Generally speaking, we recommend using baking soda and vinegar as a gentle and natural cleaner that is also tough on soap scum and hard water buildup.
How do professionals clean showers? Professionals use acid-based cleaning solutions like vinegar for hard water spots and soap scum. For deep-set soap scum, cleaners will use heavy-duty detergents and degreasers. Bleach cleaning solutions are best reserved for cleaning the mold and mildew from grout.
Baking Soda and Vinegar
To get rid of soap or grout stains on your tiles, just add some water to the baking soda and make a thick paste. Apply this paste generously to your tiles. Add a few drops of vinegar to the paste to clean your tiles even more effectively.
Our top pick, Scrubbing Bubbles Disinfectant Bathroom Grime Fighter Spray, does away with soap scum and dirt. It also gets rid of 99.9% of viruses and bacteria, earning it our best overall rating for its great cleaning power.
Sometimes, with soap scum, professionals will need detergents or degreasers as well to clean it thoroughly. Bleach is good for removing mold and mildew from your shower grout, but it's more of a temporary solution. You need to really clean the mold from within and seal the grout to prevent any mold from spreading.
Bleach works great on vinyl, nonporous tile and even grout. Back-to-school cleaning. Ace your cleaning curriculum with Clorox products and tips. Hard, nonporous flooring surfaces, especially those in bathrooms and kitchens, can be easily cleaned with a Clorox bleach and water solution.
Final Verdict. Our top pick is the RMR-86 Instant Mold and Mildew Stain Remover for its versatility and effectiveness on nearly every surface. For those looking for an eco-friendly mold remover with natural ingredients, we recommend CLR Mold and Mildew Clear.
With sponge in hand, you should start scrubbing down the walls of your shower, starting at the top and slowly working your way down to the bottom. If there's a substantial amount of dirt and grime in your shower, you should use baking soda to help break it down, then respray and use the sponge to clear it off.
Spray all over the tub and shower and let it sit for a few minutes to a few hours, depending how challenging the job is. Scrub if you need to, but the scum should rub right off. Don't worry about the strong vinegar smell. You will be pleasantly surprised it smells more like Dawn than vinegar!
The dish-washing liquid, when combined with an equal part of vinegar, is a solution that many pinners praise for taking off soap scum without scrubbing. I don't know what mystical ingredient blue Dawn has hidden inside, but this stuff works. Just spray, wipe, and rinse.
To that end, you can go for an all-purpose solution with equal parts dish soap and white vinegar. To make the combo even more potent, feel free to add a couple of drops of antimicrobial essential oils. Another powerful mixture consists of three quarts of hot water, ½ cup ammonia, and ½ cup distilled white vinegar.
If you have brown or white residue or scum that builds up in your shower, toilet or sink and won't come off easily with standard cleaners, this is also a tell-tale sign of hard water.
Using bleach is a popular method and involves mixing equal parts of chlorine bleach and water in a spray bottle, and spraying all shower surfaces before scrubbing away with a soft cloth. Any remaining stubborn stains will require extra scrubbing using an old toothbrush can work for this.
Roff Cera Clean is the best pick for cleaning all types of tile surfaces. It is an all-purpose product that works well for getting rid of any kind of dust or oil accumulation on tiles. This highly versatile liquid takes rapid action on the surface and helps in retaining its natural look.
Rinse the shower tiles with clean water and use a squeegee to dry them. To clean shower grout with white vinegar, mix one part vinegar to two parts water and scrub with a stiff brush.
If your shower has not been used for a week or more, run water from both hot and cold supplies through the shower hose and showerhead for two minutes. To ensure no spray escapes from the showerhead, run it through a bucket of water or full bath.