Most people consider doing laundry to be mundane, boring, and unfulfilling. Sometimes just tossing your dirty clothes and detergent into the washer isn’t enough. With fabrics used for grunt work or kids’ camp outfits, extra treatment may be required before they come out smelling and feeling anything close to clean and fresh. Alternatively, it might be a blanket or sheet with a musty smell you have to deal with. These are just some of the situations that make laundry time unpleasant.
A good fabric softener works well for fabrics and makes laundry time a little less of a hassle. Most fabric softeners are used mainly to eliminate static buildup and wrinkles from fabrics after laundry, and to give them a refreshing and long-lasting fragrance. The motions of a
washing machine cause static in fabrics, which makes them appear rough and feel scratchy to the touch. To eliminate this, a fabric softener in either liquid or sheet form is used alongside
laundry detergents for soft, smooth, and wrinkle-free fabric. The fabric softener often acts as a scent booster and can remove the most stubborn and clingy odors from the fabric. Fragrances can last up to three months in some cases, from time of wash to when it’s worn or used.
Apart from its laundry use, fabric softener can also be used as a house air freshener, or to eliminate bad odors from the waste bin, the closet, or the interior of a car. It can also be used in traveling boxes and bags to give a clean, fresh scent to clothing.
Now that we’ve looked at some of the reasons why you may want to get a fabric softener, we will look at the important features and factors you need to consider when choosing a fabric softener.
Before we do that, it would be remiss of us to NOT give an honorable mention to
Tide’s great fabric softener. It’s one we believe you should also check out, even though we couldn’t fit it among our featured products due to space constraints.
Price
The price of a product often informs a buying decision, and having a budget helps narrow down options. Most fabric softeners are relatively inexpensive, but there’s still some variation.
The products we reviewed here are within the $8 to $26 range. We’re sure we’ve featured quality products that’ll serve you well, regardless of cost, unlike the cheap fabric softeners we came across during our research which will not give the desired result on all counts.
Features
There are some qualities you need to consider carefully if you want a functional fabric softener that actually does the work. They include:
- Type of fabric softener
- Size
- Load
- Scent
- Extra features
Construction and Design
Fabric softeners come in two main forms – liquid and sheet. Liquid fabric softeners often have a calibrated cap to measure out the appropriate quantity according to the laundry load size. The liquid is then added to the dispenser. Sheet fabric softeners are simply tossed into the washer alongside the fabrics. There are also softeners that come in bead form, such as the Downy Unstoppable In-Wash boosters, or in ball form, such as the Woolzies Dryer Balls and Natural Fabric Softener. Both are featured in the product review. Whichever type you choose is sure to give you a great end result, and your choice here will be based on convenience and personal preference.
Most fabric softeners are made from chemicals. Some are composed of pure natural materials, such as the Woolzies Dryer Balls and Natural Fabric Softener, which are made from 100% natural wool. Other fabric softeners are made from chemical materials chosen to be mild on both skin and fabric, with some of them fully treated and tested to be hypoallergenic. If you’re concerned about the quantity of chemicals that get in contact with your skin or clothes, or you have overly sensitive skin, you may want to get the all-natural fabric softener by Woolzies which you can find in our product review.
Fabric softeners come in different bottle sizes. When choosing your fabric softener, consider the bottle size and the volume of work it’ll be doing, so you can get the most value out of your purchase. If you do large volumes of laundry, or you constantly have to wash very dirty or smelly fabrics, you may want to get the large bottle size in the case of liquid fabric softener or the big pack in the case of dryer sheet fabric softener.
Performance and Ease of Use
Most fabric softeners have a number of loads they can be used for indicated on the packaging. This information lets you know the exact quantity to use for each load. This also ensures you don’t use too much or too little fabric softener on a particular wash load, so as to get the maximum performance out of your softener. For dryer sheets, check for the number of sheets to use for each wash load size. In rare cases, such as the Downy Unstoppable In-Wash Boosters, it doesn’t matter whether you toss in a few or plenty of the beads, you should get a great result.
One of the greatest qualities of a good fabric softener is its scent. Generally, their scents or fragrances penetrate deeply and stay on the fabric for a very long time. Different brands incorporate different scents into their products, and while some are very powerful, others are light. A fabric softener’s ability to leave its scent in fabrics for a long time after washing is a quality that helps in determining its performance.
One of the brands in our review, Snuggle, has a unique odor-eliminating technology to fight and remove tough odors and smells embedded into fabrics. This technology releases the odor from the fabric, captures and eliminates it, and replaces it with a sweet and fresh fragrance.
Using fabric softener is very simple and fast. It doesn’t require any setup or skills. Just add the liquid to the dispenser, or toss in the sheet, bead, or ball with the fabrics, and wash.
After having gone through our buying guide, you should now be better positioned to make the right choice. Go on to our product review, where we are sure you’ll get that particular fabric softener you’ve been looking for.
Features
Smart Sheep was founded by a mom who had loads of laundry to go through virtually every week. She understands the challenges that come with attacking the laundry, and started selling wool dryer balls to help make laundry a bit more bearable. These dryer balls are made completely of natural materials. They're produced in Nepal, and then packaged by Christine and her team here in the US. The customer service at Smart Sheep is truly warm and professional, and you’d definitely love to have another transaction with this small company that cares.
The Smart Sheep 6-Pack 100% Wool Dryer Balls are excellent fabric softeners, and one of the many reasons we have featured it in our reviews is that they're completely natural. For people with sensitive skin, getting things like fabric softeners can be a bit of a gamble to them, as it might upset them. These softeners contain no chemicals or synthetic materials that could cause any kind of skin reaction.
In addition to softening fabrics, these softeners equally reduce drying time too. Many customers who have used them have testified that they cut down drying time to even almost half in some cases.
Because these dryer balls come in extra-large sizes, much larger than tennis balls, they last pretty long, for months in many cases. The balls can last for over a thousand loads of wash. Plus, because they can function as both a dryer and a softener, you save cash since you no longer have to buy dryer sheets and liquid fabric softener separately.
Smart Sheep is a smart way to go. Place your order now!
Features
Procter and Gamble is a household name everyone is familiar with. From showering, cleaning, and brushing, to laundry, baby care, and the dishes, P&G has a full line of products to help make dealing with these things a little easier. Thanks to hard work, this company continues to make quality products that improve lives across almost every nation in our world. It deserves a gold star for value addition!
The Gain Original Dryer Sheets are pals you want on your side in your laundry activities. These sheets soften your clothes, making them feel better against your skin. While they soften your clothes, they also reduce that pesky static cling that dryers are notorious for leaving in your pile of laundry. And that’s not all - using these sheets also helps to reduce wrinkling on your clothes. You could even possibly wear your clothes straight out of the dryer if you’re in a big hurry ... just saying.
The scent is a lovely blend of green, citrus, and amber that lasts on your clothes for a long time. In fact, it smells so good that Gain assures you that you might just do "something over-the-top" out of sheer happiness over how amazing your laundry smells.
Although this softener already comes at an affordable price, it’s still so economical that you could call it a give-away. A single sheet is enough for a medium load, while two sheets are enough to handle a really large load.
Be sure to avoid using this product on the kids’ nightclothes or other flame-resistant garments, though, as it might reduce the flame resistance.
Now that you've read our product review and are armed with relevant knowledge, we hope you are now better placed to make your choice and place an order.
