Have you noticed recently that your bed sheets don’t have the clean smell they once did? Body oil and sweat permeate sheets and blankets, leaving them with a musty smell. Find out how to get the sweat smell out of sheets and keep them smelling fresh.
It’s natural for your bedding to have a sweat smell over time, especially if you don’t wash it regularly or use a suitable laundry detergent. Even if you sleep immediately after showering, you lay in your bed for roughly eight hours. This night-time slumber is plenty of time to transfer sweat odor to your sleeping clothes, sheet, pillow, and blanket.
Bed sheets absorb body odor like gym clothes or workout gear. Unfortunately, there are times when cleaning them in the washing machine isn’t enough to remove sweat stains or a mildew smell. Luckily, there are home remedies that clean sweaty clothes and sheets to remove stubborn odors.
Removing Sweat Odor From Sheets
There’s nothing better than climbing into a bed of freshly washed bedding unless you clean the sheets improperly and still have a musty odor. Discover how to use baking soda, white vinegar, and detergent to remove a sweat stain and smell from your sheets.
What Causes Sheets to Smell Sweaty?
We expect workout clothes to get sweaty, yet why do sheets get stinky? Learn the leading causes of sweat odors on bedding to better understand ways to prevent it.
Smelly Sheets
You’re probably unaware of it, but bacteria live harmlessly on your body. When you sleep at night, they mix with sweat from your sweat glands, resulting in an unpleasant smell. You may go through some nights without sweating at all, while other times, you experience night sweats due to an overly warm environment, stress, or hormones. The sweat seeps into the bedding, leaving a nasty odor.
How to Remove Sweat Smell From Bedding With Baking Soda
Baking soda is excellent for getting sweat smell out of sheets, as it is a natural deodorizer. This alkaline powder quickly absorbs odors and is safe for use on all types of fabrics.
Fill a washtub or sink with warm water, add about four ounces of baking soda, and agitate the water with your hands. Place the affected sheet into the liquid and swish the fabric until it’s soaked.
Let the sheets soak for about an hour before rinsing them with cold water and wringing out the excess moisture. The baking soda regulates the pH level and effectively removes sweat odors.
Getting Sweat Smell Out of Sheets in a Vinegar Bath
Try soaking your bedding in vinegar if the bed sheets smell like sweat. White vinegar is naturally acidic, breaking up stubborn stains and odors from fabric. Learn how to remove sweat smell from bedding with a vinegar soak.
Fill a sink or plastic tub with hot water, add 1 tablespoon of laundry detergent and pour in around a cup of distilled white vinegar. Lemon juice is a good alternative if you’re out of vinegar.
Place the smelly clothes or sheets in the solution and massage them with your hands to work in the liquid. Soak the items for half an hour, wring them out, and transfer them to the washing machine.
How to Get the Sweat Smell Out of Sheets in the Washer
It’s essential to wash and dry your bedding after removing sweat smell from sheets with baking soda or vinegar. The heavy-duty cleaning washing machine cycle and laundry detergent remove sweat odor residue, and the fabric softener in the dryer leaves your workout clothes or sheets with a pleasing scent.
Place the sheets in the washing machine, and add the recommended amount of odor-blasting laundry detergent. Look over the laundry aisle at your local grocery or superstore, and choose a detergent specifically for foul odors.
Use the heavy-duty wash cycle with the hottest water to clean the bedding. Once it’s clean, transfer it to the clothes dryer with a new dryer sheet or hang it outside to air dry in the sun. Sunshine is perfect for killing bacteria, germs, and odors.
Keeping Your Bedding Smelling Fresh
Knowing how to remove sweat smell from bedding is ideal, but understanding how to keep your mattress and bedding odor-free is even better. Discover ways to prevent sweat stains on sheets and how often to clean your bedding.
Encase your mattress with a mattress protector to keep sweat from transferring through the sheet fabric to the bed. This ensures you only have to wash the bedding, not the mattress itself.
Wash your bedding as soon as you notice a sweat smell or stain. Getting sweat smell out of sheets is easier if you use odor-eliminating laundry soap. These detergents remove odors from fabric and work more efficiently than traditional detergents.
Another way to stop sheets from smelling is to add vinegar to the washer each time you launder your bedding. Add a quarter to a half cup of distilled vinegar to the rinse cycle to eliminate foul odors and soften your sheets.
Hang your sheets on a clothesline in the sun instead of machine-drying them. The fresh air removes lingering odors, and the sun’s ultraviolet rays also kill bacteria.
After cleaning a load of laundry in the washing machine, we don’t expect the items to have a foul odor. Yet, sweat stains and odors are too stubborn for regular washing and require extra cleaning steps. Fortunately, baking soda absorbs bad smells, and white vinegar eliminates odor causing bacteria.
We hope that learning how to get the sweat smell out of sheets keeps your bedding smelling clean, and we’d love it if you’d share our tips for removing sweat odors from sheets with your family and friends on Pinterest and Facebook.