How to Get Motor Oil Out of Clothes

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Last Updated on September 22, 2026 by Umar Farooq

Blot the excess, then cover the mark with a dry absorbent — cornstarch or baking soda — for thirty minutes. Brush it off, work dish soap or a grease-cutting pretreat into the dry fabric, wait five to ten minutes, then wash in the hottest water the care label allows. Air dry and inspect before the dryer sees it.

Motor oil is a grease stain with a pigment problem: used oil carries carbon and metal particles as well as the oil itself, which is why it looks black and why it needs two attacks rather than one.

Do not wet it first, and the reason is physics

Everyone’s instinct is to get it under the tap. It is the single most common way to lose a motor oil stain permanently. Oil and water do not mix, so rinsing fills the weave with water and forms a barrier that keeps the degreaser away from the oil it is supposed to dissolve. Clorox is explicit about the first move: “Avoid wetting the stain. You want to start with dry fabric” (how to get oil stains out of clothes).

Tide’s motor oil page starts the other way, with a soak: “create a soaking solution by adding 1 ounce or 1 ½ tablespoons of Tide Ultra Stain Release Liquid per gallon of warm water. Allow the garment to soak for up to 5 minutes” (how to remove motor oil stains). Both are published by people who know what they are doing, and they genuinely disagree. The difference is that Tide’s soak is detergent-loaded water rather than plain water, so the surfactant arrives with it. Plain tap water arrives alone, and does nothing but block the door.

The three-stage route for a motor oil stain, and where the machine fits A motor oil stain has to be attacked in three stages in a fixed order. First a dry absorbent such as cornstarch or baking soda draws free oil up out of the weave, which only works on dry fabric because water would fill the same spaces. Second a degreaser, typically dish soap or a grease-cutting pretreat, is worked into the remaining film so its surfactants can grip the oil at one end and water at the other. Third the garment is washed in the hottest water the care label allows, which keeps the loosened oil liquid and mobile so it leaves with the wash water rather than resettling. A tumble dryer is the one heat to avoid, because it bakes any residual oil into the fibre. Three stages, and the order is not optional. 1. Dry absorbent cornstarch or baking soda 30 minutes, fabric dry pulls free oil upward 2. Degreaser dish soap or grease pretreat 5–10 minutes to work grips the remaining film 3. Hottest safe wash keeps oil liquid and mobile cold leaves it clinging then air dry and inspect Wetting the fabric before stage 1 blocks stages 1 and 2 from working at all Warm water is the ally here. Dryer heat is not — it sets whatever oil is left.

How to get motor oil out of clothes, step by step

  1. Blot with a paper towel. Press, do not rub. Rubbing widens the mark and drives pigment deeper.
  2. Bury it in a dry absorbent. Cornstarch or baking soda, a generous layer, thirty minutes on a fresh stain and overnight on an old one. Brush it off outside.
  3. Work in a degreaser on dry fabric. Dish soap is formulated for exactly this job. Clorox’s timing: “Let the detergent break down the oil for 5–10 minutes.”
  4. Wash hot. Both Tide and Clorox land in the same place — the warmest or hottest water the care label permits (what temperature to wash clothes). Cold water leaves grease solid and clinging.
  5. Wash oily workwear on its own. Loose oil in the wash water redeposits onto whatever else is in the drum.
  6. Air dry and judge it dry. Clorox: “Avoid drying with heat.” Tide: repeat the steps “before tossing in the dryer, as drying will set the stain.” Oil is nearly invisible on wet cloth, so a damp inspection tells you nothing.

The advice that could set your laundry room on fire

Search this topic and you will be told to use WD-40 or nail polish remover on the stain and then put the garment in the washing machine. Alsco’s seven-step guide recommends both (how to get motor oil out of clothes in 7 steps). Do not do that.

Maytag states the rule without qualification: “Do not put articles in your washer or dryer that have been previously cleaned, washed, soaked or spotted with gasoline, dry-cleaning solvents, or other flammable or explosive substances” (how to get paint out of clothes). A solvent-treated garment must be rinsed thoroughly and aired outdoors until there is no smell before it goes anywhere near a drum or a heated dryer. There is no dose of WD-40 that is worth this.

What repeated oily loads do to the drum

Grease that leaves the garment has to go somewhere, and not all of it leaves with the water. Regular mechanic’s washing lays a thin film on the drum, the door glass and — on a front-loader — inside the folds of the rubber seal, where it holds soil and eventually smells. If you wash workwear weekly, put a cleaning cycle on the calendar rather than waiting for the laundry to start coming out faintly grey (how to clean a washing machine gasket).

FAQ

Does motor oil come out of clothes?

Fresh motor oil usually does, over two or three rounds. Oil that has been through a hot dryer often does not.

What is the best thing to remove motor oil from clothes?

A dry absorbent followed by dish soap. The absorbent takes the free oil, the degreaser takes the film that is left.

Can you get set-in motor oil stains out?

Often, with an overnight absorbent step and repeated degreasing. Expect to repeat, and never dry between attempts.

Should I use hot or cold water on motor oil?

Hot, up to whatever the care label allows. Cold water leaves the grease solid, which is the opposite of what you need.

Does WD-40 remove motor oil from clothes?

It dissolves oil, and it is also a flammable solvent. Maytag says solvent-treated garments must not go into a washer or dryer, so the risk outweighs the result.

Will motor oil ruin my washing machine?

One load will not. Habitual oily washing leaves a film in the drum and door seal that eventually causes odour, so clean the machine on a schedule.

Degrease before you wash

Dry, degrease, hot wash, air dry. Motor oil is not a hard stain — it is a stain with a strict running order, and the two ways people lose it are rinsing it at the start and drying it at the end. The same routine works on cooking grease, which is the same problem with less pigment (how to get cooking oil out of clothes).

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