This year, the LIY Team is hopping on the “crunchy” trend and making a conscious effort to slowly but surely swap our household and beauty products over to brands with clean, non-toxic, ingredients. While we might be a liiitle behind on the movement, it’s never too late to start making healthy lifestyle changes for yourself and your family! Our latest venture? Finding a clean laundry detergent that actually cleans our clothes too!
We love the idea of using clean everyday products and with with so many detergents on the market, we took it upon ourselves to put several of the most popular brands to the ultimate test! As boy moms with sweaty husbands and several furry family members, we’re taking matters into our own hands [and our own dirty laundry] to find the best of the best! Get ready to wash, dry, fold and repeat, friends. Here are The Best Clean, Non-toxic Laundry Detergents.
Brands We Tested
Attitude // Aspen // Meliora // Dropps // Molly’s Suds
The Results
Our Top Pick
Molly’s Suds Liquid Detergent
If you’re purchasing one clean detergent to try, let it be Molly’s Suds! Several of us used this brand prior to testing and will be sticking with it, even after trying other brands! It’s highly concentrated, so a little bit goes a long way and it lasts for about 100 loads! Our clothes felt soft after washing and held a light scent that wasn’t overpowering. It seemed to check all the boxes for us and even handled stinky gym clothes!
Best Detergent Pods
Dropps Detergent Pods
If you prefer the ease of a pod style detergent, we loved these Dropps! The scent lingers for a while after washing and it’s stronger than most other brands. My kids and husband all commented on how their clothes smelled! They are quite small, so we preferred to use two pods for loads that were more heavily soiled like gym clothes and towels.
Best Powder Detergent
Meliora Laundry Powder
If you tend to go for a powder based detergent, we were pleasantly surprised by Meliora. We love that it’s plastic free and a tiny scoop works for an entire load [although we ended up using two scoops for dirtier laundry to get a deeper clean]. The fragrance was very light and didn’t linger for long, which we didn’t mind, especially if you’re sensitive to overpowering smells. It also comes with a reusable stainless steel scoop!
Didn’t Make the Cut…
Aspen Clean Pods
These didn’t stand out to us. Even after using two pods per load, the eucalyptus & rosemary scent disappeared without a trace. We didn’t feel like these could handle stinky gym clothes + dirty toddler clothes! This brand would work better for someone who prefers an unscented detergent with very lightly soiled laundry.
Attitude Liquid Detergent
When we said we were putting these detergents to the ultimate test, we meant it. We didn’t feel like this cleaned our clothes at all and one of us could still smell toddler pee / dog throw up. Again, this might work better for someone with lightly soiled laundry, but won’t work for our lifestyles with dogs, kids, and sweaty gym clothes.