Is This The Easiest Way To Clean Your Beauty Blender?

Makeup

Is there anything more annoying than washing your beauty blender or makeup brushes? No! So imagine how psyched we were when a simple and easy solution popped up on our Instagram feed!

mini washing machine beauty blender cleaner

The potential solution caused a storm in the beauty world when beauty blogger, Tiffany Lynette Davis, posted her genius idea to use a kid’s mini washing machine as a beauty blender cleaner. Obviously, we had to try it out to see if its magical powers were as good as they seem, especially as the mini washing machine only costs $9 on Amazon. Here’s our review of using a kid’s mini washing machine to clean makeup sponges and brushes.

 

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How it Works:

Pour water into the machine, don’t completely fill it or it will overflow! Add a few squirts of liquid soap. You can use anything from your face wash (expensive) to hand wash (not super effective) to washing-up liquid (effective but not gentle for your skin).

The Results:

Depending on the makeup formulas soaked into the makeup sponge, we got different results. The mini washing machine cleaned away powder formulas and light foundation after a few minutes, but on blenders with built-up layers of foundation, contour, and powder, the machine wasn’t heavy duty enough to get all the stains out.

The Test:

We tried using different detergents to see which was the best and most effective at removing makeup.

Hand soap: This took forever to get our blenders clean! We had to let it run for two minutes and then change the water and let it run again. Finally, we gave it a rinse in water to make sure there was no soap left. Total cleaning time: 6 minutes.

Face Wash: We used a gel cleanser and it worked more efficiently to break down oil and makeup than the hand wash, but it still took quite a long time till it was clean and we had to change the water once, and then rinse it with clean water. Total cleaning time: 5 minutes.

Washing-up liquid: Considering this is designed to break down oil and grease on pans, this worked the most quickly and efficiently to clean our blender, but to ensure it’s safe to use on the face, we double rinsed it after cleaning. Total cleaning time: 5 minutes.

The outcome: The most effective cleaning solution was washing up liquid, however, you need to ensure it’s thoroughly rinsed so the soap doesn’t cause irritation.

The Verdict:

mini washing machine beauty blender cleaner

Is it cute af? Yes! Will it clean your beauty blenders? Yes, but it won’t get them completely clean. If we’re honest, as fun as this was to use, we wouldn’t recommend it for everyday blender cleaning. Not only is it not as effective as using a bar of soap to clean your blender in your sink (it’s super quick if you haven’t tried it, literally 20 seconds), it’s also really fussy to use. You have to drain the water out between spins to get it clean, and each spin needs 2-3 minutes, and even then, it won’t remove tough stains. Finally, you need to rinse it in clean water as well.

You can also use the mini washing machine to clean brushes, but this worked best for lightly used powder brushes.

Overall, this is a fun gadget and useful if you can’t get to a sink, but we found our usual blender-cleaning technique much faster, easier, and effective.