This DIY Natural Floor Cleaner with Essential Oils is one of my favorite ways to clean our laminate and tile floors in our home. I’ve put together all of my essential oil recipes and tips in one spot for you to have a resource.
DIY Natural Floor Cleaner With Essential Oils
If you’re looking for a more natural way to clean the floors in your home then I have the perfect recipe for you.
I love being able to clean my floors without damaging our laminate floors and tiles while leaving the house smelling like peppermint.
This floor cleaner is super easy to make, keeps the floors clean, and you can customize the smell to the seasons!
You can easily choose your favorite essential oils that fight bacteria and order.
To help you out I’m going to share my favorite floor cleaner recipe that I use at home.
This post contains some affiliate links for your convenience (it means if you click on a link and make a purchase I will earn a small commission. It will not cost you a penny more).
Disclaimer: I only recommend using high-quality therapeutic-grade like Young Living Essential, Revive, and DoTerra. These are not everyday oils that you can find at the store. This is also what has worked for me and my family, this is in no way to take away from what is suggested by your doctor. I am not a doctor and I am not promising any healing or medicinal advice. I just love therapeutic oils and love sharing how we use them in our home. These statements have not been evaluated by the food and drug administration.
Making Time To Create Cleaners
My main floor cleaner used to be the Swiffer Mop Pads, but since the new year, I’ve been trying to buy either natural cleaners or making them myself.
My excuse has been that I just don’t have time to make my own, but the truth is that it only takes a few extra minutes to mix all your ingredients together.
I have tried a few other natural cleaners on my laminate flooring, but for some reason, they leave a thin layer on and the floor honestly doesn’t look clean.
The easiest way to make sure that you stick to your natural floor cleaner is to make sure you always have all the products needed to make it.
It will take you an extra few seconds to add your ingredients into your mop water container then it will add a mopping pad to your Swiffer.
Ingredients For Homemade Floor Cleaner
This recipe makes about 5-6 oz of the natural floor cleaner.
The amount should be enough for a house less than 1500 square feet, depending on how much flooring you are cleaning.
For our new home, I double the recipe because the entire house is wood laminate floors and tiles.
Sometimes I triple the recipe if I know the floors are extra dirty.
- Water 2oz
- Distilled White Vinegar 2oz
- Rubbing Alcohol 2oz (optional, not necessary)
- Up to 10 drops of Peppermint Essential Oil
- Floor Mop (I use the Rubbermaid Reveal and it works great)
How To Make DIY Natural Floor Cleaner With Essential Oils
When I mix my ingredients I usually make about 6 to 8 ounces, just because I like to make a little extra to have just in case.
Especially when having to do a nice cleaning in the bathroom area.
- Using your mops water container add 2 ounces of each water, white vinegar, and the rubbing alcohol
- Then add 10 drops of Peppermint essential oil.
- Give it a gentle shake to combine all of the ingredients together.
- Clean your floors naturally.
Why Use Re-usable Mop Pads
One of the things that I love about using a mop like the Reveal Rubbermaid you can easily switch around the mop pads as you need to.
Personally I use a pad for the bathrooms, a different one for the living room/kitchen, and then finally one for the bedrooms.
Then I simply throw them in the washing machine and dryer to be used the next time.
I like having a few extra pads this way I don’t have to worry about always washing the dirty mop pads before the next time I clean the floors.
The difference in my floors was incredible and it didn’t leave a residual film.
I definitely feel more at ease when the girls are playing or eating food while sitting on the floor.
More Essential Oils For Cleaning Floors
Here is a list of my favorite essential oils that I use for cleaning our floors.
- Tea Tree Oil also is known also as Melaleuca fights germs and bacteria.
- Lemon is antibacterial and great for wood.
- Lavender is a great antibacterial and diminishing order.
- Peppermint, as I mentioned above, is one of my favorites and it’s antibacterial and antifungal.
- Cinnamon is antibacterial and antifungal, plus it smells amazing.
- Thieves is a magnificent essential oil blend from Young Living that is great for fighting germs and smells like cinnamon.
Favorite Cleaning Supplies
I also wanted to share my favorite cleaning supplies that you can get shipped directly from Amazon.
More Essential Oils Resources From The Blog
Do you clean with essential oils in your home?
Disclaimer: I only recommend using high-quality therapeutic-grade Young Living Essential Oils for ingestion. These are not everyday oils that you can find at the store. This is also what has worked for me and my family, this is in no way to take away from what is suggested by your doctor. I am not a doctor and I am not promising any healing or medicinal advice. I just love therapeutic oils and love sharing how we use them at home. These statements have not been evaluated by the food and drug administration.
I have all the ingredients at home! I also struggle with keeping the floors clean – we live in Hawaii without air conditioning so we have to keep the windows open all the time. The floor is always dirty! I’ll definitely be trying this soon.
We use a steam cleaner most of the times for our floor but until recently I had no need for a real mop then I seen the spill of a life time and I need a mop but I don’t like using chemicals on my floors seeing how i have a toddler around. This would have been the perfect solution for me. Wish I had it two days ago. Thanks this is recorded in my memory bank for the next time
A very timely post for me. I ran out of chemical stuff the other day and ended up using 1/2 cup white vinegar in a full kitchen sink of hot water. It worked a treat. A tiny smell of vinegar initially but it went away. I will definitely use this method again with lavender oil. I love lavender…Good for the floors and much better for the environment. A winner!
The essential oil really does help with the vinegar smell Elisha! Which is what I was worried about, LOL!
I’m going to have to try this! Our new house is all laminate wood flooring or plain ol’ laminate! Thanks for sharing this tip!
I am definitely trying this. Not only is it better for the environment, but it would be a lot less expensive than what is available in the stores.
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I LOVE the smell of Peppermint it leaves at the end! So clean 🙂 Thanks for stopping by Jill!!
thanks for the tip. I’m going have to try this ! Coming from Mummy Mondays!
Thank you for stopping by Charlotte 🙂
Hmmm…does the rubbing alcohol hurt your floors? We have laminate wood too, and the company said only yo use dilute vinegar, but they never stay shiny! Maybe I’ll try this!
It doesn’t Ashley 🙂 I’ve been using this mixture now for about 3 months or so and I LOVE it! I also finds that it keeps the floors cleaners longer if that is even possible! LOL!
Does this mixture work on sealed wood flooring?
Hi Sandy! We have laminate flooring, but I have read that this mixture does work on sealed wood flooring. I would probably try it on a small area of your home and see how it turns out.
careful with peppermint and eucalyptus, they shouldn’t be used around kids under 10
🙂
Why is the alcohol part of this solution? What does it do? Is it really necessary?
Hi Laura! Not necessary at all. Most days I don’t add the alcohol in it. I add it on days my girls have had a busy day of coloring and markers on the floor 🙂 It cleans up crayons and markers really well.
Vinegar is a solvent. Our will probably eventually destroy your mop. It destroyed our Hoover hard floor clear. It ate the seals and destroyed the machine.
Yes, that is true. I always make sure to clean out my mop after every use. That’s a great point Jess. Thanks for stopping by!
I woke this morning to find that my cat had started Rosie….my vac robot. Yay!! But when I took my dogs outside…my cat messed on my laminate wood floor. And Rosie kept right on going!! What a mess!!
I too had been using a swiffer mop, but no pads and it doesn’t disinfect. THIS was PERFECT! I had all ingredients including a reveal type cleaner.
Mixed it up…added some thyme too. and went to work. I feel much better now. THANKS!!
Does this hurt laminate floors over time? Also, am I understanding the recipe right? 6oz of liquid cleans approximately 1500 sq ft? 4 oz if omitting rubbing alcohol. Do you add anymore water?
Hi Ashley! It’s never hurt my laminate floors and I use it several times a week. I can usually fill up the container and it cleans my entire house, including the bathrooms. You can definitely add more water if necessary.
Thanks for sharing this Victoria. We have really loved using the white vinegar. It’s been a lifesaver ever since we completed our hardwood floor refinishing. It’s effective but we never worry about it damaging the new finish. You’re simply amazing!
Curious as to what the rubbing alcohol does for the mix? If you know and will share, it may help to decide to leave in or out. Thank you!!!!
Hi Lori, thanks for your question. The rubbing alcohol is not necessary to use; it just helps the floors dry quicker, especially if you have laminate flooring that way water doesn’t sit for too long. You can definitely omit it. I’ve actually stopped using rubbing alcohol in my recipes lately.
Can this be used in a steam mop?
When I use my steam mop I just add essential oils right on the pad itself to give it that extra cleanliness smell. But I haven’t used the mix in my steam mop.