How To Clean A White Snapback Hat Without Ruining It

After a couple years of heavy use, my filthy baseball caps have been known to simply find their fashion to the trash rather than be washed. I'd tried the folk-lore-ish height-rack-of-the-dishwasher route, but it had never yielded great results for me. The hats came out misshapen, seemingly discolored, and only partially cleaned.

But I did some digging, and discovered a far better, and gentler, methodology for cleaning the ol' ballcap that will refresh it, brighten information technology, and add together years to its life. And best of all, it'south largely easily-off.

Luckily for you readers, I had a few very gross hats to do some testing on. Let'due south dive in.

General Lid-Washing Tips

Don't put caps into the laundry — either the washer or dryer. A high-efficiency washer that doesn't have a center agitating column can be okay, only even and then it has to be absurd h2o on the gentlest cycle, and you also have to be concerned almost other dress in the load squishing the lid's grade. Dryers are besides hot, and the tumbling isn't good for the shape. Amend to just avert the laundry machines altogether.
Don't apply whatever products with bleach in them; you want your ballcap colors to stay overnice and vivid for years to come up.
Dispelling the dishwasher myth. You've probably heard yous can throw caps in the dishwasher on the top rack. Don't do that. Dishwasher detergents ofttimes include bleach, and the appliance usually runs at high oestrus (both for washing and drying), which tin damage the hat likewise.
Paw-washing is really the best method to retain both the color and shape of the hat.

The Best Way to Wash a Baseball Cap

1. Fill a clean sink or saucepan with warm water. Err on the side of cool versus hot.

ii. As information technology's filling, add together a tablespoon of laundry detergent or OxiClean. Dish lather tin do in a compression, but detergent, or a defended stain-fighting treatment like OxiClean, is stronger and works harder at getting the stains out of the hat'south fibers.

Shampooing the bill of the baseball cap.

Shampooing the bill of the ballcap.

3. Spot-make clean the hat first, equally needed. If there are areas that are especially problematic, spot-make clean them with a dab of cleaning product right on the hat. After first dipping the hat in the water of your bucket or sink, use a toothbrush or other small-scale scrubber to rub the cleaner into the material. I saw a tip to utilize shampoo on sweat stains; I tried it on ane of my caps and the results were pretty spectacular. The bill was clean of sweat stains, while the back (where I didn't use any shampoo), remained pretty gross after cleaning:

Dirty hat.

Ane annotation here: Be especially careful around threaded stitching. If you lot're too vigorous, the stitching can become misplaced, and the artwork marred.

Hat in sink.

4. Let the lid soak for up to a couple hours. After you've spot-washed, let the hat soak in the soapy water-filled bucket or sink you've filled for upwardly to a couple hours, though I found that even simply 20-xxx minutes will get the job done. About halfway through soaking, take a await at the cap and see how the stains are looking. Although the wetted material will hide some staining, they'll nonetheless show through if they're bad. Using your small scrubber, over again spot wash those persistent problem areas, and over again, exist careful around stitched patterns and logos.

five. Rinse all the soap off with warm water. Give the hat a expert rinse before letting it dry.

6. Pat downward with a towel to become rid of excess moisture. The lid volition obviously be very wet when you remove information technology from the water; let some of the backlog drip off, and then pat dry out with a towel every bit much every bit yous can while retaining the shape of the hat, and existence gentle with logos. Your goal here is simply to remove the excess so that information technology can dry out on a counter without dripping h2o all over.

Hat drying.

No towel underneath = wet countertop.

7. Always air dry on some sort of container. You want to find a mode to dry the lid so it's non just crumpled on the counter. Find a java jar, a canister, a balled-upward towel, or mayhap any mannequin heads yous have lying around to set up it on. This volition ensure the hat's shape stays true and doesn't cockle up. Throw a towel under the container too; no matter how much patting you do, I've found there will always be some drippage. If you desire to speed things upward, use a minor fan to blow air over information technology, or a pilus dryer on the low setting.

Tips for Cleaning Wool Hats

Wool hats are a flake more than delicate than your standard cotton or mesh caps. The discontinued AoM cap (if you lot take one, keep information technology, it'due south now a vintage collector's item!), for instance, is wool, and needs just a picayune more TLC to clean. Rather than standard detergent or cleaning product, find something that'south made specifically for wool, and soak it equally directed above.

Be certain to be especially gentle when doing whatsoever scrubbing; if you're also harsh, the wool tin can go disordered and come up to resemble felt. Y'all don't want that.

And finally, when drying the hat, pat it dry to remove backlog moisture, then consider actually wearing it to dry the balance of the fashion. It will probably be a little uncomfortable, only the shape will arrange exactly to your caput rather than to some java bean container. Wool hats are notorious for losing their shape after washing, so be particularly conscientious.

Tips for Cleaning Older Hats

If your hat is 20+ years old, there'due south a decent chance it'south made with unlike, less-durable materials than today's hats, both in the bill and the cap. Believe it or non, bills used to be made from cardboard rather than the more forgiving plastics of today.

The first thing to do when cleaning an sometime cap is to give it a color test. The vast bulk of today'southward hats are colorfast, meaning they take some alloy that helps them retain colour upon washing. Old caps don't always have this, though. To examination, rub a small corporeality of cleaner on the underside of the bill with a rag. If the rag comes away with some color, you'll accept to use water only to make clean the cap, and simply do the best you tin. If the rag comes away clean, you're articulate to utilise detergent.

Equally for bodily washing, spot-clean but, especially if you're unsure of the pecker material. Soaking an old cardboard nib in water will obviously ruin it. And old hats in full general are merely less durable than today'south. Use a small scrubber, and clean up whatsoever problem areas by hand.

The Verdict

Washed caps to the right and left; unwashed "control" cap in the middle.

Done caps to the right and left; unwashed "control" cap in the middle.

My hats came out much cleaner after using this hand-washing method. I did some testing of dissimilar methods, including not washing the middle black and white cap. The stains are still visible on the bill, and the white isn't equally white as the newly-cleaned "Playoffs" baseball cap to its left. The OxiClean really brightened up the colors on that one. You'll also detect on that Playoffs cap that the stains on the beak are nearly completely gone. They're nevertheless faintly visible, but it's way better than before.

The grayness cap on the right is too much better, although every bit you saw higher up, the dorsum is still kinda gross because I didn't spot-clean information technology. Lesson: spot-cleaning is a must for especially problematic areas.

If your favorite baseball cap is grimy from a few besides many summertime sweats, give it a proficient hand-washing and you'll be able to take information technology into enough of actress innings.

FAQs

Can you put your hat in the washer?

No, a washing machine will only damage your baseball lid.

Can you lot put your cap in the dishwasher?

No, the dishwasher detergents are a lot harsher than clothing detergents, and so y'all'll ruin your lid putting it in the dishwasher. Besides, the estrus in a dishwasher can likewise impairment and shrink your hat.