This article is about how to clean your toilet either daily or several times a week, how to fix the toilet if it needs it some TLC and how this all fits together with my sanity during our world trip. You will learn more about how to clean your toilet than you ever thought possible or ever wanted to know. However, once you learned this, daily life might become just a little easier. I encourage you to read on.

Everyone needs to clean the toilet at regular intervals, how however learning to clean the toilet and saving your sanity is an unusual, interesting combination. During our 2025 world trip, I refined how I clean the toilet, and it helped me in several unexpected ways

2025 was the year that my family and I went on a world trip. It was amazing! We learned so much about ourselves, about different places in the world, and of course, some parts were amazingly challenging, aka the cleanliness of the many spaces we stayed at, hence this updated article.

Several weeks into our trip, I started to struggle with not feeling that comfortable in my living spaces, the lounges, floors, light switches and bathrooms left a lot to be desired in many places. Not to mention that if you live in any space, it doesn’t take more than three days for it to get dirty enough to need some attention.

The ritual to clean the toilet daily - became a thing that allowed me to feel more in control of my space. There are clearly hundreds of things that are outside of your control when you are travelling the world, language, culture, some features of your accommodation, your food and the list goes on. This small act of cleaning the toilet allowed me every morning to, in a small but tangible way, do something positive for me and my space. It didn’t matter whatever had happened that night, the week before or what would be about to happen in the day ahead, if I cleaned the toilet and the bathroom, this area was sparkling clean (often cleaner than it had been in years) and I had made a small difference in my world, which in turn made me feel more comfortable.

How to clean the toilet daily

When traveling I used this super simple system to clean the toilet.

Buy (ideally biodegradable):

Disposable wipes (ideally disinfectant cloth)
Disposable gloves (just a few, you don’t need to run a hospital)

If you can’t find these things, another way you can do this is with kitchen paper and alcohol gel.

How to clean the toilet – the daily actions:

Put on your gloves (I only did this the first time; once it is disinfected, you know what happened on that seat after).
Clean the toilet by wiping from top to bottom, from outside to inside
- First with the wet cloth*
- Then, with toilet paper or a paper towel, to pick up loose dirt
Make sure you wipe around the toilet hinges and the base/back of the toilet (this is often the grossest part).
Dispose of the tissues and gloves.

*Wet cloths dislodge and disinfect areas, dry cloths actually help to remove this dirt from the place you find it.

The benefit of this method is that the first time is the worst, it however also shows most improvement. For me it was a tiny act of defiance; “come on scare me world, I just cleaned the toilet, again!”.

After you clean the toilet like this once, all that is left is maintenance simply wipe down the toilet and extend this to the bathroom floor.

Do you have to clean the toilet daily? It is up to you, for me this way of cleaning the toilet saved my sanity. It also makes it a two-minute job instead of a big job every couple of days, as a bonus you arrive at a beautifully clean spot several times a day.

Additional notes on how to clean the toilet:

When you clean the toilet, you might realise something is broken

What you might notice when you clean the toilet is that it is broken or partially broken, the number of times this happened on our world trip was astonishing (– really this isn’t super hard Airbnb hosts!).

When you learn to clean the toilet and do a deep dive so to speak, you might notice or be more annoyed than you would otherwise be by some things that aren’t right with your toilet.

It could be the hinges are loose, or broken, the toilet seat buffers are broken (these are the plastic bumps that take the impact when you put the seat down). If you are in a location where there is a hardware shop, you can pop over to the shop and get:

I linked the above to some products at Bunnings, “the most prolific” hardware store in every populated place in Australia (no, I don’t get commission). Here is a video on how to fix your toilet seat -Learn how to tighten or replace your toilet seat in 3 minutes.

This is a tip for when you are somewhere a long time, most of this costs very little money, for my own house or long-term rental I think it is worth it. But I’ll be honest during the world trip I had other priorities than going to hardware shops to fix Airbnb hosts toilet seats.

In your own home fixing the seat after you clean the toilet will make it easier to clean the toilet moving forward, it is more hygienic in a lot of cases and why would you put up with sitting on a wonky seat? You don’t do it for an office chair so why accept mediocrity of with the toilet seat?

Behaviour change, I clean the toilet at a set time

I encourage you to read past the actual topic of this article and note that I am talking about the organised consistent habit to clean the toilet. The habit is what counts; you start the day every day with something not that inspiring, but an action that is beneficial. This creates your ability to add other habits to your cleaning routines and organising habits; however simple it sounds, this demonstrates that you are the type of person who cleans and organises their spaces daily.

For more on this, check out the book Tiny Habits from BJ Fogg – I love how his key habit was flossing one tooth. Another organiser, Flylady, started organising her whole house after she shined her sink at night.

Both BJ Foggs, Flylady and I show different actions on how to start with one organised habit, if implemented daily they should all result in beneficial behaviour change and you feeling good about yourself.

How do different parts of the world clean the toilet?

Let’s talk about my favourite, Japanese toilets - during our world trip, cultural perceptions about the cleanliness of toilets were very different. Argentina insists on two bowls (one for rinsing), and most South American countries don’t flush toilet paper. For us, Guadeloupe had no running water, which was interesting. America was pretty good, Europe, especially the toilet floors, were disappointing (it wasn’t water that we were standing in), but then we arrived in Japan! In Japan their spiritual practice Shintoism has a “toilet god” resulting in a nationwide focus on clean toilets, I was in heaven the few weeks we were there. Now we are back in Australia, and let’s say we can do better both in our homes as well as in public facilities – hence this article.

If you prefer to clean the toilet less often than daily

I am an advocate of regular, very small jobs rather than infrequent, larger ones, but everyone’s situation is different. If you are someone who can only clean the toilet once or twice a week, please read on.

How to clean the toilet weekly in a few minutes

As I made the argument above, cleaning the toilet is something we all have to do and there is probably few people who like doing this job. On this page, I can teach you how to clean the toilet so it can be done in less than 10 minutes a week.

Here are some ideas on how to clean the toilet regularly in a step-by-step format:

Clean the toilet regularly at least once a week (depending on the number of people in the house and how “tidy” they are).
Use throw-away tissues. I like to reuse clothes and be very environmentally friendly. However, when I clean the toilet, I use a cloth and dispose of it. This could be paper towel with some disinfected spray, my preference is opting for the antibacterial disposable (biodegradable) cloths which you use once, they disinfect the place, you bin it and get on with life.
If the toilet needs a scrub, put some Jif or other cream cleanser in the bowl, scrub the bowl and let it stand for a minute.
Do not use pumice stones, they can damage your toilet bowl for good, making it even harder to clean in future.
Make sure you have a clean brush. See it as the toothbrush of the toilet and show a little respect for this very important seat in the house.
Pick a brush you like the look and feel of; life is too short for crappy toilet brushes.
Work from top to bottom and outside to inside.
- First, top to bottom on the outside, include the outside-facing hinges
- Then work from top to bottom on the inside.
  - For the inside, make sure you are getting a bit closer to the bowl (if you have cleaned the outside already, this should be a bit better). Open the lid; Clean the inside of the lid, the seat, both the top and bottom (often one of the filthiest parts).
  - Make sure you clean the bowl's brim thoroughly, using enough cloths. With a bit of practice, you don’t even need to touch the bowl at all.
Clean the floor around the toilet. I am not a fan of cloths around the toilet, to me, they are a breeding ground for germs.
Bin your wipes
This is also a great time to clean the bin next to your toilet (having one next to the toilet is super useful for cleaning and for the female population in general).
- You could even clean the bin out with a disinfectant cloth before closing it.

How to clean the toilet – advanced

Whilst you are on your knees next to a clean toilet, clean around the toilet and in the corners. There are often spider rags or daddy long-legs living here, especially if you haven’t ventured into this area of the house recently.
- If you follow the above steps, you will not have to do an extensive job after your first time, as you will keep up with regular toilet cleaning.
Make sure you have a good bowl for your brush.
Clean the brush bowl, throw old water in the actual toilet bowl. Place maybe a little water and soap in the stand with the clean brush.
If you prefer experiment with “continuous cleansers” either throw these cleaners in the top water banister or hang them around the brim. This provides more continuous freshness but will not eliminate regular cleaning.

Wash your hands with disinfectant soap, just to be sure.

How to clean the toilet as a habit – what can prevent you from doing this?

Going back to the topic of behaviour change it isn’t always lack of willingness to do something. Often something isn’t working which prevents you in this case to clean the toilet.

Have a quick look around, have you got the tools you need?
Are they easily accessible?
Do you have a clear trigger to do this habit?

One key pitfall to forming habits is not having the right tools when and where you need them and not getting a situational trigger telling you that a small action needs to be done. That is why your first bathroom visit of the day might be a good one to create as a trigger.

Make sure you celebrate with a small hooray after you clean the toilet – you are awesome!

Well done!

You now know how to clean the toilet daily in 2 minutes or weekly in less than 10 minutes.

Whilst you are getting the hang of all this, teach your partner and children as well (seeing they also use this space). My son has known how to clean the toilet since he was five and does a good job (he doesn’t mind it and sometimes thinks it is time to do it out of his own accord – other time he needs the reminder).

These small organising habits can have far reaching implications, as this article shows, cleaning the toilet saved my sanity and for my son, I belief that one day his future partner will be very happy. But let’s be honest in another blog let’s talk about something more fun to organise than how to clean your toilet.