How to Do Laundry Faster: 11 Time-Saving Tips Guaranteed to Make Laundry a Breeze

Laundry is one of those chores that seem to be never-ending! I only know a few people that enjoy doing laundry, but I am not one of those people. Laundry is one of my least favorite chores because it never seems to be done and it takes me so much time to sort, fold, and put away everything.

I wanted to know how to do laundry faster. I was determined to make my laundry time more efficient and productive. Here are the changes I made that cut my time doing laundry by 50%! Keep reading to learn 11 time-saving laundry tips to cut your time doing laundry in half.

1. Don’t Fold Everything!

Washing and drying clothes doesn’t take much time. Folding is the part of doing laundry that is the most time-consuming. Here are some things you can stop folding.

•  Don’t fold sheets- when you are finished washing your bedding, just put them right back on your bed. We only keep one extra set of sheets for our house and we haven’t used them in over a year.
• Don’t fold all your towels. After washing towels, hang 1 towel for each family member back in the bathrooms. This will cut down on how many towels will need to be folded.
• Don’t fold pajamas, play clothes, underwear, or socks, kids’ pants & shorts.
• Hang up shirts. If you have children, have them help you hang their shirts.

2. Learn How to Fold Laundry Faster

Folding is my least favorite part of doing laundry. If I can’t toss something in a basket or drawer (like the items listed above) and I can’t hang it up, I try to use methods to at least help me fold those things faster. This step by step guide to folding clothes fast is really helpful. I also recommend watching this clothing tips video. The first tip is my favorite; it shows how to hang shirts in seconds.

3. Solve the Sock Issues

Another part of doing laundry that wastes time is finding all the socks in the pile of clothes and matching them up. One tip is to have all the same socks so you don’t need to match them. There will only ever be one sock without a partner.

You can cut down on the time it takes to find all the socks in a pile of laundry by washing your socks in a mesh bag. Clip a mesh bag to each person’s laundry basket for them to put socks and underwear in. When it is time to do laundry, toss the entire bag of socks and underwear in the washer. When the laundry is done, simply dump the bag of socks and underwear back in the person’s drawer.

I like to have two baskets in my drawer to help keep it organized, one for socks and one for underwear. Since all of my socks are the same, I don’t waste time pairing them up.

4. Other Ways Mesh Laundry Bags Can Save Time

I also use laundry bags for bras and swimsuits that I don’t want to be stretched out. I put clothing items that have been stained in a mesh bag so I can quickly check if the stains are gone before I put them in the dryer. This saves time so that I don’t have to sort through all the clothes that were in the washer to try to find the stained items.

The last thing that I put in a laundry bag is items that I want to hang to dry. This makes it easy to find so that nothing accidentally gets put in the dryer. If you don’t have a mesh laundry bag, use a pillowcase with a zipper or tie a string around the top of a pillowcase to keep the clothes in.

5. Stop Sorting Your Laundry

Instead of sorting clothes by color, wash them by person. Have a hamper in each room or a separated hamper in your laundry room. Once one person’s basket is full, dump the entire basket in the washer. Add ½ a cup of vinegar to the washer and wash on cold to prevent colors from running and save on energy costs.

When your load of laundry is finished, put the clean clothes in a basket and put it directly in the person’s room to be put away. The only clothes I wash separately are whites and delicates, but the majority of our clothes can be washed in the same load.

When I first tried this method, I thought for sure I would have issues with colors bleeding and ruining clothes, but I haven’t had a problem with it since I started using this method.

6. Enlist the Help of Your Children

Teach your children to help you with the laundry. Even young toddlers can help take clothes out of the dryer and transfer clothes from the washer to the dryer. As they get older, they can be in charge of putting away their clothes. They can hang shirts, put their underwear and socks away, and put their pajamas in their pajama drawer (no need to fold these). They can even put their pants and shorts away.

When I first heard about people that had their kids sort and put away their own laundry, I thought that my 5-year-old daughter wasn’t old enough to do that. But I decided to try it anyways. I bought cube organizers and baskets and a step stool so she could reach everything.

She has a basket for solid pants, patterned pants, shorts, and skirts. She has a nightstand with two drawers. One for socks and underwear and one for pajamas. All of her shirts and dresses get hung up.

I showed her how to sort her clothes and how to hang her dresses and shirts. To my surprise, she was able to do it right away, and now I don’t have to put away any of her clothes. This has been a huge time saver! I think it is probably my favorite of the time-saving laundry tips.

Read my complete guide about how to get kids to do chores for more tips on this topic.

7. Have a Laundry Schedule

If you have a small family, like my family of 3, you can get away with doing laundry only once or twice a week, but if you have a larger family you will want to get on a schedule where you do a load of laundry every day or two. That way you are no longer needing to spend hours on the weekend doing all the laundry.

8. Keep a Small Trash Can in Your Laundry Room

Have a small container or mini trashcan by the dryer to put lint from the lint trap. I used to waste time by walking to the kitchen trash can every time I emptied the lint trap. You can also use the mini trashcan to throw away things that are in pockets. Make it a habit to empty pockets before putting clothes in the hamper so you can just dump the entire laundry basket of clothes in the washer without needing to check all the pockets.

9. Try to Wash Fewer Clothes

Hang your towels to dry after using them so you don’t need to wash them as often. We have Norwex bath towels. I highly recommend them because they dry quickly and have something called Baclock that self cleans the towel so they don’t get stinky. I have gone up to two weeks without washing our bath towels and they never smell bad! They are kind of expensive, but they are worth every penny. You could easily just have 1 towel for each person in your house, and 1 or 2 extras just in case. Instead of washing your towels every few days, you can wash them every weekend, or every other weekend.

Another way I have less laundry to wash is by re-wearing lightly used clothing. Items like pajamas and pants can be worn more than once. This has an added benefit of making your clothes last longer.

Finally, the best way to have fewer clothes to wash is to have fewer clothes!

10. Use Dryer Balls

Dryer balls can cut drying time by 30% while at the same time reducing wrinkles. The best part about dryer balls is they are non-toxic! Dryer balls bounce around as your clothes dry to naturally separate your clothes as they are drying, allowing air to circulate better. This results in faster dry times, softer fabrics, less static cling, and fewer wrinkles.

11. Do Something Fun to Pass the Time

If you are not someone who loves doing laundry, try to do something fun to make the time pass faster. I like to listen to podcasts, talk to a friend on speakerphone, or watch YouTube videos while I am doing laundry. You could also listen to music or audiobooks.

Next Steps

What did you take away from this guide to how to do laundry faster? I know these time-saving laundry tips will help cut down on the amount of time you spend doing laundry. Let me know in the comment section below of any other time-saving laundry tips that you use. I’d love to learn some new ideas to make doing my laundry even easier!

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