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 most 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 strips. (The latter test so poorly in our labs that we don’t recommend them.) While laundry strips 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 suggests that people with sensitive skin 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 80 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 worked exceptionally well as a pretreatment for tough stains and remained effective in hard water. (In fact, with the exception of Tide Pods Plus Downy 4 in 1, all of 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 contains brighteners. If you’re looking for a detergent without dyes, fragrance, and brighteners, you can try Tide Plus Downy Free.
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. (And pretreating stains isn’t an option here.)
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.
Arm & Hammer Power Sheets join Earth Breeze at the top of our laundry sheet ratings, but they have the same unimpressive Overall Score. In our tests, they clean chocolate and blood better than Earth Breeze, but they aren’t as effective at removing dirt and grass.
Earth Breeze Liquidless Eco Sheets are tied as the top-rated detergent strips in our ratings, but don’t be misled. These sheets may be green, but they underwhelm on cleaning, earning less than satisfactory scores for removing body oil, salad dressing, chocolate, and grass. And you’ll want to avoid using them for blood and coffee stains at all costs because they aren’t at all effective at removing them. They 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 (you can’t adequately pretreat your clothes with them, for example). 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 and blood stains. It also does a solid job at cleaning dirt and grass stains, even in hard water. But it was only passable at removing salad dressing and coffee stains, and it fell below the mark for chocolate stains. The detergent we tested comes in a large 143-ounce package with a transparent measuring cup. If you measure precisely, it will cost you only 20 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. It comes in a 127-ounce box and 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 as a group in our tests. But we found Tru Earth Eco Strips, below, most likely to disappoint.
Don’t be misled by Era 3X Oxibooster’s low price per load. This budget detergent from the maker of the top-performing Tide brand ranks at the very bottom of our liquid detergent ratings. It performs best (meaning satisfactorily) against body oil, salad dressing, and coffee, but it disappoints when it comes to removing grass and blood stains, and it’s downright lousy at getting out dirt and chocolate. Performance this dismal could lead to overuse, with unfortunate consequences for the environment, your wallet, and your clothes (in the form of lingering detergent residue). For a few cents more, you can get a much more effective detergent.
Arm & Hammer Plus OxiClean 5-in-1 Power Paks talk a big game but disappoint 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 disappointing. 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. Sure, 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.
