I wash mine about the same, but I only buy new if they start to fall apart or no longer dry properly. Even then, they go into the scrap towel drawer and are used for dirty jobs. Eventually they'll get too dirty and I'll get rid of them.
I wash weekly. My bathroom has a tendency towards dampness.
They stay around until they start fraying and then they go in the retired towels pile, for pets and spills and such, and once they are embarrassing to hang on my outside line i throw them out.
I’ll soak in vinegar water every so often to reduce the limescale that builds over time and that helps keep them fresher looking, but mostly that is a losing battle.
Pro tip: don’t use scent beads or softener products. They reduce absorbency (and they’re nasty chemicals that smell terrible but apparently I’m the only person who thinks that).
You are not the only person that hates those scents! But we are rare. I usually get deer in headlights look when I explain it to someone.
Same. Burns my nose and feels gross, like leaving conditioner in my hair.
Yep, you shouldn't use fabric softener on anything you WANT to be absorbent. Towels, workout clothes, undergarments, etc.
Citric acid as a softener works great. Also removes scents and does a much better job than vinegar. Also neutralizes any detergent that was not rinsed out.
Good tip. I know this as a fact but haven’t connected it.
My dishwasher suggests replacing the rinse aid with up to 2(?)% solution citric acid, which I haven’t tried but I’m going to give it a shot when I run low.
Yup. I also use citric acid for dishwasher rinse aid. 2 tablespoons of citric acid powder to 100 ml of warm water. Let mixture cool and pour into dispenser.
I change my towel when it starts making me stink again right after a shower.
There are three of us in the house, and I wash them weekly, more or less.
As for replacing them, I don't know what to say. We destroy towels in about ten years. My mom had towels that were 20-30 years old and as good as new.
I replace them as soon as they don't feel "rough" anymore. I hate soft towels. That ends up being probably once a week. Never bought new ones.
I wash my towel after ever use.
Like, you whip it off your shoulders and lash it out at a monster, and just like that, the towel is dirty‽
Did you just touch a towel on the shelf? Well, it's used now, so in the washer it goes.
Nope. Once I dry myself off it goes in the hamper.
Same, but I ensure it's fully dry before putting it in the hamper. So usually a couple of hours later, or just before I next need a towel I replace it.
They start to build the funk if you throw them in there wet.
Once a week or two depending on how much other laundry I've got.
I'll replace them when they fall apart.
idk, after 4 or so uses. I have super dry skin so my towels never get stinky. I'm washing them long before I notice anything. Humidity being very low where I live also plays a part I"m sure.
Some of my towels may be older than me. I got a pile of hand-me-downs from my mother when I moved out and uh....I still use a few of them until they are dilapidated enough to become garage oil rags and then I buy a replacement. Nothing in my bathrooms matches!
Face towels are a different story. I replace them after a single real usage. Probably just as old though.
Swap everything on a Sunday for clean, thats towels sheets, teatowel etc. They live on a heated towel rail so dry out well between uses.
We have a few sets of nice towels, just got two more last year after a decade or so.
Animal shelters are always keen to take old towels.
Animal shelters are always keen to take old towels.
Oh that's a good tip! I have old towels that I now use for cleaning towels, but I'll check animal shelters near me as an alternative.
A kindred spirit, I too change all linen, towels, teatowels on a Sunday. I love the feeling of crisp linen and rough towels.
I have sets of "three" of everything. One set in use, one set in the laundry and one set in the closet. I only buy new things if visible frayed and no point trying to mend.
Heck man, I use RIT dye on older towels so they look nice again. So 2-3 decades so far on my towels. was 1-2 times a week
Heh, I still have two towels from my British boarding school from 40 ,years ago. They don't make 'em like that any more...
I swap out my bath towel once every 3-4 days. When there’s 3 or more in the hamper, I wash them.
I’ll use these towels until they wear out.
You guys have more than one towel???
Gotta rotate between two in case you want to swap them and not do laundry just yet.
I change my towels once a week. I have a special hand towel to dry my nether regions.
For towels that are sized for hands, I change those once every 1 - 2 months.
For towels used on the body, about 2 - 3 months.
Yikes
When they start to bend and crack
Wash once a week, replace as needed which is probably 10 years or so. Then they become dog towels.
Whenever I can hold them flat and horizontal without bending when grabbed by a corner.
Use bath towel, then that bath towel becomes bath mat for next shower, when I have no more towels wash them while impatiently waiting to shower.
I wash them after three uses and use them until they fall apart.
I am a bit perplexed no one is writing about washing in 60*C or above.
Guys, this is common knowledge, innit?
Usually wash them about once every 3-6 months. I don’t think I’ve ever replaced a towel in my adult life, had my absorbent bath robe for 9 years so far.
I wash my body towels (for stepping out of the shower) weekly. I wash hand towels, for drying hands after washing hands, whenever I feel like it, quite infrequently but they get washed.
I'd only replace a towel if it fell apart or something like that. If it's unusable.
Depends. I have an accuute sense of smell. Before it smells bad, it stops "smelling nice" usually a 3-4 day grace period. In that range, I wash them. It varies because in winter, the heat register dries them pretty fast, in summer, less so, but the HVAC fan constantly circulates so since they dry fast, they keep longer.
In the summer, I'll do less than a week sometimes because I'll shower more than once a day because sweat. They stay wet longer and get "unfresh" faster.
When the pile gets too large in the bathroom or on Sunday, whichever comes first.
I loathe newly purchased towels, they always feel like they don't dry well for a while. I typically wash/swap every 4 or so days. We also "strip" our towells with a deep clean like every couple months.
I wash them on saturdays, usually each week but sometimes every other week. The ones for showering get dried quickly after use on the upstairs handrail (bathroom is kinda small). The hand towels have a small heated holder in the bathroom, so they don’t get a chance to ripen as well. Face towels after each use.
Replacement only if they get thin or holey. And then they become cleaning rags.
We wash them after using them. Replace when broken after years.
I change out my towels every day... they are washed weekly.
I don’t have a satisfying answer to you. I think once a week wash is perfectly fine and it is roughly what I do.
It depends on how much you’re using them.
If you shower once a day 6 days a week (just as an example), a wash once a week is good. If you’re showering and using the towel multiple times a day it’s getting a lot more use and likely never totally drying out between washes. I’d recommend a second towel and/or more frequent washes of the towels.
If you use the towel for showering at home only 3 times a week (for example you shower at the gym and they provide towels there) then you could radially go multiple weeks without washing your towels just because they aren’t being used.
Finally replacing. I also don’t have a strong answer for that but I replace them when I notice they either stop absorbing water as well or when the threads are getting much thinner. Current set of towels is 3 years old and replaced a set of towels that were 8 years old. Also if the towels get significantly dirty or stained (blood usually in my case) I’ll replace them.
No Stupid Questions
No such thing. Ask away!
!nostupidquestions is a community dedicated to being helpful and answering each others' questions on various topics.
The rules for posting and commenting, besides the rules defined here for lemmy.world, are as follows:
Rules (interactive)
Rule 1- All posts must be legitimate questions. All post titles must include a question.
All posts must be legitimate questions, and all post titles must include a question. Questions that are joke or trolling questions, memes, song lyrics as title, etc. are not allowed here. See Rule 6 for all exceptions.
Rule 2- Your question subject cannot be illegal or NSFW material.
Your question subject cannot be illegal or NSFW material. You will be warned first, banned second.
Rule 3- Do not seek mental, medical and professional help here.
Do not seek mental, medical and professional help here. Breaking this rule will not get you or your post removed, but it will put you at risk, and possibly in danger.
Rule 4- No self promotion or upvote-farming of any kind.
That's it.
Rule 5- No baiting or sealioning or promoting an agenda.
Questions which, instead of being of an innocuous nature, are specifically intended (based on reports and in the opinion of our crack moderation team) to bait users into ideological wars on charged political topics will be removed and the authors warned - or banned - depending on severity.
Rule 6- Regarding META posts and joke questions.
Provided it is about the community itself, you may post non-question posts using the [META] tag on your post title.
On fridays, you are allowed to post meme and troll questions, on the condition that it's in text format only, and conforms with our other rules. These posts MUST include the [NSQ Friday] tag in their title.
If you post a serious question on friday and are looking only for legitimate answers, then please include the [Serious] tag on your post. Irrelevant replies will then be removed by moderators.
Rule 7- You can't intentionally annoy, mock, or harass other members.
If you intentionally annoy, mock, harass, or discriminate against any individual member, you will be removed.
Likewise, if you are a member, sympathiser or a resemblant of a movement that is known to largely hate, mock, discriminate against, and/or want to take lives of a group of people, and you were provably vocal about your hate, then you will be banned on sight.
Rule 8- All comments should try to stay relevant to their parent content.
Rule 9- Reposts from other platforms are not allowed.
Let everyone have their own content.
Rule 10- Majority of bots aren't allowed to participate here. This includes using AI responses and summaries.
Credits
Our breathtaking icon was bestowed upon us by @Cevilia!
The greatest banner of all time: by @TheOneWithTheHair!