The Best Way to Clean Windows

Cleaning windows is our whole job, so here’s the honest version of how to do yours properly, what actually works, what’s a waste of money, and the point where doing it yourself stops making sense. No gatekeeping, this is genuinely how to get good glass at home.

The Method That Actually Works

For standard reachable windows, you need four things, a bucket of warm water with a small squirt of dishwashing liquid, a proper squeegee, a microfibre cloth, and an overcast morning. That’s it.

• Brush or dust the frame and sill first. Most streaks aren’t on the glass, they’re dirt washing off everything around it. Two minutes with a brush saves ten with the squeegee.
• Wash the glass with the soapy water, a soft sponge or window mop, corners included.
• Squeegee top to bottom in overlapping strokes, wiping the blade with your cloth between passes. The wipe matters more than the stroke.
• Detail the edges with the dry microfibre, edges are where drips hide and streaks start.

Do the outside first. It carries most of the dirt, and once it’s clean, anything still showing is on the inside, which makes the second pass quick and precise.

Is Vinegar Better Than Windex?

Neither is the answer people want it to be. Diluted white vinegar cuts light grime and costs nearly nothing, and it’s fine for interior touch-ups. Spray cleaners like Windex are convenient for the same light work, but both share the same weakness, they’re being wiped around with a cloth, and cloth-wiping redistributes dirt more than it removes it. Either one with paper towel is how you get that swirled, hazy finish in afternoon sun. The squeegee method above beats both, not because of the liquid, but because the squeegee takes the dirty water OFF the glass instead of pushing it around.

What About a Homemade Window Cleaner?

The internet’s favourite recipe, vinegar, water and a drop of dish soap, works about as well as anything from a bottle, which is to say fine for maintenance, unremarkable for a proper clean. Skip anything with baking soda (abrasive residue), methylated spirits in quantity (streaky film) or newspaper (it’s not 1980, and modern ink transfers). Honestly, the cheapest good setup is dish soap, water and a $15 squeegee.

The Five Mistakes That Cause Streaks

• Cleaning in direct sun, the water flash-dries before you can squeegee it, and Perth sun does it in seconds. Overcast days are perfect window weather.
• Skipping the frames and sills, the first rain washes that dirt straight down your clean glass. It’s the main reason freshly cleaned windows “streak in the rain”, the rain’s innocent, the frames were dirty.
• Too much detergent, more soap means more residue means more film for dust to stick to.
• A worn squeegee blade, one nick leaves one line, every stroke. Blades cost a few dollars, replace them.
• Forgetting the flyscreens, clean glass behind a dusty screen still looks dirty from inside. Screens want a soft brush and a hose, or better, a proper wash as part of a professional clean.

Hard Water Stains Are a Different Problem

Those white mineral spots from sprinklers and bore water aren’t dirt, they’re deposits bonded to the glass, and no amount of vinegar enthusiasm removes established staining. Light, recent marks sometimes shift with dedicated hard-water products and real elbow grease. Old staining generally needs professional treatment, and prevention beats everything, adjust the sprinkler that’s hitting the glass.

When DIY Stops Making Sense

An honest list, because there genuinely is one:

• Anything above comfortable ladder height. Upstairs windows are where DIY window cleaning hurts people, and no clean glass is worth a fall. Professionals reach up to six storeys from the ground with water-fed poles, nobody needs to leave the ground.
• Lots of glass. Past about twenty windows, your Saturday is gone and your shoulders know it.
• Flyscreens, tracks and second-storey frames, the fiddly time-eaters that make the difference between “cleaned the windows” and “the windows look professionally done”.
• When you want it to last. Professional pure water cleaning dries spot-free with no detergent film, so glass stays cleaner noticeably longer than any soap-based DIY clean can manage.

If that’s where you’ve landed, most everyday Perth homes fall between $300 and $600 for the full inside-and-out clean, frames, sills and flyscreens included, and whether it’s worth paying someone is answered honestly here.

The Short Version

Squeegee, soapy water, overcast morning, frames first, outside before inside. That’s the best way to clean windows yourself, and it’ll do a genuinely good job on any glass you can safely reach. For everything you can’t, that’s what we’re here for.