Does Washing Clothes At 30 Degrees Really Work? My Accidental Experiment….

I’ve washed most of our clothes at 30°C for years now.

I still wash things like bedding, towels, bath mats and particularly dirty whites at a higher temperature, but for everyday clothes I’ve always been happy with a 30 degree wash. It’s cheaper to run, it’s gentler on our clothes and I’ve never felt like they come out anything other than clean.

Last weekend though, I accidentally did my own little experiment.

I started the day by washing our bedding, towels and bath mats, so I turned the washing machine up to 60°C as I normally would. The problem was that I completely forgot to turn it back down afterwards.

Don’t judge me here but I’d hardly done any washing the week before because it had been so hot, so I ended up doing another four loads that day. It wasn’t until I’d finished the last load that I realised every single one of them had been washed at 60°C instead of my usual 30°C.

Thankfully nothing shrank or was damaged, but what really surprised me was that I genuinely couldn’t tell the difference.

The clothes looked just as clean.

They smelled exactly the same.

They felt exactly the same.

If someone had asked me which load had been washed at 60°C and which had been washed at 30°C, I honestly wouldn’t have been able to tell you.

That was all the reassurance I needed that washing our everyday clothes at 30°C is absolutely the right choice for us.

Does Washing Clothes At 30 Degrees Save Money?

Yes, although probably not as much as some of the headlines would have you believe.

The exact saving depends on your washing machine, the programme you use and your electricity tariff, but because most of the energy a washing machine uses goes into heating the water, lower temperatures generally mean lower running costs.

As a rough guide, a modern washing machine costs around:

• 30°C: 8-12p per wash
• 40°C: 12-18p per wash
• 60°C: 20-30p per wash

We normally do around five loads of washing each week, which works out at roughly 260 loads over the course of a year. Based on the figures above, that’s approximately:

If you’re currently washing your everyday clothes at 40°C, switching them to 30°C could save somewhere in the region of £10-£20 a year. If you washed everything at 60°C, the saving would obviously be even greater although I still think towels, bedding, bath mats and particularly dirty whites benefit from a hotter wash so I won’t do all of our washing at 30°C.

What Do I Wash At 30°C?

Almost all of our everyday washing goes in at 30°C:

• T-shirts
• Jeans
• Jumpers
• Dresses
• Everyday tops
• Most coloured washing

The only things I regularly wash at 60°C are towels, bedding, bath mats and particularly dirty whites.

My Tips For Washing Clothes At 30°C

If you’re thinking about switching to a 30 degree wash for your everyday clothes, these are the things that work well for us.

Sort your washing first. I always separate whites from colours to stop colours running and to help keep whites looking their best.

Don’t overload the washing machine. Clothes need room to move around if they’re going to come out properly clean.

Use the right amount of detergent. More detergent doesn’t necessarily mean cleaner clothes. I just follow the instructions on the packet based on the size of the load.

Treat stains before they go in the machine. If something’s particularly grubby, I’d rather deal with the stain first than rely on a hotter wash to do the job.

Is Washing At 30°C Better For Your Clothes?

One of the reasons I’ve stuck with 30°C for so long isn’t just the money.

Lower temperature washes are generally kinder to fabrics, which means clothes are less likely to fade, elastic tends to last longer and there’s less wear on prints and delicate fibres. Modern detergents are designed to work really well at lower temperatures, so for everyday washing I don’t feel like I’m compromising at all.

So, Does Washing Clothes At 30 Degrees Really Work?

For us, it absolutely does. This accidental experiment actually made me feel even better about washing at 30°C because I’d accidentally given myself the perfect comparison. If washing our clothes at 60°C had made them noticeably cleaner, fresher or brighter, I’d have seen it straight away. But I didn’t and I didn’t because the results were exactly the same.

The dial was quickly turned back to 30°C and that’s where it’ll be staying for our everyday washing. I’ll still use a hotter wash for bedding, towels and anything that needs a more hygienic clean, but for everything else I can’t see any reason to use anything other than 30°C.

Sometimes the best money-saving habits are the ones that don’t really feel like you’re making an effort. This is one of those for me. It costs nothing to try, I haven’t noticed any difference in how clean our clothes come out and, over the course of a year, it all adds up.

I know saving £10 or £20 a year isn’t going to change anyone’s life, but if I can save that without noticing any difference in the results then I’ll take it. It’s one of those little changes that takes no extra effort once you’ve got into the habit, and those are usually my favourite kind.

I’d love you to follow me on Twitter and it would be amazing to see you over on my Facebook page and on Instagram. If you’re interested, you can find out more about me here and while I’ve got your attention, if you’re wondering why some of my posts lately are a little bit less frugal then have a read of this post. 😉

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