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This homemade all purpose cleaner recipe makes my absolutely favorite cleaner for my house! I pretty much use this cleaner for 90% of the cleaning done around my house. I just use the Dawn but if you need something a little stronger you can use ammonia. It’s in volume 1 of our cookbook and I just love the way it makes everything from windows to sinks and toilets shine!
Homemade All Purpose Cleaner Recipe
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5 from 2 reviews
Ingredients
Units
1 gallon water
1 cup ammonia or 2 tsp. Dawn dishsoap
1/2 cup vinegar
1/2 cup baking soda
Instructions
- Combine all ingredients.
- Put into a spray bottle to clean showers, toilets, sinks and counters.
This homemade all-purpose cleaner is great for most cleaning needs. Use all-purpose cleaner to clean your floors. Just spray on and wipe off as you would counter-tops.
This is not a disinfectant. To make it a disinfectant, too, add about 1/4 cup rubbing alcohol to the bottle.
All Purpose Cleaner Recipe #2 – (My newer version.)
This disinfecting cleaner is the one I prefer and use most often. It is the same as the all purpose cleaner above except that it includes alcohol for disinfecting.
All Purpose Disinfecting Cleaner Recipe
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No reviews
- Author: Tawra Kellam
Ingredients
Units
1 gallon water
1 cup ammonia or 2 tsp. Dawn dish soap
1/2 cup vinegar
1/2 cup baking soda
1/4 cup rubbing alcohol
Instructions
- Combine all ingredients.
- Put into a spray bottle to clean showers, toilets, sinks and counters.
This all-purpose cleaner is great for most cleaning needs. Use this all-purpose disinfecting cleaner to clean your floors. Just spray on and wipe off as you would countertops.
Notes
This all purpose disinfecting cleaner is a disinfectant because it includes the alcohol.
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Reader Interactions
Comments
- Marsha
I’ll have to give this a try…
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- Lori Worley
The all purpose cleaner works. Thanks for sharing!
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- Kellie
If you have asthma ommit the ammonia as it causes lung problems. The water, vinegar, and baking soda will still work just fine.
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- Ellen
I’ve started making my own cleaners in an effort to have less toxic chemicals in my home and save money – I will definitely use this recipe!
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- Krista
do you have any other all purpose without ammonia? just wondering. I like vinegar and baking soda but would like a stronger one for some things, particularly like grease.
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- Jill
Tawra sometimes uses a squirt bottle with 4 Tbsp. vinegar, 4 Tbsp. rubbing alcohol, a squirt of dish detergent and then the rest water. It really depends what you want it for. Hot soapy water to me is the best for most everything.
If it helps to know:
Vinegar is good for cleaning residues, shining and does some (about 85%) disinfecting
Ammonia is for cutting grease.
Baking soda is abrasive
Rubbing alcohol is for cutting grease, disinfectant, and shinesReply
- Beccie
Bec’s all purpose cleaner recipe:
Place in a spray bottle: 2 cups water, 1/4 c. vinegar, 2 tsp dish soap. Shake for one minute.
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- Mama Bear
Good article. I have new Corian counter tops and am not supposed to use ammonia on them. Your alternatives work fine for me.
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- rose
a woman i used to work with at a restaurant many many many yrs ago .. she told me she cleaned her house and etc with hot sudsy water . but she would take a lemon and squeezed it in the water adn dropped the lemon wedge (she said she used a half a lemon per sink full of water.. and if there was any greasy pots/pans and needed scouring .. she would (after soaking the pans/pots) take some table salt, squeeze a lemon and then add a bit of the soapy hot water and just scrub .. she said this worked for her ..
just thought i would share …thanks for posting this recipe .. i appreciate it .. :D
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- Susan
You can also add 2 or 3 drops of your favorite essence oil to the All Purpose Cleaner and your whole house will smell great!!
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- Susan
Does the oil cover the vinegar and alcohol smell or can you still smell them?
I’d like to try this but can’t stand the smell of vinegar or alcohol.
Thanks!Reply
- Jill
I assume you mean does essential oil cover the smell of the vinegar if you put some in it. I don’t know. I don’t usually use essential oil in this cleaner. You could make a very small batch and try it and see. Personally I doubt it will. Depending on what you are using it for, you could just leave the vinegar out. What people don’t realize is that vinegar doesn’t really kill all the germs and really should just be used to help with mineral build up like on faucets and things and it is good for cutting hard water spots on windows and such. It is really the Dawn in here that is doing the germ killing and the baking soda is adding a little bit of abrasiveness.
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- cathy
I just LOVE you and your faimly ! I wathc you every day. and at 67 you have become e like family to me. I don’t have one except the LORD. what a blessing you are.
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- Jill
Oh thank you Cathy. You are so sweet to take the time to write and let us know that. I don’t think people know how much our viewers like you really mean to us too. There is such sweet fellowship when we get together on the live streams or anytime so thanks.
- Jan
Found this general purpose cleaning solution in a 100 uses for baking soda book…works awesome on counter tops,cutting grease after frying, and soap scum in the tub:
1 tsp borax
1 tsp baking soda
2 tsp vinegar or lemon juice
1/4 tsp liquid dish soap(we used Sunlight)
2 cups hot water
* Be sure to wear rubber gloves when working with this mixture.mix and store in spray bottle(I used an empty and rinsed out Windex bottle…925mL sized and doubled the recipe).Reply
- Yvonne
Jill and Tawra, I made the All Purpose Cleaner today. The home health care provider lady that helps us used it to mop the kitchen and bathroom floors. They look clean and real shiney. We will be using it on other things too.
Thanks for the receipe.Reply
- Cindi O Rose
Thanks for your comment as I was wondering if it was ik on floors. Did it have be rinsed, cuz dawn soap?
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- Jill
You don’t need to rinse because the vinegar helps with not leaving much residue.
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- Terri
Save your lemon/orange peels and add to vinegar – then when you add your vinegar to the cleaning solution you will have a nice citrus scent.
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- betty
will the vinegar help the peels from getting mold spots in it? How long will this solution stay good for?
I used to make my own citrus olive oil and it would turn like a werewolf later.Reply
- betty
…. ALSO, when needing to add water… would you reccommend using DISTILLED WATER so that too will stay fresh?
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- Jill
One way to help figure out how long something will last is to look at the ingredients and think about how long will these ingredients last if they were sitting on my shelf separately. For example the vinegar and ammonia have a very long shelf life. If you are adding things like the citrus peels they don’t have quite the shelf life although the vinegar will sort of help “pickle” them so they will last longer but the cleanser won’t keep as long as if you leave them out. You could to make much smaller amounts of the recipe that you will use up more quickly.
As far as distilled water goes many people have recommended it but since I am always trying not only to save money but save the time and energy it takes to buy and store extra things like distilled water I have never used it and mine does fine.Reply
- Bea
I like that lemon and orange peel idea.
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- Cathy
I have a question: I have a linoleum kitchen floor.The pattern has little indents size of a pin head. These do not come clean with regular mopping,have tried mechanical floor scrubber, and mops and the floor still looks dingey. Can anyone help? TY so much I love this site.
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- Jill
I know just the kind of floor you are talking about Cathy and boy do I feel your pain. I had the same stuff and it was a mess. The only thing I could find to ever do was to slosh water with cleaner (sometimes I used dish detergent and Clorox) on a 2-3 foot area, let it soak then took a scrub brush to it. That helped some but it was a job. I didn’t have to do this though but once in awhile because once I got it cleaned it stayed “ok” for a few weeks. My floor was white and that can make a difference too.
Someone else might have a better idea but one thing I have learned over the years in cleaning whether it is a kitchen floor, a stove or a counter top – what ever- let the water and cleaner do the work and let them soak for a bit.
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- Sheri
I had that same floor… My kitchen was 17 x 20. That was a big job. Yep, soak it, then scrub it and wipe it up right away do the dirt doesn’t settle back down in the dimples. I bought a floor brush I could use standing up. It was on a pole like a broom stick. That helped a lot! Other wise, I’m sitting on the floor. I clean about a 2 foot square at a time or we went at it like an assembly line. I soak and scrub the section, then move on and someone else follows me and wipes it up. I use laundry detergent and oxiclean on my floor.
Yep, I agree with Jill. Let the water and soap do the work.
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- Alexander
I don’t mean to be the nay-sayer here, but what I remember of chemistry is that this mixture renders the vinegar entirely useless. (baking soda and vinegar neutralize…) Further, if the mixture is poured directly into the bottle and sealed before the reaction finishes, you make yourself a very dangerous, lung-destroying bomb…
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- Jill
The thing is for a recipe like this the ammonia in the recipe is being used as a degreaser, the baking soda for mild abrasion, and the vinegar is to help with the streaking and getting rid of residue. As we mentioned in the recipe this is not used for sanitizing and if you look many store bought all purpose cleaners you buy don’t sanitize. All purpose cleaners are for getting rid of grime and dirt which is exactly what this recipe does. The problem is so many don’t have a clue when and how to use the different things like vinegar, ammonia, baking soda and what they actually do in the cleaning process.
What you are thinking of from science is the ph factor and that type of thing isn’t even a factor you have to consider for this type of recipe. I personally for most all my cleaning use just plain soap and water but there are times like right now as I am cleaning out my garage and there are things which have been sitting there for a hundred years that have a gross layer of “stuff” stuck on it so this is when I would pull out the big guns like my ammonia or this cleaner.
As far as the bomb part goes, well I can’t live my life in a spirit of fear all the time. I ate a peanut yesterday and almost choked to death on it literally but that doesn’t mean I woke up thinking “If I eat there is a chance I will choke to death so there for I come to the conclusion that I will no longer eat because there is a one in a several million chance I will choke.” I see people worry all the time about what this or that is going to do to their lungs and will it hurt them yet they get in their car and speed, text or talk on the phone not giving it a thought that their chances are much greater of getting hurt or killed from doing that. Makes no sense to me at all.
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- Genghis
I’m inclined to agree with Alex. The Vinegar in the recipe is neutralized, i.e. ceases to exist, when mixed with the Ammonia and Baking Soda. As does some equal part of those two compounds.
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- Jill
Genghis, you need to really the whole thing and understand what this recipe is for. We state that it is not used as a disinfectant. It is used in this recipe for one purpose only and that is to get rid of residue build up when cleaning so it doesn’t matter if it is neutralized or not. When it comes to cleaning products it is important to understand what the purpose is for the different ingredients in it. For example many use vinegar as a degreaser which it can do some what but ammonia is a much better degreaser and vinegar is better for mineral build up and removing residue.
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- Suleyman Ulucay
Hi Jill,
thanks for the great work.
I have a big garden and many fruit trees, what would you recommend for disinfecting my pruning tools. I have used various things in the past such as Bleach and liquid copper but unfortunately they are dangerous to use and corrosive for the pruning tools. Do you think Vinegar + rubbing alcohol + water + dawn dishwashing liquid will do the job?
kind regards
Suleyman Ulucay
North CyprusReply
- Jill
I would just wipe them with rubbing alcohol. The alcohol kills everything and the vinegar only kills about 80% of things which leaves 20% on the tools to keep growing and multiplying. You could use water and any dish detergent because it kills everything good too but you would have to be sure to dry them well where the alcohol evaporates and you don’t have to worry about the moisture.
Also a heads up for anyone new to gardening – keep a small bucket of sand to stick your hand tools in when you are not using them. It helps with moisture and other things.Reply
- Lana Watkins
Thanks for the cleaning receipt! It is great to have one cleaner and to replace all the rest of the cleaning products I am used so far. Best regards
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- Edith
I have read that it is not good mixing baking soda with vinager, even most posts use to share similar recipes. Someone else knows about that?.
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- Macie Staples
When you combine vinegar (an acid) and baking soda (a base), the result is mostly water. They react to each other and render each other inert. I would suggest using one or the other, depending upon what is being cleaned.
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- Teri Thomsen
Has anyone tried this for a general cleaner? The peelings of 2 oranges, put in a mason jar, fill with vinegar and put on lid – must sit 14 days before using to “cure” Then remove peelings and put liquid in spray bottle.
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- Jill
I haven’t Teri but I have studied it and found that vinegar does not kill all the germs when you use it for cleaning. You leave behind about 20% of the germs. That is too high of a number for me to want to chance it especially in places like the bathroom and kitchen. That means 20% of salmonella and other germs are left behind. Vinegar does not do well at all for cleaning mold and I think that is why in recent years the questions on how to get rid of mold has gone up in proportion with more people using vinegar as a cleaner.
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- Elizabeth
I love this! For disinfecting I have a seperate bottle of hydrogen peroxide to spray on afterwards. Spraying vinegar and hydrogen peroxide (both stored in their own bottles) on the same surface actually disinfects as well as bleach with none of the crazy chemical fumes! Note that it is a chemical reaction between the two that causes the cleaning, so if you have them in the same bottle that bottle will be super disinfected but your surface will still be dirty.
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- Jill
You really don’t need the vinegar for disinfecting because the hydrogen peroxide does it just fine with out it. Don’t use more products than you have to because it just cost more so just use the peroxide. The problem with chemical fumes from clorox is usually because most people are using way more than is needed. If you are using the right amount you will smell no fumes. It only takes a small cap full to work for a sink of dishes. The only thing vinegar really does well for cleaning is to get rid of mineral or hard water build up and spots.
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- Jeni
What about just using bleach and water (1:4 ratio). I bought a nice glass bottle sprayer on Amazon. A small thing of bleach (plain) will last me at least 6 months. Thoughts on just using this for disinfecting?
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- Jill
Jeni I personally use only bleach and water as a disinfectant or products that have bleach in them. This recipe is more for general cleaning like a wall, window sill or floor that is gummy, greasy or just has plain old dirt on it. Vinegar really doesn’t disinfect properly that is why years ago they changed over from vinegar to bleach and people stopped having as many problems with mold and such. In even the past 10 yrs we have more than doubled the questions from people of how to get rid of mold and one of a couple of reasons is people have gone back to using vinegar and it isn’t working properly. Now bleach though super good for disinfecting it doesn’t cut grease and grime as well as ammonia or a dish detergent like Dawn.
Vinegar is more for mineral build up that is why many think that vinegar has cleaned their bathroom so well because with their eyes they see the soap scum and mineral build up is gone so they think it is sparkly clean which it is sparkly but it hasn’t killed all the things you can’t see with the eye.Reply
- Rebecca
If I don’t have ammonia can I sub bleach, or even clorox 2?
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- Jill
You you could use the 2 tsp. of Dawn in place of the ammonia. The clorox 2 is not really a disinfectant but more of a stain remover.
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- Monica Cromartie
Love this. Where is the most affordable place where I can purchase the oils? Is there a specific type of oil I need to be looking for?
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- Jill
Monica they do sell oils in many places even at WalMart but Tawra usually gets hers from amazon. Just type in essential oils and it really doesn’t matter what kind you get especially if you are using them in cleaning products
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- Anna Libby
Baking soda and vinegar reacted and made a volcano erupt inside my spray bottle. hahahaha I’m curious how this didn’t happen to anyone else??
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- Jill
If you mix baking soda and vinegar you will get a “chemical” reaction. I have to chuckle because so many (I am not saying you are)are concerned about using any chemicals in their home for cleaning so they use vinegar and baking soda all the time which are chemicals. You might try mixing the water, Dawn first then adding the vinegar and soda.
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- Natalie
Can I use this cleaner on hardwood floors? thanks!
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- Jill
It depends on if your hardwood floors need special care. I have older hardwood floors and I would use it on mine just making sure that I use a damp mop and not soaking wet leaving puddles so that it dries well.
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