When you read these 17 super clever, thrifty and amazing uses for Dawn dish soap, you’ll never want to be without it again.
If you love thrifty, DIY cleaning ideas, you should read How to Make Your Own Natural Cleaners. Another one of my faves is our list of all the ways you can use dryer sheets.
17 Uses for Dawn Dish Soap
Quick tip: Always make sure you buy the original Dawn. The plain blue stuff is what you want.
First a note about one of the controversial uses for Dawn dish soap.
If you’ve successfully used it in the past to get rid of fleas on your dog or get rid of the awful smell after a showdown with a skunk, you’re not alone.
It works. Those fleas jump ship for sure.
But, there is also evidence that it’s not good to use Dawn on pets very often.
Yes, it’s used to get the oil off the poor birds that we all see on television. (Thank you for that, Dawn.) But it’s not meant as a regular shampoo for our pets.
If you use it on them regularly, it’ll dry out their skin and cause a whole new set of problems.
The best advice about using Dawn on your pets? Call your vet.
1. Degrease those tools.
Run about a gallon of hot water and put a TBSP of this blue gold and that grime will wipe away. Tip: Use old rags to clean them and another to dry them off right away. We don’t want any rust!
2. Garden pest fighter.
You’ve worked so hard to have such a beautiful garden and then the dreaded aphids show up. If you haven’t heard of aphids, you haven’t been gardening very long.
An aphid is a tiny bug that sucks the sap right out of plants. Even worse, they make babies so fast that before you know it, you have an infestation. They will ruin your garden.
Don’t worry. The bees and ladybugs will be just fine. Won’t hurt them at all.
Mix 2.5 TBSP of Dawn with a gallon of water and spray the tops and bottoms of the leaves. You’ll have to do it for a few days to get rid of the little buggers.
(Please be sure to test a little on your plant before spraying it completely.)
3. Clean hairbrushes with Dawn dish soap.
Make sure you get all the hair out of your hairbrushes – or at least as much as you can.
You’ll need a TBSP of Dawn and a TBSP of 20 Mule Team Borax and hot water. Mix it all up (I put it in my sink) and soak your hairbrushes until they’re clean.
4. Clean fireplace brick.
Have you ever cleaned the brick exterior of your fireplace? No? All it takes is some Dawn, some salt, water, and a stiff bristled brush. (And some elbow grease!)
Mix together a half cup of Dawn and a half cup of salt. Add enough warm water to make it into a paste.
Rub it into the brick, let it dry (only takes about 10 minutes or so) and start scrubbing with your brush.
When you’re all done, wipe the brick down with water and a sponge.
5. Prevent paint from sticking to your skin.
Painting your walls? Before you begin, put some Dawn in the palms of your hands and rub it all over your arms and hands. Let it dry.
When you finish painting, you can wash the inevitable drips right off your skin!
6. Get rid of hair dye stains.
After you get your hair done, you can clean up any stains left behind on your skin with a little Dawn and some warm water.
7. Remove greasy food stains.
From pizza grease to french fry grease, Dawn makes it a cinch to get rid of the stains left behind on your clothes.
Put a drop of two of the soap right on the stain, scrub it in and wash the way you normally would.
8. Clean stainless steel appliances.
If you’re like me, your stainless steel refrigerator always looks like there are ghosts in your house who love putting their handprints all over it.
I tried this trick and it got rid of all my refrigerator ghosts.
Put a little bit of Dawn dish soap on a damp, soft sponge. Squish it with your hand until it looks soapy.
Starting from the top, wipe the fridge in the direction of the grain, which sounds weird because you may not have known stainless steel has a grain.
Look closely at the appliance and you’ll see that it does.
When you’re finished, rinse it off. I use a spray bottle of clean water and a clean sponge. After all that DRY IT OFF with paper towels. Make sure it’s totally dry or you’ll wind up with spotty stainless steel.
9. Clean greasy cabinets.
Think about how many times, just in one day, fingers touch cabinets. Holy cow! They’ll definitely start to look gross if we don’t clean them – especially around the spots where we open and close them.
Using the exact same method you used cleaning stainless steel, clean your cabinets. But first, please check a small spot somewhere inconspicuous to be sure it doesn’t cause any damage.
10. Clean car tires and hubcaps with Dawn dish soap.
Hose them off really well and then put some Dawn on a rag and start scrubbing away. It’s amazing how well it will clean them up.
Don’t forget to rinse them off after you’re done to get all the soap off.
You’ll never have to buy special tire cleaner again.
11. Remove sticky goop from kids’ hair.
You know that putty kids love? Try removing it from their hair with shampoo and you’ll probably pull your own hair out!
Rub a little Dawn between your fingers and work through the spot in the hair that has something sticky in it. Shampoo as normal.
12. Clean the driveway.
Oil stains look so yucky on your nice driveway. Cover the spots with kitty litter, Dawn dish soap, and hot water. Scrub away with a hard bristled brush.
13. Remove stickers and labels.
I bought a super cute glass cannister which, unfortunately, had a big sticker right on the front.
I covered the sticker in Dawn and let it sit awhile. It slid right off with no residue left behind!
14. Make some fun bubbles for the kids.
You’ll need:
6 cups of water
1 cup of Dawn
¼ cup of corn syrup
Stir together the water and Dawn, but try not to make it foamy. Be gentle. Next, mix in the syrup. When it’s all mixed together, cover it and let it sit overnight.
15. DIY ice pack.
This is one of my favorites! Fill a baggie about half-way with Dawn. Squeeze the air out and seal it. Pop it in the freezer until it’s like a gel. It’ll be flexible and ready to go.
16. Unclog a sink or shower drain.
Pour ½ cup of Dawn into the drain and let it sit for half an hour. Pour some boiling water in the drain.
17. Sidewalk De-Icer
You can mix 1 teaspoon of Dawn dishwashing liquid, 1 tablespoon of rubbing alcohol, and 1/2 gallon of warm water. Pour this mixture over your walkways. This will keep them from refreezing.
So there you go! Tell me how you use Dawn dish soap. Did I miss something great?
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29 comments on “17 Uses for Dawn Dish Soap that have Nothing to do with Washing Dishes”
Help, can I use my Dawn inmy washer to clean my Jean’s I used for weed eating they got oily gas on them . I tried washing with Tide 2 x but still have the smell. Thinking it’s just not cutting the residue completely.
I clean my windows with a mixture of 2 Tbs. Dawn dish soap, 2 Tbs. of alcohol and 2 Tbs. of ammonia to a gallon of warm water. Put the water in your bucket first or you’ll have a lot of suds. You clean your windows with a microfiber cloth and dry it with another one. No rinsing required. You can do your windows, the tracks and around your window all at the same time. Works great! Not a lot of elbow grease required either. I’ve been using this mixture for years.
When drilling stainless steel, use a drop of dawn as lubricant instead of oil. It is amazing. I’ve used dawn to drill half inch stainless metal and it doesn’t wear out the drill bit, and cuts very well.
Use Dawn to cure poison ivy. I’m serious! Smear it on the affected area, rub it in, then rinse it off. For best results, towel dry thoroughly. For an advanced case, you may need to repeat several times.
Dawn fights the cause, not just the symptoms. It removes the oily toxin, so the rash and itch clear up much sooner than you’d expect.
Try it and see! We live in the woods, and we swear by it.
bath your dogs with it once a week
I knew it got fleas out pets but rest i didnt no bout
Flea killer
It kills fleas on an animal.
Weed Killer
Mix it with salt and vinegar you have your diy weed killer.
Try using Dawn to get rid of capsaicin oil after slicing hot peppers (I didn’t have any gloves). It worked for me!
Artist find that dawn is great brush cleaner when they are used with oil paints.
#16. Works Great unplugging toilets too!
1 cup, hot water, let sit and give it sometime!
We just gave our kitty a bath with dawn to get rid of the fleas she had when we rescued her. It worked, and we thank you and he (kitty Samson) thanks you
Can I used Dawn dish washing soap to clean my carpet?
I’m what you call a broke person. Can I reasonably use Dawn to wash my clothes?
I use it on my clothes to get deodorant stains out. Rub it on, let it set for a few minutes, wash. Yes, you can use it as laundry detergent, just don’t use too much or you will get suds that overflow.
We had these teeny tiny ants thousands of them in our kitchen the other night. I never saw such tiny ones before, they were so small you could hardly see them. I only knew they were there because they moved. Anyway, first I used Clorox whips to kill them all, or so I thought. Later that night I checked and they were back again I used the wipes to kill them. Then I saw where they were coming from and took my trusty antibiotics Dawn and squeezed it where they were coming out. Also, where I had seen them. The next morning and few days nothing appeared. Dawn kept them out.
Any suggestions on how to use Dawn for little ants that show up in out kitchen the last 3 yrs out of 36 yrs and a few times here and there in the bathroom now during the summer months. I don’t know where they’re coming from.
my puppy had major surgery that required two drains in the incision. He was very sick and the blood continued to drain for over 10 days. He is spoiled, naturally, and slept in the bed with me. I had to cover it with something, so having moved into a retirement residence, my supplies were limited. I found three very heavy, good quality white bath towel sheets and covered the bed with them. It wasn’t the most sanitary solution for me, but it did protect my bed and bedding. They were covered in large blood spots, especially the one, and I was about to throw them out when I remembered Dawn Platinum. Boy!!! Thank goodness that i still have a memory. I took the towel that was almost totally covered and dropped a little Dawn on each circle. I didn’t even rub the detergent in. I simply allowed it to remain in the washer for about 15 to 20 minutes, and then simply pushed the on button. You should see my towels! They are pure white again and like new. Thank you Dawn. No body would believe the before and the after. Remember, that blood had dried in for at lease ten days. I had to allow it to set and dry because he was still draining, and If I removed them, I had nothing to replace them with. My Puppy is not a small dog, so he bled a lot. Thank you again and again.
Windows – my professional window cleaners put a bit of dawn in water and wipe the windows with it, then dry with a soft cloth. They don’t even rinse them.
As a wallpaper remover. In a spray bottle add about a eighth of a cup (eyeball it) add water as hot as you can get from the tap water. Spray it on the wallpaper, let it set about 5 minutes then use a flexible metal spatula, hold it down on the back side of the spatula next to the handle and at about 12-15 degree from the wall with the tip down. When removing the paper do not wet wall so far ahead that it is too cool or too dry.
Grease on clothes. Even a mechanic’s clothes will come clean! Just put it on the spots and lightly brush or rub it in.
Perfect for stains on baby clothes ! Especially breast milk poop! I also used essential oils on my 9 year old , and they burned her skin. The nurse suggested dish soap to get it off! Worked wonders!
I also used it to clean my Snow Village pieces that I have over my kitchen cabinets. It worked wonders.