Cleaning your toilet tank

TRY this twice-yearly trick to keep your bathroom truly spotless.

Your bathroom is probably one of the spaces in your home you clean the most regularly. It is important to do a deep clean at least once a month and you should disinfect the toilet, wipe down the sink and counters, and scrub your bathroom floor about once a week.

We have created a handy checklist to help you get all of that done (and done well), but there is one more thing you should be sure to keep in mind when tackling your bathroom: You should really be cleaning your toilet tank, too. While it might not be as obvious as scrubbing your shower, cleaning that toilet tank is still a very important step in the routine. Here is a breakdown on why, plus how to do it the right way.

Why you need to clean your toilet tank

Your toilet tank can be a hotbed of bacteria and fungus. Toilet water can cause mould and mildew to build up, even more so if you are not flushing the toilet often enough. You should also look out for that suspicious red ring around the waterline — that might be Serratia marcescens, some bacteria that can cause a number of unpleasant issues.

How often toilet tank should be cleaned

You probably only need to clean your toilet tank twice per year, which means it will not be an add-on to that list of every-week tasks. However, there are a few exceptions to that rule. If your toilet uses water from an area with “hard water”, ie, more dissolved calcium and magnesium in the water supply, you will want to clean it quarterly.

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