How to Make Homemade Air Freshener with Natural Ingredients
Ever thought about making your home smell wonderful using natural stuff? Let me share a neat trick with you on how you can make your own homemade air freshener.
Grab some baking soda – yes, the usual kitchen kind – it’s a fantastic odor catcher. Now, mix it with a few drops of your favorite essential oils, and voilà! You’ve got an easy, super-effective air freshener. It’s pretty cool how something so simple can freshen up your space!
Table of Contents
Simple Recipe for Making Your Own Natural Air Freshener
Here’s my quick and easy recipe for making this natural air freshener. You’ll need:
DIY Eco-Friendly Air Freshener Ingredients
- 1/2 cup of baking soda
- 10–15 drops of your favorite essential oils
- A mason jar (or any small jar)
Step-by-Step Instructions on How to Create Your Safe Air Freshener
- Pick Your Jar: Any small jar will do. I love using mason jars for their look and practicality.
- Mix It Up: Pour the baking soda into the jar. Then add your essential oils – lavender, lemon, or peppermint are my go-to’s for a fresh vibe.
- Stir It Well: Give it a good mix with a spoon or fork to get the scent all nice and even.
- Lid Holes for Airflow: If your jar has a lid, poke some holes in it to let the scent circulate through. Or, just use a piece of cloth or paper on top.
- Place It Where You Please: Bathroom, kitchen, living room – wherever needs a scent boost.
- Keep It Fresh: Give the jar a little shake now and then to wake up the scent. You are welcome to add more oils over time to keep it smelling great.
Don’t Miss:
FAQs about Aromatic Homemade Air Fresheners
What’s so great about homemade air fresheners?
They’re outstanding because they’re eco-friendly, super affordable, and free from all sorts of chemicals.
Can I make up an air freshener without essential oils?
Absolutely! You can try using some lemon juice or fragrant herbs like rosemary. They’re natural and smell fantastic.
Do you have any quick, easy air freshener recipes?
First up, try mixing water with a few drops of your favorite essential oils in a spray bottle. This one’s a classic and super versatile. Or, if you’re up for something a bit more unique, simmer cinnamon sticks, orange peels, and cloves on your stove. Once it’s nicely brewed and strained, you can use this aromatic solution as a natural room spray. It’s like a cozy hug for your home!
Should I be cautious before using homemade air fresheners?
When it comes to using these homemade air fresheners, a bit of caution is key, especially around pets and kids. Essential oils are wonderful but potent, so it’s best to use them thoughtfully and sparingly.
Do these DIY air fresheners actually eliminate odors?
Absolutely. Ingredients like baking soda and vinegar are champs at not only masking, but actually eliminating those pesky odors. They tackle the source, leaving your space genuinely fresher.
Conclusion
Wrapping up, making your own homemade air freshener isn’t just kind on your wallet. But, it’s a healthier, more natural choice for your home. You get to skip all those synthetic chemicals that are often in commercial air fresheners. So, give it a whirl and see how it transforms your space.
Thanks for stopping by The Complete Guide to Imperfect Homemaking. Thanks.
There is a great book out on “Baking Soda” by Diane Sutherland, with all types of use for it, plus some neat recipes.I’ve tried alot of them and they work!!
i did this but there is not much deodorizing happening!! Do I need bigger holes? More holes? More Oil?
This is such a cute idea. Baking soda is awesome at removing odors. We went fishing once and put the fish in a container in the trunk. In transit the box tipped and fish fell out. We didn’t realize until days later that one fell in a crack, it was horrible. We poured baking soda on the area that smelled of rotting fish and vacuumed 2 days later and it took the odor away completely. Up until that point we thought it only worked in the fridge. Thanks for sharing this cute way of using it in the bathroom. I’ll definitely use it.
California Scents pack three fragrance blocks in to each and every can for long lasting fragrance. They last for up to 60 days and some have been known to last past this time too!
I did It and It isn’t smelling up my room at all :- am I doing something wrong?
OMG this is such a great idea. I love crafts and just recently descovered the world of Pinterest. Thats how I found your Idea. I also just started my own blog called Devine Design Overnight. It’s about crafts and cooking.
Wow, it’s really great idea…i would like to make homemade air freshener.
I love the idea, going to try it out myself I think. I too have a crafts blog, so I will give you a shout out if I post!
How about using one of those weird salt shakers that your relatives have given you for a Christmas present? It already has the holes and must be more attractive than a Mason jar.
I use baking soda to clean the stains from my china teacups and coffee cups. I LOVE this product~!
love it! and i prefer it to buying something chemically & costing more than it should at the store
This looks like an awesome idea and sort of a fun craft. I’m involved in a Mothers of Preschooler fellowship and would like to suggest this for one of our crafts. Do you think using baby food jars would work as well? I’m afraid canning jars would strain our craft budget to buy and I doubt there is anyone willing to donate 30 of them so everyone can make one.
I saw another pin on Pinterest that used baby food jars for this type of project. They would work great and you’re recycling! The other pin was using gelatin and essential oils to make a gel air Freshener. This pin suggestion is cheaper and better for us in my opinion.
Well, love your idea. You are so creative. I like the homemade air freshener and I want to try it.
www. rainingblossoms (dot) com
Maybe the point is that the baking soda neutralizes the bad odors, not makes your room smell like lavender. Maybe….
But Baking Soda is wonderful for a lot of things, in any case.
A different Anonymous
Baking soda has so many uses! I use it to scrub the kitchen and bathroom too. I hate inhaling the harsh chemicals in regular cleaners. Thanks for the tips!
I love this!! Although since I am addicted to Downy Unstoppables, I think I might put some of it in the jar instead 🙂
I tried this but I cant smell anything..even in the bathroom with door closed..I added upto 20-22 drops of essential oil.. I would soo love for this to work and any suggestion would be really appreciated…
Thank you for this!!! I love the idea and I will do it right away!!!So nice….
Beautiful idea. I am so going to do this. I found you on Stumbledupon. I am new follower on blogger and Facebook.
Julie
another neat and simple idea is to use water beads. You can find the receipe at waterbeadcreations (dot) com
these are beautiful and so inexpensive to make. all you need is 1 packet of water beads, they come in a variety of beautiful colors, add water based fragrance oils and water, the beads will absorb the water and the scented oils resulting in beautiful scented water marlbes.
Hi, girlie! This is featured at Recognition Day Thursday found here: www. homemakeronadime .com/2011/05/recognition-day-thursday-do-able(dot)html. Please feel free to grab the feature button 🙂
I did this only, instead of poking holes in the lid, I used a bit of light weight woven fabric held in place by the normal ring. It totally works and looks pretty too.
I tried this but mine doesn’t smell 🙁 maybe the essential oil is no good.
LOVE this idea…thank you so much for sharing it!
love love love!
Found you through Pinterest. This is such a great idea. Practical, cheap, and oh so easy! It’s things like this that make me shake my head and say…now, why didn’t I think of that? 🙂 Will be making one of these asap!
I just made this today – heart design and everything. I used a Pomegranate/Vanilla essential oil and my living room already smells wonderful! I can’t wait to make my Tangerine/Lychee one!
great idea love it, now lets c how creatively decorative i can get with this !!! Thank for sharing
OHH how fab! I have both of those ingredients plus a mason jar..so I am going to do this! Thank you for sharing 🙂
-Lindsay
Delighted Momma
I’m so loving this idea works perfectly
Love the idea as an air freshener but wouldn’t using the same jar with the oils as a cleaning agent be harmful to carpet or fabric furniture? I know it’s not much in there but I’d be careful with oils like that!
I am going to try this! Thanks for the tip!
Great idea! I cannot wait to try it! I shared you on my facebook page too! “The Mama Tidbits”!
Thanks for linking up this great post at the Creative Bloggers’ Party & Hop 🙂
There always has to be a pessimist out there.
Thanks for the information (whoever you are- “anonymous”), but the rest of us tend to like the baking soda & e. oils idea!
But you can go ahead and put your charcoal in a jar and enjoy. 🙂 Have a great day!
I loved the easy-green-n-cheap idea but it didn’t work the way I expected. I used about 10 drops of lavender essential oil, but I can only smell lavender if I bring the jar really close to my nose 🙂
Shake the jar a little everyday, you’ll smell it.
Contrary to very popular belief, baking soda is actually fairly poor at absorbing odour.
Much of the push for doing this comes from the producers themselves, since it sure sells a lot more boxes of baking soda than are actually used for baking.
To copy text from an “Ask a Scientist” site…
The popular “open box of Arm & Hammer in the refrigerator” simply provides an adsorbent material that can soak up odors — but not very effectively. For example, if some of the odoriferous materials floating around in the refrigerator are acidic, the alkaline baking soda can absorb and neutralize the acid. Even in that regard, it is not all that effective because, as the powder in the box contacts water vapor, it tends to crust over an lose a great deal of its already limited surface activity. It all sounds quite nice, but it does not work very well. Far better would be a canister of activated charcoal because it can indeed adsorb vapors that contact the charcoal.
I am a smoker and my 1 year old Jeep smelled horrible. I had tried numerous air fresheners and I have a professional detailer that cleans it every 2 weeks and nothing was helping the smoke odor. I googled it and came across an article about putting baking soda in a cup and just sitting it in a cup holder. I did this and it absorbed the odor overnight. I am a HUGE believer in baking soda, not only does it work, it is super cheap. The best of both worlds!
cut am apple in half and leave in car,takes away cigarette odors! who would of thought?!
To me, it seemed odd to mix lavendar with the baking soda. We expect the air freshener to release the lavendar scent, but how can it if the soda “absorbs” odors? Seems counter-productive, doesn’t it? I use baking soda in my fridge and I like the way the jar looks and would like to try this natural, low-cost project. I’m no pessimist, and I think there’s nothing wrong with sharing information and asking questions when something doesn’t make sense. Thanks for sharing this project! 🙂
I would love to add my two cents to the OP above regarding the ineffectiveness of baking soda as an order absorber. My personal experience is that upon knocking over a cup of coffee in my car cupholder, I immediately sopped up the liquid, then filled the cupholder with baking soda. The next morning there was NO smell of coffee whatsoever – so yes, baking soda to absorb order does work effectively in removing odors. I would question the use or addition of EO to baking soda unless you add enough EO to create a pleasant smelling scent. But since baking soda works so great on its own, why bother with the EO? Just place a pretty bowl and fill it part way with baking soda and let it do its job.
Great DIY. I quoted your air freshener tutorial on my blog karboojeh. wordpress(dot)com
Thank you for the inspiration. I made a baking soda + musk deodorizer, and it smells heavenly! God bless
Too Fun; but my frustration comes ’bout when scent just doesn’t linger long enough. I’m curious to y’alls findings…Am I the only one?…Tips?
This is an awesome idea!!! 😀 Must try!!! Especially near the kitties litter box. 😉
Love this!! I feature it on my blog!
formamas. blogspot .com /2011/07/homemade-air-freshener (dot) html
Thank you for your inspiration!
I was going to mention the myth about baking soda and odors, but Anon beat me to it. Really, it doesn’t do much except give the Essential Oil a place to vaporize. Why not use rock salt, EO, and lavender flowers or dried rose buds to look prettier in the jar instead of baking soda. My kids would use that sucker as a giany salt shaker anyway, and rock salt would be harder to get out the little holes! Sea shells would look good too.
That’s an adorable idea! And, if I’m not mistaken, you could use almost any fragrance in the baking soda, right? Great post, and thanks for posting pics too 😀
I love this idea…I’m definitely going to try it. I’m your latest follow, love your blog!
I use plain baking soda as a room deodorizer. I never thought of adding essential oil to it. *runs out of the room to get essential oil*
Great idea! Pinned! 🙂
Most car air fresheners that are available these days are very effective in masking the underlying odor in your car. When searching for the best auto air freshener, you will have to check out the fragrance and also the effectiveness of the air freshener.
how long would it last
Ok..love this idea and now that I have tried it…I can’t smell anything! I didn’t use lavender. I used a very strong vanilla essential oil and nothing. I really had hoped this worked. I am going to try a different oil.
I would have never thought of such a wonderful idea…thank you!! I will try this as I am a sniffer xoxox
This is great! Visiting from Pinterest. New follower here and on Pinterest. I’m going to use your tip for sure. Looking forward to more awesome posts.
Save any citrus peels and spices that are too old to use. Boil them in little water. They make the house smell lovely for next to nothing.
This may be a dumb question…but if you add essential oil to the baking soda, isn’t the baking soda going to absorb the smell of the essential oil??
I love the idea though, just curious if it will work?
Great idea!
I just started a linky party this past Tuesday. It was a great success with over 50 link ups! I would love it if you would participate ToDaY! It’s called $10 Tuesdays and it’s for things that cost less than $10 and take 20-30 mins (ish) to complete. I love inexpensive and quick projects and I’m guessing others will too 😉 Thanks so much for considering.
Tina
spam.
what else can i use as substitute for lavender oil?can i use perfume instead?
Yeah — cause unlabeled small containers of white powdery substance will never be misconstrued, right?
Seriously?!?!?! You really said that? I hear what your saying, BUT your average person has no reason to worry about a small container of white powdery substance being misconstrued. And if they did, I can assure you, they wouldn’t be keeping it in a pretty jar on the counter for everyone to see…. If you are worried that would be th case in your life, then by all means, don’t make one.
Awesome idea definately will do.I am a new follower can’t wait to see more deas.
I can’t wait to try it and see alot of homemade cleaning ideas. Where do you purchase the essentials oils? The only ones I have found are costly
I really like this post. I have it pinned on my pinterest, have tried it, and wrote about it on my blog. Thanks for your post!
And to the anonymous person above, check out amazon.com. I was able to get a box of essential oils for a really good price. I got 6 1 oz bottles for around $20. 1 oz seems so small but it goes a LONG way with essential oils.
You are paying for what you get. I love doTERRA because I know I am getting a certified pure oil. I know that I am not getting any fillers. The reason there are cheaper oils out there is because they are using fillers plus a little bit of oil. If you are interested in getting any doTERRA oils feel free to contact me.
Heather Story
801-558-6684
I found mine at Michael’s!
Anonymous–feel free to contact me and I would be happy to help you get in contact with some amazing essential oils–they are great for me than just the smell!!
Instead of a mason jar, I found a “cheese shaker” at the dollar store so it already has holes!
use a piece of lace fabric instead of metal lid-just cut it larger than the lid so it will stick out from under the band
That is a great idea!
Hi Kelleigh!
I’ve just found your blog and I am so thrilled!
I really love it.
I’m sure I will find such a big inspiration here!
Francesca from Italy
i love this idea…but as my contrary husband asks…if the bicarb absorbs oudor…wont it just absorb the lavendar drops??…arg. hes so contrary and i dont have a comeback…
That is a great question, and I don’t really have a scientific answer for why it still smells lavender-y…but it does. Try it, prove him wrong 🙂
Wow its really easy… i’ll try it for sure…thanks for sharing dear! 🙂
I love the idea of using a bit of lace, (or one of my huge number of flea market find doilies), held by the canning ring. I am reluctant to poke holes in a new canning lid, but it would be a great reuse of a used one.
I really want to try this idea out! How long does it last? Do you find that the baking soda absorbs the essential oil fragrance?
I think I found my homemade Christmas presents! Work friends & relatives are going to be excited!
You could use glass baby food jars as well 🙂
Interesting idea! So the baking soda doesn’t counteract the scent from the essential oils then I am assuming.
I definitely want to try this! Now I just need to find a pretty jar…
Great idea! I have been trying to find something to do with pretty powder makeup jars and other containers to pretty to throw away.
I am going to try this. I will post the results on my blog! 😀
AWESOME idea! Thanks for sharing on the Homemaker on a Dime Blog Hop! Your newest follower