WD-40 Life Hacks That Will Blow Your Mind

Ashley - February 20, 2023
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WD-40 is a lifesaver when you need to silence a squeaky door, remove a stubborn screw, or remove gunk and grease from your car’s fenders, windows, and interior. Many people love keeping a roll of duct tape around for its varied uses, and if you’re one of those people, you’ll want to add a can of WD-40 to your toolbox after reading this list! There are tons of ways you can use WD-40 around your home and in other aspects of your life. Get comfy and read to take notes because we’re about to blow your mind with these WD-40 life hacks!

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Protect Your Lawnmower Blades

Mowing the lawn is a chore all homeowners must deal with, but it can be taxing when you’re trying to cut through thick grass. Have you ever had to stop mowing and clean off your lawn mower blades because they were so gunked up with grass? Well, you’ll never have to deal with a delay in your mowing process again when you use WD-40! Simply spray it on your lawn mower blades and enjoy mowing uninterrupted. Cleaning up the blades after mowing will be an easy, quick task with this life hack.

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Remove Crayon Marks

Parents will be thrilled to hear about this hack! Children love to test the boundaries and be creative, so they often end up coloring on the walls. It doesn’t matter how many coloring books or pages of construction paper you offer them. Your walls will always end up with rainbow swirls and twirls of delightful crayon creativity. It can take ages to scrub those marks from the wall when you’re working with simple soap and water. Give your crayon-coated walls a spray of WD-40 and scrub with a clean rag to remove those marks without extraneous effort. The marks will come off super quick and leave your walls looking clean again!

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Don’t Fear Getting Your Ring Stuck

Getting a ring or wedding band stuck on your finger is an uncomfortable experience. You’ve probably tried all the tricks; soap and water, vaseline, etc. and nothing’s worked! Well, pull out your can of WD-40 and prepare to be amazed! Spray your finger liberally with WD-40 and watch the ring slide right off. You definitely want to wash your hand and the ring very well after this.

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Clean Your Toilet Bowl More Easily

Cleaning toilets is a chore no one enjoys, yet it’s an unfortunate necessity of life. Using powerful chemicals like bleach works well on toilets, but the fumes can be overwhelming and the chemicals themselves can damage your plumbing over time. A much more effective alternative is to use WD-40! WD-40 will break down the grime and hard water deposits in your toilet within minutes. All you have to do is spray the toilet bowl, let it sit for a couple of minutes, and then scrub with a regular toilet brush. You’ll cut the time and energy you spend on this chore in half when using WD-40.

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Goodbye Sticky Gum

Old, stuck gum is very difficult to remove. Whether it’s stuck to the bottom of your shoe or the underside of your table, it’s not an easy substance to remove. Chipping away at the yucky, dried up piece of gum with a butter knife only chisels small pieces away at a time and leaves you with an additional mess to clean up. An excellent trick is to spray the area where the gum is stuck with some WD-40. Spray generously, let it sit for a minute, and then use something like a butter knife to leverage the gum away from the surface it’s stuck on. This trick works like a charm and removes the entire piece of gum at once!

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Wear Makeup Without Worrying

Makeup stains on white clothes are the absolute worst, especially when you’re dealing with a lipstick stain. These stains can seem impossible to remove because any effort to handwash them away often results in spreading the stain. Here’s where a WD-40 life hack comes in. Simply spray the stain with WD-40 and let it sit for several minutes. This will loosen the vibrant pigments causing the stain. Then, you can throw the shirt in your washing machine and pull it out looking brand new! You’ll never have to fear makeup stains again once you know about this trick.

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Fix Your Bathtub Spout

Whether you, your spouse, or your kids enjoy taking a nightly bath, it’s important to keep the bathtub spout running properly. These spouts can get clogged up with debris, especially in areas with hard water. This can cause your water pressure to run low and can potentially cause plumbing issues down the road. An excellent way to clear out any clogs is to spray some WD-40 up there! Let it sit for several minutes, then run the water to flush out any debris. Some WD-40 cans come with a flexible nozzle that makes it easy to stick the hose straight up your tub spout, which makes this chore even easier.

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Eliminate Tough Tar Stains

Have you ever noticed those black scuff marks that gather toward the bottom of your car? Well, these are no ordinary scuff marks. They’re often caused by driving on tarry roads and is the result of kickback from those roads while you’re driving. It can take hours of fruitless scrubbing to remove these marks with usual cleaning supplies, but if you spray them down with WD-40 and wait a few minutes, these marks will wipe right off!

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Safely Separate Glassware

How many times have you pulled two glasses out of the dishwasher and found them stuck together just like the glasses in this picture? Glass expands as it’s warmed up, so as they dry together in the dish rack, this will occasionally happen. Trying to pry glassware apart is very dangerous. If one breaks, you could end up with a ton of glass in your hand and all over your counter or floor. But don’t panic because WD-40 will save the day! Spray the inside of the outer glass with WD-40 and gently pull them apart. Of course, you’ll have to wash the dishes again, but at least they won’t be stuck together or end up broken.

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Repair Cracked Phone Screens

We all know that heart-shattering moment where you forget your phone is in your pocket, lean down, and hear it smack the ground. Phones aren’t cheap these days, and repairing them can cost a pretty penny too. WD-40 isn’t a miracle worker, but it can fix minor cracks in phone screens! If you have one or a few small cracks in your screen, spray them with WD-40 and run a clean cloth over them. The WD-40 will fill in the cracks and keep them from splitting open further. It’s a great hack to extend the lifespan of your phone until you can get the latest model.

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Keep Your Scissors Squeaky Clean

Scissors get put through so much. People use these for crafts, office work, school projects, and even cutting up pizza! It’s no wonder this tool gets all gunked up on occasion. If you need a way to clear out all the debris from your scissors and keep the blades looking clean and shiny, then we have the perfect solution for you. That’s right, simply spray your scissors down with WD-40 and wipe them off with a clean cloth. Give them a rinse and enjoy your fully functional scissors.

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Protect Your Plants

Are you tired of slugs, beetles, and other creatures destroying your potted plants? Perhaps you’ve been searching for an alternative to powerful insecticides, but haven’t found the right solution yet. Spraying the sides of your potted plants is an excellent way to deter pests from eating up your plants. WD-40 has a pretty strong odor that insects and other bugs don’t like. They’ll avoid your potted plants when you spray them with WD-40 and you won’t have to worry about negatively impacting the insect population in your yard. It’s a win-win!

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Save Your Wood From Cup Stains

Untreated wood makes for gorgeous, rustic furniture. Dressers, cabinets, side tables, and coffee tables made of untreated wood give your home a cozy atmosphere, but they can be difficult to keep clean. Have you ever set a cup down on your wooden coffee table and forgotten to use a coaster? If you have, then you’ve probably noticed a water ring stain form on the table. These stains are tough to remove, unless you have some WD-40 handy! Just spray the stain with WD-40 and clean as you normally would. You’ll be amazed at how easily the stain is removed.

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Make Your Kitchen Tiles Look New Again

Cleaning the tiles and grout in kitchens is a tough task. No matter how frequently you clean them, they also seem to turn an unfortunate brown or black color very quickly after. Kitchens tend to be a high-traffic area where a lot of messes are made, so it makes sense, but you need an easier way to clean. This is where WD-40 comes you. You can spray WD-40 on your tiled backsplash or floors and easily remove debris from the tiles and grout. Just let the WD-40 sit for a few minutes, then wipe away the mess with a clean cloth. You’ll never go back to scrubbing your kitchen with soap and water again after trying this life hack!

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Safeguard Your Boots for Winter

Winter brings plenty of challenges, and it’s helpful to find as many ways to make this season easier on yourself as possible. WD-40 can help keep your boots in tip-top shape throughout the winter. You can spray WD-40 on your boots or your shoes to provide them with a barrier against water. This will especially help those who live in areas that receive a ton of snow and rain during the winter. You can also use WD-40 to clean salt stains left behind from roads and sidewalks.

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Clean Tough Residue Off Your Carpets

Carpets help provide a comfortable and relaxing atmosphere in the home, but they can be really difficult to keep clean. This is especially true if you have kids or pets running around the home. Thankfully, as long as you have a can of WD-40 around, you can solve most of your carpet headaches with ease. Spraying WD-40 on tough stains will allow you to clean them out of your carpet more easily. You can also use WD-40 to loosen tough residues stuck in your carpet like gum, glue, and wax!

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Protect Your Window A/C Unit

Your air conditioner is probably your best friend during the summer. Having an air conditioner during the summer months is a necessity in many parts of the world, but they require plenty of upkeep. Window a/c units are particularly prone to becoming clogged with dust, which can prevent your unit from functioning properly. To prevent this summertime tragedy, grab your trusted can of WD-40 and get to spraying! Spray down the vents of your a/c with WD-40 to prevent dust and other debris from collecting on your unit. This will keep it looking clean and running in top shape all summer long. Make sure to wipe down the unit first so you’re not locking a layer of dust onto your machine!

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Clean And Restore License Plates

Retiring an old car can be an emotional time, and many people like to hang on to their old license plates. It’s a great way to remember where you’ve been and how far you’ve come! However, license plates have a tendency to rust after a while, and that can be a pin to clean. WD-40 is an amazing resource for restoring old license plates and keeping them rust-free! Just spray the old license plate with WD-40 and wipe away any light rust stains with a clean cloth. You can also spray non-rusted plates with WD-40 to prevent any rust from forming!

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Clear Your Bathroom & Kitchen Faucets

Kitchen and bathroom faucets tend to fall victim to mineral deposits and limescale build up over time. Areas with hard water will experience low water pressure or taste metal in their tap water when it’s time to clear out their faucets again. Sending a good spray of WD-40 up your kitchen and bathroom faucets will help clear the deposits and break down the limescale build up, which will improve your water pressure and the taste of your water! Make sure to run hot water after for several minutes to flush out any remaining debris and WD-40.

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Clean Mildew From Your Sink

Kitchen sinks are a prime spot for the development of mildew and mold. Even if you clean your sink super frequently, there’s still the possibility for mildew growth around the edges of your sink and underneath your drain catcher. No one wants their kitchen filled with yucky growths like mildew and mold, so it’s time to pull out your handy can of WD-40 again. Spray the areas around or inside your sink where you spot the unsightly growths and wipe the area clean with a paper towel or cloth. You’ll be amazed at how easily WD-40 eliminates messes like mold and mildew from your kitchen!

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Prevent Snow From Piling Up On Your Windowsill

Many people prepare for an oncoming snowstorm by stocking up on essential foods and bottled water, buying rock salt for the sidewalks, and pulling out their snow shovels. However, if you haven’t already started using this hack, you’re going to want to start this winter! Snow can be very dangerous when it piles up on window ledges, as seen in this photo. Imagine a 20lb chunk of snow breaking off a windowsill and falling three stories right onto someone’s head! It wouldn’t end well. Use WD-40 to coat the outside of your window and the windowsill to prevent snow from settling there. Your neighbors will thank you!

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Keep Your Home Free of Wasps

Wasps love to build their nests on people’s homes under the eaves. Sometimes they’ll build nests up in the corner of your porch or under the lip of your roof. Regardless of where it’s built, having a wasp nest attached to your house is an awful way to spend your summer! WD-40 works as an amazing deterrent against all types of insects and pests. Simply spray a generous amount of WD-40 in all the places wasps love to build their nests and enjoy your summer without the fear of getting stung.

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Keep Your Windows Free of Ice

People who live in areas where the temperature frequently falls below freezing understand the struggle of having to wake up extra early every morning just to run your car and let the windows defrost. It’s an annoyance that you don’t have to deal with anymore! Whether you need to get to work early or drop your kids off during the morning school run, you won’t have to wait an extra 30 minutes every morning for the ice to clear from your windows with this hack. Spray your windows and windshield with a generous amount of WD-40 to prevent them from icing over. This is a great hack that saves you valuable time in the mornings.

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Reduce The Glare On Your New Floors

Installing new flooring or a fresh polyurethane coat gives your floors a squeaky clean and super shiny appearance. Sometimes the shine is too extra and a little overwhelming. But don’t worry because there’s an easy solution to reduce the glare on your new floors. Spray a cloth with WD-40 and wipe the flooring to reduce the shine without damaging the flooring. It’s quick, effective, and gives your floor a bit of additional waterproofing.

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Get Those Stubborn Legos Apart

Building massive Lego creations is the height of most people’s childhoods, and an exciting hobby for many adults! Complex models made of Legos are often put on shelves to be admired for many years to come, but there always comes a time when you need to take those Legos apart. Sometimes the stubborn bricks are stuck together so tightly that it’s impossible to pull them apart! An easy solution is to spray them down with WD-40. It’ll loosen the stuck bricks and make pulling them apart a breeze.

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Clean Stuck Piano Keys

Piano keys are notorious for becoming stuck and dirty over time. It’s easy for the keys to collect a build-up of oils from your skin, dust, and other debris that sticks between the keys and causes some performance issues. Rather than spending a fortune on a professional cleaner to come out and fix your piano keys, there’s a much simpler solution. Spraying in between the keys will remove any gunk and grime that’s fallen between them and caused sticky keys. It will also remove bacteria, which helps keep you healthy! Use WD-40 on your piano keys every couple of weeks to keep them in working order and prevent a build-up of bacteria.

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Loosen Stuck Zippers

Dealing with a stuck zipper can be very frustrating, especially when you’ve got places to be and things to do! It can take ages to get your zipper unstuck using only your fingers, but we have a much easier method for you to try. The next time you find the zipper on your jacket or pants stuck, give it a good spritz with WD-40. This will help lubricate the zipper’s track and make it easier to slide the zipper back onto the proper track.

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Clean Tarnished Silver

WD-40 has so many extraordinary uses for everyday objects around your home. Most people have something made of real silver at home, whether that’s jewelry, containers, or actual silverware. Silver can become tarnished over time and loses its appealing sheen. Polishing or cleaning your silver with WD-40 will restore it to its former glory and give it back its shine!

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Clean Your Guitar Strings

Guitar players understand the importance of keeping their guitar strings properly clean and lubricated. It can make the difference between playing through an entire set or experiencing that dreaded moment where one of your strings snap mid-song. All you need to do is spray a cloth with WD-40 and gently wipe down your guitar strings. Don’t spray WD-40 directly on your guitar because that could cause it to get clogged up!

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Always Be Prepared When Fishing

There are few things that can disrupt the peaceful tranquility one experiences while out in nature with a fishing pole and a cold beverage, but a giant tangle in your fishing line is a major disruption! This has happened to everyone who enjoys fishing at one time or another. Whether you go to retrieve new line out of your tackle box and find it a snarled mess or make an awkward cast and tangle up your line, you know it’s going to take ages to fix the problem. However, it doesn’t have to take forever! Keep a can of WD-40 in your tackle box to use when your line gets tangled. Just spray the line with WD-40 and use a pin to carefully get rid of all the tangles. You’ll never have to throw away several feet of fishing line again!

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Keep Bugs Off Your Car

There’s nothing more unsightly than a car grille full of bugs! Unfortunately, this is a common occurrence, especially in certain areas of the US. Driving through the midwest will almost guarantee you have a grille full of locusts during certain months and these little critters can be a pain to clean off. WD-40 is handy to have in your car for a variety of reasons, including dealing with bugs! Spray down your grille with WD-40 to easily remove any bugs in your grille and then reapply it before your next drive to keep bugs from sticking again.

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Keep Wooden Handles Free Of Splinters

Who doesn’t love working with wooden-handled tools in the summer? Plenty of gardening equipment has wooden handles, and they give your hands the summer callouses that say you’re the type of person who enjoys working with their hands. The downside to wooden handles is the possibility of splinters digging into your skin, but that can be easily remedied with some WD-40. Generously apply WD-40 to the wooden handles and leave them to dry. This will protect the wooden handles from water damage and other corrosive elements, which will keep them intact and splinter free for the duration of their lifespan.

 

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Save Your Chalk Art

Who remembers long summer days spent with a box of different colored chalks and your imagination? Doodling on the driveway and sidewalk with chalk is a favorite pasttime for many children and adults. But there’s always that slight feeling of disappointment when you walk outside the next morning and see your chalk art erased by the rain or smudged by the morning dew. Extend the life of your chalk art by another day or two by spraying it with a coat of WD-40 when you’re finished! Kids will especially love this trick and tell their friends in hushed whispers how their chalk drawings survived the nightly rain.

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Break In A New Baseball Glove

We bet not too many people are aware of this nifty trick you can do with WD-40! When you need to break in a new baseball glove, grab your can of WD-40 and spray it liberally over the glove. Then, place a baseball in the palm of the glove and wrap a rubber band around the glove. The WD-40 will soften the leather and allow the glove to start conforming to the shape of the ball. Remove the rubber band the next morning and wear the glove for a few practices until it’s comfortably suited for your hand.

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Bring Your Lawn Furniture Back To Life

Fluctuating temperatures and weather conditions often cause plastic lawn and patio furniture to degrade in appearance after only a few short years. Rather than throw away your location of lawn furniture, you can restore them to its previous visage with the help of WD-40! Spray the furniture with WD-40 and give them a good wipe down with a clean cloth. This will help eliminate any dirt or mildew build-up and get them looking squeaky clean again. You can also spray the furniture with WD-40 when they’re clean to extend the time between cleanings.

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Clean Grease & Oil Off Your Hands

Whether you’re a trained mechanic or someone who simply enjoys working on their own vehicles and machines, then you’re probably going to end up with hands covered in grease and oil at some point. Removing these substances from your skin can be a hassle, but there are some things that will help make the process easier. Spray a small amount of WD-40 into your hands and rub them together for a couple of minutes. Then, wipe them down with a paper towel. Next, head to the sink and give your hands a good wash with soap and water. The grease and grime should come right off!

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Get Stickers Off Your Car

Nearly everyone has gone through a phase of putting stickers and decals on their car. It’s fun to throw on a sticker representing your favorite sports team or movie, but those stickers have to come off eventually. Removing these stickers can be a massive pain and you risk chipping the paint on your car if you can’t get them off cleanly. WD-40 works wonderfully for this purpose. Just spray it over the sticker, let it sit for 30 minutes, and then peel the sticker off without any hassle!

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Lubricate A Shovel

Ah, spring has arrived! It’s a time of new beginnings, including starting that garden you’ve been thinking about for ages. But, when you go to make your first dig into the freshly warmed up earth, you realize it’s still much harder than you were hoping. So, how do you remedy this issue? Coat the blade of your shovel in WD-40! This will help the shovel slide into the earth more easily, and it will allow the dirt to fall off easily. You won’t break your back doing yardword with this trick.

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Make Cleaning Your Fridge Easy

Cleaning out the refrigerator is a task many of us dread. You have to pull out all your food and beverages, wipe down every inch, and then put everything back. The task can be made even worse by spending ages scrubbing at stains, dried pieces of food, or mildew. Thankfully, you can use WD-40 to easily tackle all of these issues! Spray any tough spots inside of your fridge with WD-40, let it sit for a few minutes, then wipe away the mess with a clean cloth. Cleaning your fridge has never been easier!

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Clean Your Sneakers

Whether you have an old pair of sneakers you want to bring back to life or a brand new pair you want to keep in peak appearance, WD-40 can help. Spray a little WD-40 on any scuff marks or stains on your sneakers and easily wipe away with mess with a paper towel or clean cloth. You won’t believe how easy it is to keep your shoes clean!

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Remove Barnacles From Boats

Barnacles often get stuck to boats, and anyone who’s spent a lot of time on a boat understands the importance of removing them as often as you can. It’s usually an arduous and difficult task, but using WD-40 makes the process much easier. Spray a generous amount of WD-40 on the affected area, wait a few minutes, and then use a putty knife to gently scrape the barnacles off.

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Keep Your Camping Trip Stress-Free

If you’re a fan of camping, then you need to start bringing a can of WD-40 with you. It can help with so many headaches campers often come across. Got a stuck tent or backpack zipper? Spray some WD-40! Swiss army knife clogged with gunk? Put that WD-40 to work! Need to make sure your tent spikes come out easily? Coat them with WD-40 before driving them into the ground. The possibilities are endless!

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