How Often Should You Clean Your Kitchen Cabinets?

How Often Should I Clean My Kitchen Cabinets?

You should clean your kitchen cabinets at least once per month and deep clean them annually. Some households require their cabinets to be cleaned more or less frequently due to factors such as children, pets, and the color or material of the cabinets. 

As you can see, when it comes to cleaning kitchen cabinets, the necessary frequency can vary depending on the space’s overall cleanliness level and the material your cabinets are made of, as some alternatives hold on to oils and grime more easily. 

Should I Deep Clean My Kitchen Cabinets Frequently?

When it comes to keeping a tidy home, cleaning your kitchen cabinets should definitely be on top of your cleaning itinerary. However, it can be hard to determine how often you should clean them. So how frequently should you give your kitchen cabinets some extra attention? 

You should deep clean your cabinets at least every 6-12 months, or more if they get dirty quickly. If you’re giving your cabinets a quick clean once or twice a month you’ll be able to go longer without a deep scrub.

How often you clean your kitchen cabinets is up to you, but it’s always a good idea to give them a quick wipe down if you notice them becoming grubby or that splatters of food have gotten on them. Otherwise, cleaning once or twice a month should suffice for the exterior while cleaning every six months is excellent for re-organizing and cleaning the interior. 

How Often Should I Clean My Cabinet Exteriors?

The exterior portion of your kitchen cabinets is probably the most important to keep clean, as this is what everyone will see when walking into your kitchen.

Kitchen cabinet doors don’t tend to become overly dirty, but it’s always a good idea to keep up with their cleaning maintenance schedule. So, how often should you clean the outside of your cabinets? 

You should clean your cabinet exteriors as often as they appear dirty and at least once or twice per month even when they don’t. By regularly wiping down the outside of your kitchen cabinets, you can prevent them from building up hard-to-clean layers of food, oil, and grime. 

Regular cleanings of your kitchen cabinet’s exterior are also an excellent way to keep your home spotless and stop the spread of any potential viruses going around. This is because many people in your family touch those cabinets throughout the day, picking and transmitting bacteria. By regularly wiping your cabinets down, you prevent that bacteria from spreading. 

Most people opt to clean their cabinets’ surfaces every other week. This seems to be the perfect balance between over cleaning and under cleaning when it comes to maintaining a cabinet’s cleanliness. 

How Often Should You Clean Your Kitchen Cabinets?

As I briefly mentioned in the previous sections, it’s essential to clean the outside of your kitchen cabinets as well as their interior. The inside of a cabinet can easily become grimy due to leaks from packaged food and escaped crumbs. So how often should you attempt to manage the mess inside of your cabinets?

You should clean your kitchen cabinets’ exteriors about once or twice a month and the interiors every six months. By staying on top of your kitchen cabinet’s cleaning schedule, you can avoid harsh stains and hard-to-scrub messes in the future. 

By maintaining a regular cleaning schedule of your kitchen cabinets, you should have a lot less to clean when you eventually have to perform a thorough scrub. Not to mention that your kitchen cabinets will simply look better when you do so.

You may also notice that if your cabinets are a lighter color, such as eggshell, creme, or white, you’ll have to clean them more. This doesn’t necessarily mean that you and your family are less careful or harder on light colors; it’s simply because light colors show grim more easily.

The grime is still there with the dark cabinets, you just won’t see it as much, and it will come off far more quickly. Therefore, it’s essential that you clean up any perceived grime from light color cabinets as quickly as possible; otherwise, they’re also more likely to stain. 

I want to note that not all cabinet materials will be easy to clean, and some definitely accrue more stubborn build-up than others, meaning you’ll have to be cautious when choosing a new model. You should also be careful as to what cleaners you use on certain surfaces, such as wood, laminate, and painted cabinets, as using the wrong chemicals can cause warping or chipping, rendering the whole cleaning process useless. 

How To Clean Kitchen Cabinets

Last but not least, I want to go over how to best clean your kitchen cabinets and what products you should use on them. 

You will need:

• A rag
• An old toothbrush
• Paper towels
• A spray bottle
• A vacuum
• Vinegar and baking soda solution
• Rejuvenate Cabinet Cleaner (available on Amazon.com). This fantastic product fills in scratches on wooden cabinets and seals the wood to protect it from future damage.

If your cabinets are not made of wood, you can disregard the last cleaner and simply opt for the vinegar and baking soda solution. 

How to clean the exterior of your kitchen cabinets:

1. Dampen your wash rag and apply some of the baking soda solution. 
2. Gently wipe down the cabinet’s surface. 
3. Use an old toothbrush to unroot any difficult grime, especially in crevices.
4. Wipe away any remaining moisture with a paper towel.
5. Lightly apply the cabinet cleaner to the surface of the cabinet.
6. Buff the cabinet cleaner into the surface of the cabinets using a rag. 

How to clean the interior of your kitchen cabinets:

1. Remove the contents of your kitchen cabinets. 
2. Use your vacuum’s hose extension to suck away any crumbs or dust. 
3. Liberally spray the vinegar and baking solution onto the shelves.
4. Allow the mixture to sit for a few minutes.
5. Use a rag to scrub down the shelves.
6. Take a paper towel and mop up any of the leftover moisture. 
7. Place the contents back inside the cabinets. 

And there you have it, perfectly cleaned cabinets for months to come. Just be sure they are dry before re-organizing your items. 

If you are more of a visual learner you should check out Clean My Space’s excellent video on cleaning kitchen cabinets.