Best and Worst Laundry Detergents of 2026
Liquid, pod, sheet, or powder? Our breakdown of top-performing laundry detergents reveals the winners—and losers—in each category.
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The best detergents from Consumer Reports’ tests do a stellar job of removing common stains like body oil and dirt, but they can also tackle tougher ones, like grass and blood. The worst detergents? They’re barely better than water when it comes to removing stains from your laundry.
But shopping for detergents can be confusing. Our advice is to ignore the marketing hype and focus on performance.
To test how well detergents clean, we launder cloth swatches saturated with some of the toughest stains, including blood, body oil, chocolate, coffee, dirt, grass, and even salad dressing. After washing, we use a colorimeter to see how much of the stain remains. Our ratings, based on those tests, separate the most effective detergents from those that fall short of their Marvel superpower-like hype.
We’ve also found that cleaning power varies depending on water conditions and the type of detergent. For instance, mineral-rich hard water can diminish the performance of your laundry detergent, leaving clothes stiff, faded, or dingy. CR’s ratings show which laundry detergents perform best in hard water and which don’t.
Our tests also reveal a wide disparity in performance among the best liquids, pods/packs, powders, and laundry detergent sheets. (The latter test so poorly in our labs that we don’t recommend them.) While laundry sheets aid the environment by reducing plastic, they may lack the strong ingredients or sufficient concentration levels to do the job effectively. As for powders, you’re likely to find that your choices have narrowed in recent years. “Most detergents sold today are liquid, and their popularity—plus the increase in sales of pods—means that few powders remain on store shelves,” says Kelly Moomey, a CR market analyst.
You can find powder detergents online at Amazon, Target, Walmart, or specialty stores. Because many consumers prefer powder detergents, CR recently began testing them again after a several-year hiatus. You can see the results in our ratings. “We found that the powder detergents didn’t perform as well overall as the top-rated liquids and pods, but they were excellent at removing blood stains,” says Rich Handel, who oversees CR’s detergent testing.
That doesn’t mean powder detergents are ineffective. Most powders we tested were decent at removing sebum (aka body oils) and effective on blood stains. In fact, even the worst powders in our ratings—Ariel With a Touch of Downy and Molly’s Suds Original Unscented—removed blood stains better than most liquids and pods we tested. Keeping a powder detergent on hand could be useful for cleaning blood-tinged football jerseys or period-stained underwear.
If you see a detergent that advertises “Oxi” on its packaging, it generally has a color-safe oxygen bleach. When activated by water, this bleach releases hydrogen peroxide, which helps to remove dirt, odors, and stains and brighten whites and colored fabrics. It’s gentler than chlorine bleach, which can damage some fabrics over time and even cause whites to yellow if overused.
“Chlorine bleach is only for whites, unless you’re doing tie-dye,” Handel says. “Oxi, though a milder bleaching agent, will help brighten whites and colors, too. But it’s not as powerful as chlorine-based bleach.”
In your store’s laundry aisle, you’ll notice many detergents with fresh, fragrant scents, flowery graphics, and appealing monikers. As enticing as they smell, look, or sound, fragrant detergents often leave a lingering residue on your clothes (some proudly promote this fact). We list whether laundry detergents contain fragrances, dyes, or brighteners, which can affect people with allergies or sensitive skin.
“People with sensitive skin and preexisting skin conditions, such as eczema and psoriasis, are most susceptible to irritation,” says Jennifer Davis Alexander, MD, a holistic skin scientist and CEO of Dr. Jen Knows Skin. She says that people with sensitive skin should avoid common irritants often found in detergents, including dyes, bleach, synthetic fragrance, and sulfates (such as sodium laureth sulfate and sodium lauryl sulfate).
Below are our recommendations for the best liquid detergents for a variety of laundry needs, including lifting tough stains and cleaning effectively in hard water. We’ve also included the best pods, powders, and laundry sheets we’ve tested (despite the latter’s overall substandard performance). We conclude with the four worst-performing detergents in our tests, one from each category.
If you don’t see your favorite detergent here, check our laundry detergent buying guide and ratings for more than 90 products.
Best Liquid Laundry Detergents
These liquid laundry detergents perform well in our tests and rise to the top across various categories—from the best for tough stains to the best value.
A name like Tide Plus Ultra Stain Release comes with high expectations, and our tests show that this detergent delivers. Formulated for high-efficiency (HE) machines, this liquid did a top job removing body oil, salad dressing, chocolate, and plain old dirt from our test samples. We also found that it remained effective in hard water. (In fact, with the exception of Tide Pods Plus Downy 4 in 1, all the Tide detergents we tested cleaned very well in hard water.) The drawback? It’s pricey—one of the costlier detergents outside of green and gentle formulas.
Despite its budget-friendly price (just 14 cents per load with the 194-ounce bottle), Kirkland Signature Ultra Clean from Costco ranked among the top five detergents we tested in terms of performance. It impressed us with its ability to remove stains from body oil (like sweaty workout clothes) and also got a top score for removing salad dressing. But Kirkland doesn’t pack the same punch as the top-ranked Tides when it comes to blood and grass stains, so consider the types of stains you typically have to contend with. Like those detergents, though, this one cleans well in hard water.
Most manufacturers of hypoallergenic detergents say their products contain no dyes or perfumes, and Kirkland Signature Ultra Clean Free & Clear also carries that claim. It does an exceptional job of removing salad dressing and is very effective at removing body oil, dirt, and chocolate stains. It’s also one of the least expensive of the hypoallergenic detergents we’ve tested and is formulated for use in both high-efficiency (HE) and conventional machines. But this detergent does contain brighteners.
Best Laundry Detergent Pods
These detergent pods are highly rated for their cleaning ability. That said, CR doesn’t recommend pods in general and advises avoiding them in households with children under 6 years old or cognitively impaired adults. Contact with or ingestion of the liquid contents may pose a risk of serious injury or death.
Tide Plus Hygienic Clean Heavy Duty 10X Power Pods laundry detergent lives up to its superhero moniker as the top-rated pod/pack we’ve tested. It aces our cleaning tests for body oil, salad dressing, and dirt stains. It also does well against blood, grass, and chocolate, and scores near the top for cleaning power in hard water. While it’s not the highest-priced pod we’ve tested, be aware that you’re paying for this performance and the convenience of toss-in-and-wash pods.
The Tide Plus Ultra Oxi with Odor Eliminators Power Pods use a formula similar to the Hygienic Clean Heavy Duty variety listed above, with extra odor-eliminating detergent to combat laundry funk. It’s not “heavy duty,” however. You’ll lose a bit of effectiveness in removing body oils in exchange for its ability to fight especially odorous clothing, but it’s still above-average at eliminating those types of stains. Testers also found it works wonders against dirt and salad dressing, and is effective against all other stains except coffee. (But then, we found most detergents fall short in removing coffee stains.)
Best Laundry Detergent Sheets
Designed as an environmentally friendly alternative to liquid detergent, laundry sheets are plastic-free, concentrated laundry detergent held together by resin and paper that dissolve in water. But their cleaning power falls short of that of other detergents, and they score lower than the lowest-scoring liquids and pods in our tests.
Tide Evo Free & Gentle isn’t exactly a sheet. It’s a Brillo pad-sized, fragrance-free detergent tile that bridges the gap between liquid efficiency, pod concentration, eco-friendly strips, and granulated powder. Tide Evo Free & Gentle tops our sheet category by a wide margin, but it cleans more like an adequate powder than a higher-performing liquid or pod. Unlike the Original Scent Tide Evo, this version contains no fragrance, dyes, or brighteners. We found it excellent at cleaning blood (like powders), very good at cleaning dirt (like a liquid), and decent at cleaning grass and salad dressing. We also found it cleaned satisfactorily in hard water. But like most detergents, it struggled to clean coffee and chocolate stains in our tests. If you’re eco-conscious and looking to eliminate plastic detergent jugs while getting your clothes reasonably clean, this detergent meets you in the middle.
Arm & Hammer Power Sheets tie with Earth Breeze Liquidless Eco Sheets for the top spot among standard (thin) detergent sheets, but they share the same unimpressive Overall Score. In our tests, the Arm & Hammer sheets clean chocolate and blood better than Earth Breeze, but they aren’t as effective at removing dirt and grass. Both earn less than satisfactory scores for removing body oil, salad dressing, and grass. And you’ll want to avoid using them for blood and coffee stains, because they aren’t effective at removing them. Earth Breeze Strips do earn a passable rating for removing dirt, but the results are inconsistent, so you may need to inspect your clothes after each wash.
Best Powder Detergent
Powder detergents offer some notable benefits and drawbacks compared with liquid detergents (for example, you can’t adequately pretreat your clothes with them). But ultimately, it all boils down to preference. These two powder detergents were the highest-rated we tested, with very good Overall Scores.
Tide Original powder detergent impressed us with its stellar ability to remove body oils. It also does a solid job at cleaning dirt, blood, and grass stains, even in hard water. But it was only passable at removing salad dressing, coffee, and chocolate stains. The detergent we tested comes in a large 108-ounce package with a transparent measuring cup. If you measure precisely, it will cost you only 21 cents per load.
In our lab, Tide Plus Ultra Oxi Powder rated excellent for cleaning body oils, and performed very well tackling dirt, grass, and blood, even in hard water. It scored decently in our tests for coffee, salad dressing, and chocolate. It does contain fragrance, dye, and brighteners, though. Purchased in a 127-ounce box, it costs about 32 cents per load.
Worst Laundry Detergents
These laundry detergents are cheaper than many of those we recommend, but that doesn’t mean you should opt for them. They perform poorly in our tests, and they’re barely better than water at removing stains. Laundry sheets, while not necessarily cheaper, perform poorly overall in our tests. But we found Tru Earth Eco Strips, below, most likely to disappoint.
Dirty Labs Bio Free & Clear is the least effective liquid detergent we tested, by far. While it does adequately clean body oil stains, it’s unimpressive or abysmal at removing our other test stains, even dirt and grass. And its trendy name is also a bit misleading. Though free of fragrance and dyes, it does contain brighteners, synthetic whitening agents that can trigger allergies and skin irritation. It’s also not “free” of investment—at 38 cents per load, it’s among the priciest liquid detergents we examined in our lab.
Arm & Hammer Plus OxiClean 5-in-1 Power Paks talk a big game but are unimpressive in real life. At their best, they achieve middling scores for removing body oil and grass stains; at worst, they’re abysmal at removing old-fashioned dirt. In our tests against chocolate, coffee, salad dressing, and blood stains, their performance was simply unsatisfactory. They may cost you a bit less than other pods, but their inability to clean effectively may tempt you to double-dose, washing away any savings.
While we applaud efforts to make laundry products more environmentally friendly, we found Tru Earth Eco Strips’ cleaning performance deeply inadequate. Its scores for removing tough stains (body oil, dirt, coffee, and grass) were rock-bottom, and its scores for eliminating salad dressing, chocolate, and blood weren’t much better. Most CR members who reviewed the product said they wouldn’t recommend it. If you’re searching for a lightweight, compact, and environmentally friendly laundry solution, you’ll need to keep looking.
Molly’s Suds Original Unscented doesn’t contain brighteners, and it’s claimed to be formulated for sensitive skin, but it’s by far the worst powder detergent in our ratings. Surprisingly, it removes blood stains like a champ, but unless you’re an MMA fighter, that doesn’t do you much good—assuming you wear more than gladiator shorts and open-fingered gloves. This detergent is lousy at cleaning typical body oils and coffee stains, and it’s mediocre at removing dirt, grass, chocolate, and salad dressing stains.
How CR Tests Laundry Detergents
In our tests, we use stains that are exceedingly difficult to remove, allowing us to detect real performance differences among detergents. But even the best detergents can’t completely remove every stain.
We wash our test loads in cool water because today’s washers are designed to operate with cooler water than traditional top-loaders did. We also test detergents in hard water, which has a high mineral content that can reduce their effectiveness.
To evaluate a detergent’s performance, we wash stained swatches in two identical washing machines using each detergent and allow them to air-dry. (We don’t use a dryer because the heat can alter the stains.) Testers use a colorimeter, a device that measures color intensity, to see how much of the stain remains on each dry swatch.
