Homemade Laundry Detergent

The best homemade laundry detergent recipe with Borax, Washing Soda and Ivory Soap.  Cut your laundry costs to less than 10.00 per year.

Would you even believe it? Well, good news! I’ve been using this homemade laundry detergent recipe for almost 3 years now, and I truly love it. This liquid laundry detergent is fantastic for he washers and regular washing machines!  It’s super-easy to make, and you’ll reduce your laundry costs to about 10 dollars per year!

You may have seen this recipe on my site before.  This post is an update to make the directions more clear and concise. Same recipe, just more to-the-point.  I’ll also address some frequently asked questions at the bottom of this post.

This laundry soap gets our clothes clean, it’s free of the toxic chemicals that your commercial detergents are full of, and it’s super-easy to make.  Best of all, I get over a year’s worth of detergent (and that’s for a family of 4 and a busy home daycare), for somewhere between 10 and 15 bucks.

Homemade laundry detergent recipe:

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• 1 cup Borax
• 1 cup Arm & Hammer Washing Soda
• 1 bar of Ivory Soap (original)
• water
• grater
• 5-gallon bucket with lid
• medium pot & long handled spoon
• empty, pre-used jug (a laundry detergent or juice jug works well)

Prepare your bucket:

If your bucket isn’t marked, use a permanent marker to make a line at the 5-gallon point.  If you think you’ll make your detergent a half-batch at a time, mark the 2.5 gallon point.  Use a large measuring cup and water to do this. You may need google’s help converting cups to gallons.

How to make your laundry detergent:

This recipe makes 5 gallons of concentratedsoap, but yields 10 gallons of detergent.

1. Grate soap, and add to pot with 4 cups hot water.  Stir over med heat until dissolved.
2. Pour into bucket and add Borax and Washing Soda.
3. Stir well until powders have completely dissolved.
4. Fill bucket to the 5 gallon mark with with warm water.  **see tip below
5. Stir, cover, and let it “set” for 24 hours.
6. Whisk or stir well to break up any lumps
7. Half-fill an empty laundry container or juice jug with your detergent and fill the rest of the way with water.

**BUCKET-FILLING TIP:  If you have a retractable hose/nozzle at your kitchen sink, simply place your bucket on the floor in front of the sink, and stretch the hose over and fill.

Using your detergent:

SHAKE WELL  before each use as detergent ingredients can settle and separate.

For front-loading/HE machines: 1/4 cup detergent per load.

For top-loading, regular machines: 1/2 cup detergent per load.

Consider switching to vinegar as a fabric softener:

To cut laundry costs even more, try white vinegar as a fabric softener and rinse agent.  I’ve been using it for 3 years due to allergies in our home.  It’s a fraction of the cost of commercial softeners, it’s chemical free, and it cleans my machine as it softens my clothes. And no, our clothes do not smell like vinegar. 

FAQS – Answer to questions commonly asked about my homemade laundry detergent:

• Yes, this homemade detergent cleans as well as commercial laundry detergents.
• Yes, it is ideal for HE machines, but it works well in regular machines too.
• No, you do not use the entire contents of the box to make the detergent.  1 CUP of each powder plus a bar of soap makes one 5 gallon bucket-full. Those boxes will make many, many 5 gallon pails of detergent in the year to come.
• Yes, your detergent may look different every time you use it.  Sometimes mine is watery and pulpy looking.  Sometimes it’s thicker with blobs of gel throughout.  Other times, it sets up with a thick layer of gel on top.  Don’t worry about what it looks like.  The key ingredients are in there.  It will work.
• Yes, the detergent and ingredients will keep indefinitely.
• Yes, you can make homemade powdered detergent as well but this version is more economical.
• Yes, you may miss the smell of your old detergent.  That smell wasn’t really “mountain fresh” anyway.  It was chemicals pretending to be “mountain fresh”.
• You can add essential oils to scent your detergent if you like.  I haven’t tried it, so I can’t recommend how much you would actually add.
• No, you will not see sudsing. This is very low sudsing detergent.  “Suds” don’t actually clean your clothes.  They’re just a nice touch added by the industry to make you feel good about the product.
• Yes, a bar of Fels Naptha can be substituted for the Ivory.  As far as any other brands, I’ve heard you can use any mild bar soap, but I’ve not tried any brand but Ivory.
• I’m sorry, but I don’t know where to get these ingredients if you are in the UK, you can use a product called Borax Substitute.  In Australia, Borax and washing soda are available, they are known by different brand names though.  Google can probably help you with that.
• You can also read this tutorial for turning baking soda into washing soda.
• Borax and Washing Soda are powerful cleaners and deodorizers.  If you have a particularly grimy load, throw a half cup of each into your washer as a laundry booster.
• Yes this is a great detergent for those with allergies and sensitivities.

Re: using vinegar as a fabric softener.  When I did some reading about fabric softeners, I was shocked to learn that they are the most toxic product designed for household use.  It horrifies me to think that our babies and children are breathing in these chemicals day and night.  Please do some reading.  Google “fabric softeners toxic”, or read a couple of articles like this one from Thank your Body or this one from Healthy Living How To.  If you’d rather not use vinegar as a rinse agent, try skipping the softener altogether or using one of these natural alternatives.

If you truly miss the scent of commercial detergents and softeners, there are many natural essential oils on the market today.  These can be added to your homemade detergent.