Clean Your Earrings With These Easy Household Hacks

Cleaning earrings

Keeping your earrings clean is easier than you might think! Here at EarFleek, our experts rely on common household materials to keep their pearls polished and their studs sparkly. We love these simple solutions because they often only require us to use materials that we already have in our home.

Below, we’ve listed our favorite household hacks for keeping your piercings clean and your jewelry beautiful for years to come.

General Cleaning Tips

Before jumping into our favorite hacks, we want to make sure you keep these important pro-tips in mind when cleaning your jewelry:

  • Scrubbing With the Right Brushes

When it comes to cleaning your earrings, scrubbing is a great way to dislodge built-up debris. However, you never want to use an abrasive brush to scrub your jewelry, as this can leave scratches on the material. Always use a jewelry brush when possible. In most cases, a soft-bristled toothbrush will work just as well.

  • Drying Cleaned Earrings

Always have a small, fresh towel on hand for drying your clean earrings. Dry them as soon as you’re done cleaning them to prevent them from tarnishing or growing bacteria.

With these two things in mind, you’re ready to start cleaning! 

Hydrogen Peroxide

Cleaning earrings with hydrogen peroxide

Hydrogen peroxide is a safe household cleaner that can be used on any piece of jewelry. It kills bacteria and dislodges dirt and grime. Hydrogen peroxide is also a safe cleaning solution for sensitive ears.

Place your earrings in a dish and add hydrogen peroxide until they’re fully covered. You might start to see things bubble – that’s a sign that the hydrogen peroxide has a lot to clean! No bubbles? No worries! It’s still doing the trick – it just means that your earrings weren’t too dirty to begin with.

After leaving them in the hydrogen peroxide for 20 minutes, rinse your earrings in warm water and dry them with a clean towel.

Window Cleaner

Window cleaner earring hack

If you don’t have hydrogen peroxide in your home, we’ve found that common window cleaners like Windex are equally safe and will also do the trick to remove dirt and grime.

Use a soft toothbrush or jewelry brush to gently wipe away any debris. Rinse your earrings in warm water to remove remaining chemical residue. Don’t forget to dry them with a clean towel!

Toothpaste

Toothpaste earring cleaning hack

Using toothpaste to clean earrings is one of our favorite hacks. It’s best to use non-abrasive toothpaste so as to avoid creating tiny scratches in the jewelry’s finish. To clean, place your earrings in a bowl with a small amount of water, apply toothpaste to a soft toothbrush, and gently scrub away.

This is safe for most jewelry, but you should never use toothpaste on pearls or opals, as it can dull their shine. Avoid using toothpaste on gemstones, too, as it has more potential than the other cleaning materials to leave tiny abrasions.

Cleaning Gemstone Earrings

How to clean gemstone earrings

Gemstones are more likely to scratch than other materials like diamonds or cubic zirconia. Protect your gemstone earrings by only using very mild cleaners and the proper jewelry brushes.

To clean, place a few drops of mild dish soap in a container with warm water. Dip your jewelry brush into this solution and gently scrub your earrings clean. Rinse the earrings with warm water and dry them with a clean towel.

Tips on Cleaning New Piercings

Cleaning brand new piercings is a unique situation. Since you need to leave your earrings in for 4-6 weeks while your piercing heals, you cannot clean the earring like you would with the methods above.

Instead, we suggest you simply use a Q-tip or cotton ball and gently apply rubbing alcohol to the front and back of the earlobe and earring. Gently rotate the earring a few times to help dislodge grime. This will prevent infection, allowing your new piercing to heal beautifully.

Keep Your Earrings Clean and Your Style Fresh with EarFleek

Earring subscriptions

Keeping your earring collection fresh is even easier than keeping it clean! Add to your collection each month with a subscription to EarFleek and your jewelry box will never go stale. Use code BLOG to get 50% off your first month when you subscribe here!

 

Written by Megan
Written by Megan

Megan is a writer and digital marketer living in the Pacific Northwest who subsists mostly on coffee. As a lover of travel, cat fostering, and cocktail making, she has a hard time deciding how to spend her free time (and usually just ends up watching Netflix).

 

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