that’s why it’s safe to use.
Sometimes, people may use an acidic product like lemon juice or vinegar to remove stains on clothes. This is a very common and easy way to clean stains. Just be mindful that you don’t mix those acidic liquids with bleach when cleaning your clothes because it may do some damage.
If you’re able to follow these tips, you’ll have squeaky clean clothing in no time!
Alternative Options for Using Detergent and Bleach
There are a couple of great alternative options that you can employ to deep clean your clothing and garments.
Grab some vinegar and hot water and follow the steps below:
- Mix 1 cup (240 ml) of vinegar with 6 cups (1,420 ml) of hot water. This is a pretty simple move, and you can use a big basin or tub to hold all of the liquid.
- Submerge dirty clothing in this liquid and let it sit for a while. Hopefully, this will take out stains and other unwanted markings.
- Also, don’t forget the classic method of taking ½ cup (64 g) of baking soda and throwing it in with your load of laundry. Apparently, this will result in cleaner clothes, and it’ll smell nice too! Who knew baking soda could be used for things that aren’t just delicious cakes?
Conclusion
In short, you can most definitely mix bleach and laundry detergent. Not only is it safe to do so, but mixing the two together can actually result in even cleaner clothes and other laundry items. After all, who doesn’t want their white shirts to appear even whiter and blemish-free when they come out of the wash?
So, go forth and wash your garments with bleach and laundry detergent! Here’s to looking good in those clean clothes!