Easily Descale Your Grimy Shower Head With An Epsom Salt Hack

If you live in an area with hard water, you're probably familiar with the frustrating white mineral buildup that creeps onto all of your appliances, the sink, and, maybe most annoyingly, your shower head. The good news is that there's a super easy and really satisfying hack that can help solve this problem, and it requires an item that you probably already have sitting in your bathroom cabinet: Epsom salt. Yes, the stuff you use to soak your feet after a long day or to take a restorative bath can also help revive a grimy shower head. When used alongside acidic cleaning solutions, Epsom salt can help dissolve and break down limescale from your shower head. It's one of the many clever ways to use Epsom salt to refresh your bathroom.

Because let's be honest, it's beyond frustrating to step into the shower for a relaxing rinse, only to find a shower head covered in limescale. And it isn't just about how it looks, mineral buildup can actually clog your shower head over time. This can reduce the flow of water and make your shower head less effective.

But first things first, what even is limescale? It's a residue that's left behind by minerals that are in your tap water, like calcium. Over time, it creates a white, grimy deposit that looks a little bit like salt or chalk. It's not dirty per se or bad for your health, but over time, it can damage some appliances by clogging them. It's best to clean up limescale from appliances about once a month, and to give them a deep clean at the very least a few times a year. 

It's often said that Epsom salt can soften water, but it's a bit more complicated than that. Epsom salt is actually just magnesium sulfate, and adding it to water doesn't really "soften" it in a true chemical sense, because it can't remove the minerals responsible for hard water. Instead, Epsom salt interacts with minerals by binding to them, which can help power up the effectiveness of other cleaning agents.

To effectively descale a shower head using this method, start by mixing 1 or 2 tablespoons of Epsom salt with about a cup of lemon juice and a cup of water in a container. Next, detach the shower head and place it with its head facing downward into the mixture, so that it's submerged. Let it soak for a few hours before rinsing it and attaching it back in place. This approach is more effective than simply spraying the solution because it allows the lemon juice and Epsom salt to penetrate inside the tiny holes, which dissolves buildup that can block water flow, unlike other surface-level cleaning methods. Repeat this step whenever you start to see mineral buildup on the shower head. 

You can use other acidic cleaners instead of lemon juice, like white vinegar. You can also get rid of stubborn limescale without using vinegar or lemon with citric acid, which you can buy from any grocery store. Citric acid is a natural cleaner that is even more eco-friendly than vinegar, and you can use it throughout the house to remove hard water stains, rust, and soap buildup.