Making your own homemade cleaning sprays with natural ingredients and essential oils couldn’t be easier! Here are three unique recipes to get you started.
Do you know what happens to me when I walk down a store’s cleaning aisle?
Woah, nelly! I feel like I’m just smacked in the face with a cloud of artificial fragrances. I don’t know if I’m more sensitive to the scents since eliminating them from our home or if brands use more fragrance in their formulas now.
Whatever the case may be, I do know that artificial fragrances are getting more attention as legitimate environmental health hazards. And they give me a headache.
Thankfully, it’s really easy to avoid these fragrances by making my own cleaning sprays with simple ingredients. These are effective and inexpensive (bonus!), and when I add essential oils, they smell just as nice as the store bought brands.
I have three different homemade cleaning spray formulas for you today. Each one is best suited for a particular need, so be sure to make note of that when choosing a spray to use in your home. Having all three available will cover all of your bases!
Homemade Cleaning Sprays
Affiliate links are included for project ingredients and supplies, never costing you extra but supporting this site with a commission if you make a purchase. Thanks!
For each cleaning spray recipe, you’ll need a 16 oz. plastic spray bottle (or the spray bottle top). You can certainly use glass spray bottles if you’d like, but I prefer plastic bottles for cleaning because these tend to get knocked around a bit.
It’s really helpful to label your cleaning sprays with the ingredients and best uses. You don’t want to waste your time using peroxide to try to get soap scum off of a shower or vinegar to remove grease and grime!
Vinegar Base
- 1 cup vinegar
- 20 drops essential oil
- 1 cup water
Combine vinegar and essential oil, then swirl to combine. Add the remaining water.
Vinegar-base cleaning sprays are great for cutting soap scum and hard water buildup. They are also mildly disinfectant.
Soap & Borax Base
- 1 cup hot water
- 1 T borax
- 1 T liquid Castile soap
- 1 cup cold water
- 20 drops essential oil
In a glass measuring cup, pour hot water over the borax and stir to dissolve. Combine the castile soap, cold water, and essential oil in the spray bottle. Swirl to combine, then add the hot water and borax mixture and swirl again to fully mix.
Pick soap and borax-based cleaning sprays for grease, grime, stains, and odors. These are also your best bet for potty training accidents!
Peroxide Base
- 16 oz. hydrogen peroxide
- 20 drops essential oil
For this one, it’s easiest to add the essential oil directly to the peroxide in the brown bottle. Just replace the bottle cap with a spray bottle top. Peroxide needs to be kept in an opaque bottle to remain effective, so you don’t want to store this one in a clear plastic spray bottle unless it’s always kept in the dark.
A peroxide spray is a great addition for cleaning and disinfecting the kitchen (think cutting boards and food prep areas) and bathroom. You can also get more disinfecting power by spraying a surface with vinegar first, then following with a spray of peroxide.
But Don’t Combine These Ingredients
Some green cleaning ingredients shouldn’t be combined when making your sprays:
- Peroxide and vinegar mixed together create peracetic acid, an unstable compound that could be potentially harmful.
- Baking soda and vinegar are fun for our kiddos, but they really just neutralize each other when they’re done fizzing.
- Vinegar and castile soap leave you with messy globs of oil and liquid. The acidic vinegar causes the saponified natural oils in the soap to return back to fat.
Essential Oils for Cleaning
Most essential oils have some sort of antimicrobial activity, so you don’t have to worry too much about finding the “right” oil or blend. You can even go by scent alone when choosing essential oils for your cleaning sprays.
Tea tree is a favorite for cleaning recipes because it works on fungi, viruses, and bacteria. Citrus oils smell really fresh and are nicely disinfectant. You can’t go wrong with jack-of-all-trades lavender, of course! Really, any of my favorite multipurpose essential oils are great choices for cleaning.
Homemade disinfecting essential oil blends can be fun when you’re making your own cleaning materials, too.
Most of my essential oils are from Florihana (sold through Tropical Traditions), but you can also get quality essential oils from Plant Therapy.
Leticia says
December 8, 2018 at 11:44 amGood morning I came across a video about Whole Foods oils and really put me unease I also have a collection of Dotter oils also I know some say that their wickin in wholes foods I would likt to know if the Dottera oil is ok to use.I give all honor and glory day to God and for sending his son for us thank you Jesus . Thank you. I would to here from you have blessed day♥️Leticia
Kristen Smith says
December 8, 2018 at 1:36 pmHello Leticia. I don’t personally use doTERRA oils, but I have friends who do and they have been happy with the brand. A lot can go into choosing essential oil brands (just like choosing our favorite grocery store) and some of it is simply personal preference. I share a few guidelines on choosing oil brands in this post and go more in-depth in my book here. Since you already own the essential oils, I would encourage you to use them so they aren’t wasted.
Karen Daniels says
November 3, 2018 at 11:33 amThe following recipe has me a bit confused. The 3rd ingredient (?). Then in the directions it calls for Castile soap which isn’t listed in the recipe.
1 cup hot water
1 T borax
1 T liquid glass spray bottles
1 cup cold water
20 drops essential oil
In a glass measuring cup, pour hot water over the borax and stir to dissolve. Combine the castile soap, cold water, and essential oil in the spray bottle. Swirl to combine, then add the hot water and borax mixture and swirl again to fully mix.
Kristen Smith says
November 3, 2018 at 1:57 pmAh, thank you for alerting me to that, Karen! That error is from an annoying glitch that changed wording when I added a link. Sometimes I wouldn’t catch that it did that, as happened this time. I’ll update it right away.
The third ingredient is supposed to be 1 T liquid castile soap, not liquid spray bottles. (Goodness… that wouldn’t make sense at all!) I hope that helps!