The most popular grout cleaner on the internet stops working before it even touches your floor. It’s baking soda and vinegar. Everyone recommends it. But the fizz is over in about a minute, and a chemistry professor named Amanda Morris at Virginia Tech looked at what was left in the bowl and called it “glorified water.”
Bleach is the second most popular fix. That one is worse, because it looks like it’s working while it quietly eats your grout. And if you skip both and call a pro, a tile and grout cleaning costs around $480 on average.
Luckily, you don’t need to spend that kind of money, and you don’t need to waste your time on methods that don’t work either. This guide shows you how to clean grout lines with a simple recipe that costs about $3. It also shows you how to keep them looking clean afterward.
What Do You Need for This Job?
The list is short, and you probably own most of it already.
- Baking soda
- Dish soap
- A small bowl and a spoon
- A drill brush attachment (about $10)
- A cordless drill
- Clean water and a cloth or sponge
- Grout sealer (a few dollars)
No drill? A regular toothbrush works. Just plan on spending a lot more time on your knees.
How to Clean Grout Lines: Step by Step
Here is the change, and it’s one ingredient. Keep the baking soda, and throw out the vinegar. Mix the soda with dish soap instead.
This one actually makes chemical sense, which is more than the vinegar version ever did. The soda stays a base and gives you grit to scrub with. The dish soap is a surfactant, so it lifts the greasy film that holds dirt in the joint. Nothing cancels anything out.
Step 1: Mix the Paste
Put two parts baking soda in a bowl. Then add one part dish soap. Stir until you get a paste, not a liquid. It should be thick enough to sit on the grout instead of running off.
Step 2: Spread It on the Grout
Use a spoon or an old brush to spread the paste along the grout lines. Cover the dirty spots fully.
Step 3: Let it sit for 10 to 15 minutes
This is the step that decides how much scrubbing you do. While the paste sits, it does the work instead of your arm. Just don’t let it dry out completely. Dried paste is harder to rinse off than the dirt was.
Step 4: Scrub with a drill brush
This is where most people lose the war. They grab a toothbrush, spend two hours on their knees, and quit halfway through the kitchen. A drill brush attachment costs about $10. It does the same job while you stand up, and it takes a fraction of the time. That one purchase is the difference between a job you finish and a job you abandon.
Quick tip from someone who messed it up: don’t rush the paste. Give it a full 10 minutes, keep the drill slow, and save yourself a lot of scrubbing and cleanup.
Step 5: Rinse and wipe clean
Rinse with clean water and wipe the area with a cloth. Check for leftover paste. Since the dish soap helps everything rinse away, you shouldn’t see that white film.
How Do You Keep Grout Clean Longer?
Seal it. This is the last step, and skipping it is why grout gets dirty again in three months. Cement grout is porous. It’s basically a sponge.
Wait until the grout is clean and completely dry. Then wipe grout sealer along the joint. A bottle costs a few dollars, and it stops the next spill from soaking in. Sealed grout still needs a wipe now and then, but the dirt sits on top instead of sinking in. So a quick wipe is all it takes. Seal it once, and your hard work lasts for years instead of months.
Related: How to Clean a Shower Drain in 5 Easy Steps
What If the Grout Is Stained All the Way Through?
Sometimes cleaning can’t save it. You’ll know, because the grout comes back gray the moment it dries. In that case, you have two options. Both cost under $20.
- Grout paint: Paint it over the top. It’s fast, and it looks good for a couple of years.
- Re-grout: Dig out the old joint with a grout saw and fill it with new grout. It takes an afternoon, but it lasts about a decade. Just don’t guess the amount. Enter your tile size and joint width in our grout calculator before you buy.
Final Thoughts
So here is the whole thing. Skip the vinegar, and skip the bleach. Use baking soda and dish soap, a $10 drill brush, and 15 minutes. Then seal it. That’s how to clean grout lines without wasting a weekend or damaging your floor.
Pick one room and start this week. Then tell us in the comments which room you chose and how bad it was, out of 10.