How To Make Your House Smell Good (And Eliminate Odors)

There are lots of natural ways to make your house smell great, including wax melts, essential oils, orange peels, and baking soda.

The Best Ways To Make Your Home Smell Amazing

To make your house smell good, it’s best to tackle the process in two stages: first, getting rid of musty smells, stale air, and other unpleasant odors, and second, introducing fresh, clean aromas that that will keep your home smelling great. And since I try to avoid synthetic scents and harsh chemicals when I can, many of the tips and tricks you’ll find throughout this post are totally natural ways to make your house smell great — my homemade air freshener spray, as an example! 

Whether you’re looking for the best tips to get rid of odors, or easy and cost-effective ways to fill your home’s square footage with pleasant smells, you’ve come to right place! (We’ll start with the former, then move on to the latter.)

7 Ways To Deodorize And Freshen Your Home

Cleaning with scented vinegar deodorizes and makes your house smell good

1. Use Scented Cleaning Vinegar To Clean Your Home

If bad odors are making your home fragrant in all the wrong ways, start with a good cleaning session to eliminate odors at their source. I suggest whipping up some scented cleaning vinegar with a clean, refreshing fragrance like mint for maximum odor elimination. (Brush up on the dos and don’ts of cleaning with vinegar first for a reminder not to use it on porous stone and certain other surfaces!)

And if you can, open a few windows after deep cleaning your home to let in some fresh air — even a few minutes will make a huge difference! (Too cold out? An air filter or purifier makes a great alternative!)

Make garbage disposal deodorizers with ice and lemon to keep the kitchen smelling good.

2. Remove Bad Smells From Your Garbage Disposal

If your garbage disposal is a source of some unpleasant odors, the easiest way to clean it is to make frozen disposal cleaning cubes using white vinegar and lemon or orange peels. Just toss a couple of cubes down your sink drain, grind them up in your disposal, and it’ll make a huge difference.

Keep your house smelling fresh with homemade carpet deodorizing powder.

3. Get Smells Out Of Carpet

Smelly carpet is one of the most overlooked sources of bad odors. Eliminate those odors by making your own deodorizing carpet powder with baking soda (a natural deodorizer), borax, and cinnamon or essential oils. Sprinkle the powder on your carpets, wait for a few minutes, and vacuum as usual. Not only does the powder help pick up dirt and hair, it also leaves behind a light, fresh scent of spices. This is the one of the easiest ways to help make your home smell nice all the time!

Get musty smells out of your towels with baking soda and white vinegar.

4. Fix Stinky Towels To Make Your Bathroom Smell Better

Residue from dryer sheets and detergents can cause bath towels to smell funky after a while, especially if dampness and mildew are added to the equation. Luckily, I’ve got a simple 3-step fix for smelly towels that will have your bathroom smelling fresh once more, and all you need is a bit of baking soda and vinegar.

Even with pets, you can make your house smell good with a little extra effort to remove hair and dander.

5. Keep Pet Odors Under Control

To keep pet smells at bay, make sure to wash their bedding and toys regularly, and vacuum diligently to keep pet hair under control. Also, be sure to clean up pet stains immediately (sprinkle baking soda over it, if nothing else), and make sure any air fresheners or sprays you use are safe to use around pets.

Curtains can collect dust and smell musty, so give them a whack with a hand towel to help your house smell good.

6. Give Your Curtains A Whack

It’s all too easy to forget that curtains can develop a stale odor after a while. If your curtains are machine washable, toss them in the washer with your laundry. If not, try one of the expert tips from hotel housekeepers — take a hand towel and give your curtains a few good whacks to get the dust out of them!

To get rid of odors in upholstery and make your house smell fresh, dust the furniture with baking soda, let it sit for half an hour, then vacuum.

7. Freshen Upholstered Furniture

Furniture can get smelly in a hurry, especially when pets are allowed on it, so it’s important to keep upholstered furniture clean by vacuuming it regularly. For a quick refresh, sprinkle baking soda over upholstery, let it sit for half an hour or so, then vacuum it up.

Once you’ve eliminated any musty, dusty, or unpleasant odors from your home, you can move onto the next step: filling your space with your favorite scents! (Not sure what aromas to use? Check out the bonus section near the end of this post!)

16 Ways To Make Your House Smell Good

Essential Oil Diffusers are a fantastic way to make your house smell amazing - and they can have health benefits too!

1. Run A Diffuser To Make Your Whole House Smell Good

When it comes to fragrance and freshness, it’s hard to beat the results of an essential oil diffuser! Simply fill it with water, add a few drops of essential oils, and turn it on to emit a fine mist that will carry the fragrant oils throughout your house. (‘Tis the season to diffuse essential oils that smell like fall!)

A homemade fabric freshening spray is an inexpensive way to make your house smell wonderful.

2. Freshen Fabrics With A Scented Fabric Spray

Another quick and easy way to fragrance your home with essential oils: make your own fabric refreshing spray à la Febreze! Just add water, a bit of baking soda, and your favorite essential oil to a small spray bottle, then use it to lightly spray furniture, drapes, linens, or bedding.

Lavender oil is a great choice for this spray because of its calming properties, but citrus oils like lemon, tangerine, sweet orange, and grapefruit smell great and offer a natural energy boost as well! For wood furniture, try a DIY lemon-scented dusting spray — people associate the smell of lemon with a clean house!

Homemade wax melts will keep your house smelling fresh.

3. Use Wax Melts To Fill Your Home With Fragrance

Those little warmers for scented wax cubes are another great way to fill your home with the scent of your choice — no need to light a candle! You can save yourself a lot of money by making your own scented wax cubes with beeswax, coconut oil and essential oils. It’s surprisingly easy, and you have full creative control to create a scent that is uniquely you.

You can make your car smell good, too, with my homemade car air fresheners.

4. Make Your Car Smell Great With DIY Air Fresheners

Okay, you car isn’t exactly in your home, but since most of us spend quite a bit of time in the car, I thought I’d include it anyway! Freshen up the air in your car by making one of these three homemade car-sized air fresheners.! 

These DIY gel air fresheners will keep your house smelling fresh and they're inexpensive to make.

5. Make Any Room Smell Great With DIY Gel Fragrance Jars

Gel fragrance jars are another great way to put essential oils to good use around the house. It’s surprisingly easy to make gel fragrance jars to freshen the air, and they make great gifts, too! All you need is water, unflavored gelatin, and essential oils to make them. Put one by an air vent to diffuse the scent throughout the room (like many hotels do!)

Houseplants actually clean the air to keep your house smelling fresh.

6. Use Plants To Clean The Air 

All potted plants are natural air purifiers, but some of the most effective ones are palm trees, orchids, and peace lilies. They not only look great, they help clean the air in your home around the clock!

A simmering potpourri is a wonderful way to make your house smell good any time of year.

7. Simmer Stovetop Potpourri For A Pleasant Scent

I love simmering stovetop potpourri during the holidays, but there’s no reason you couldn’t do it to freshen the air any time of year! Realtors and interior designers make use of this hack to give homes an inviting scent like citrus or cinnamon.

There are lots of great simmering potpourri recipes, and they are really simple to make. Fill a saucepan with water, add some aromatic herbs, fruit slices, or spices, and simmer on low heat. (You can also do this in a mini crockpot!)

Put a few drops of essential oil on a cotton pad in your vacuum's dust cup to make your house smell good as you vacuum.

8. Use Your Vacuum Cleaner To Freshen The Air

Use this vacuum hack to accomplish two things at once: clean your carpets and freshen the air in your home! Just add a few drops of your favorite essential oil or oil blend to a cotton ball, then place the cotton ball in your vacuum’s dust cup. As you vacuum, the air flow will disperse the scent of the essential oil and freshen the air as you go — sort of like a diffuser!

A homemade deodorizing tablet will help keep your house smelling fresh.

9. Prevent Stinky Trash Cans To Keep Your Kitchen Smelling Fresh

To avoid stinky trash cans, make sure to clean them well, and try to take the worst offenders (ex. seafood and produce scraps) outside instead of putting them in your kitchen trash can. Clean dirty trash cans using a solution of equal parts vinegar and water, add a homemade odor absorbing disk, and make sure it has a well-fitting lid.

Orange peels plus heat will spread a wonderful fragrance throughout your house,

10. Use Orange Peels To Neutralize Cooking Smells

Some people love the lingering smell of a home-cooked meal, but if you’re not one of them, you can easily neutralize those odors use orange or lemon peels. Just put a few citrus peels in a warm oven, and your kitchen will have a lovely citrusy scent in no time.

Fresh eucalyptus in the shower will make your bathroom smell like a posh spa, and it will help you breathe better, too.

11. Make Your Bathroom Smell Like A Spa 

Make your bathroom feel like a high-end spa by bringing fresh eucalyptus into a warm, steamy shower. The heat and steam will activate and release its beneficial compounds that can clear your airways, and also help make your bathroom smell great. To take advantage of this aromatic eucalyptus shower, all you need are some fresh eucalyptus branches, which you can pick up at a florist (or from your own garden!)

Use hydrogen peroxide to clean and disinfect your refrigerator -- no more bad odors when you open the fridge!

12. Keep Your Refrigerator Fresh

Ever get a weird smell in your fridge, whether from a bowl of forgotten leftovers or a stray piece of fruit in your produce drawer? Go through the contents of your fridge and toss out anything smelly, then wipe down the surfaces of the fridge with hydrogen peroxide to clean and sanitize them. Leave an open box of baking soda in the fridge to absorb odors and keep your fridge smelling fresh.

Sponges can get funky, so to keep your house smelling good, clean or replace sponges frequently.

13. Clean Your Kitchen Sponges To Keep Funky Smells At Bay

Deodorize stinky kitchen sponges with an overnight soak. Add a tablespoon of baking soda to a bowl of warm water, then place your kitchen sponge in the water. Let it soak there overnight to give the baking soda time to work its odor-eliminating magic! You can also pop a wet sponge in the microwave for a minute or run it through the dishwasher on the top rack.

A homemade #2 spray will keep bathroom smells in the toilet where they belong, keeping the air in your bathroom fresh.

14. Trap Toilet Odors To Avoid Bathroom Stink

Instead of using sprays to cover up bathroom odors, keep them where they belong — in the toilet — with a DIY toilet spray (a homemade version of the popular Poo-Pourri spray). Spray it before you go, and those bad odors will never have a chance to get into the air!

Vanilla is one of the most popular scents so use it to make your house smell great.

15. Use Vanilla For A Comforting Scent

Few scents are more comforting than aromatic vanilla, and you can fill your home with it quickly and easily! Just put a couple tablespoons of pure vanilla extract in an oven-safe dish, then pop it in your oven at 275°F for about twenty minutes before pulling it out and setting it on a trivet to cool.

A basket of pine cones with some pine or spruce essential oil will make your house smell good and look great at the same time!

16. Use Pine Boughs Or Pine Cones

A basket of fresh-cut pine boughs will smell great and look wonderful, too. You can also collect or buy pine cones and add a few drops of pine or spruce essential oil to them. These tips are ideal to use around the holidays!

Lemon is the number one favorite scent for making a house smell good, so put a few drops of lemon essential oil in a pan of steaming water and let it scent the air.

BONUS: What’s The Best Fragrance To Fill Your Home With?

We all have different fragrance preferences, so “best” is relative. But after consulting a number of different sources where experts share their best home fragrance recommendations, there were a handful that were clear frontrunners, including:

  1. Citrus (especially lemon)
  2. Pine (preferably the real thing!)
  3. Jasmine
  4. Vanilla
  5. Cinnamon

Any of these scents is sure to make your house smell wonderfully fresh and have a comforting, calming effect. Using these scents in the form of essential oils is a great way to enjoy their genuine aroma, and they last longer than a lot of other fragrance options normally would.

What’s your favorite way to make your house smell good?

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Jill Nystul Photo

Jill Nystul (aka Jillee)

Jill Nystul is an accomplished writer and author who founded the blog One Good Thing by Jillee in 2011. With over 30 years of experience in homemaking, she has become a trusted resource for contemporary homemakers by offering practical solutions to everyday household challenges.I share creative homemaking and lifestyle solutions that make your life easier and more enjoyable!

About Jillee

Jill Nystul

Jill’s 30 years of homemaking experience, make her the trusted source for practical household solutions.

About Jillee

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23 Comments

    • The smell of cigarette smoke might be one of the trickiest smells to deal with, because it really adheres to fabrics and surfaces. Here’s some tips for getting rid of the smell of cigarette smoke, depending on what you’re dealing with:
      Clothing and fabric – Machine wash item(s) on a cold water cycle with 2 cups of white vinegar.
      Carpets, mattresses, and furniture – Sprinkle baking soda on the item, let it sit there overnight, then vacuum it up in the morning. Repeat if necessary.
      Walls – Clean walls with a rag soaked in equal parts water and white vinegar.
      All over – Be sure to replace the air filters in your HVAC system and clean out the air ducts thoroughly.

      Please log in or create a free account to comment.
  1. I love ogt! Can you please give me a solution for creating a natural Lysol type spray that has a pleasant scent, will kill mold and mildew, and get rid of the odors? I brought the Christmas decorations up from the basement and had to spray the garlands, silk flowers & poinsettia’s, etc with Lysol to try to get rid of the awful smell. Lysol has a bad chemical smell though, and it gave me a headache. I’d really appreciate any ideas on a safe, natural alternative.

    Please log in or create a free account to comment.
    • I’ll have to get working on one, thanks for the idea Melinda!

      Please log in or create a free account to comment.
  2. I really like and love those creative ideas its nice i will try these ideas, thanks a lot.

    Please log in or create a free account to comment.
  3. Great list you got here! I really love to have Fabric Spray because I think its smell is very impressive. Thanks for sharing!

    Please log in or create a free account to comment.
  4. The natural wax melts and the garbage disposal cubes definitely got my creative thoughts going. All 10 tips are useful and I will try them all, except the carpet cleaner as my home no longer has carpet due to my allergies. Thank you for sharing! :)

    Please log in or create a free account to comment.
  5. Great ideas!! I wanna try all of them, really, but guess I’ll start with the stovetop potpourri, that one really got my attention!

    Please log in or create a free account to comment.
  6. Love these ways to make your home smell good Thank you and God bless Please remember Texas in your prayers

    Please log in or create a free account to comment.
  7. My two favorite ways to make the house smell great aren’t on here:
    1. Put a couple drops of the essential oil of your choice on your air filter. The scent is pushed through the whole house!
    2. Clean the microwave! A lot of sites recommend the “trick” of microwaving a bowl of water with some lemon or vinegar to clean it, but I use water with a little bit of vanilla extract. This works just as well, and makes the house smell like you are baking cookies as a bonus!

    Please log in or create a free account to comment.
    • It will last longer on low, but will smell stronger on high :-)

      Please log in or create a free account to comment.
  8. Great ideas. Our basement has had kind of a funky smell. With some of our recent flooding in Missouri we had a little water get in o u r entryway and basement. I may have to try the diffuser if it’s still smelly. Great timing on this post.

    Please log in or create a free account to comment.
  9. I totally love your fantastic ideas, and tips. Thanks.

    Please log in or create a free account to comment.
  10. I have tried the fabric spray with the new laundry scents instead of the oils and added baking soda as the recipe told me too. After I sprayed it I noticed the baking soda left a residue all over everything. It was a mess to clean it all up. Next time I will leave out the soda!

    Please log in or create a free account to comment.
    • I had the same situation. What a mess the baking soda made!!

      Please log in or create a free account to comment.
  11. I have scented wax cubes and recently bought pretry plastic salt and pepper shakers (from Dollar Tree) to put the cubes in and place in an inconspicuous spot in the car. The holes release the scent and the containers hold the wax when it melts from the heat Inside!

    Please log in or create a free account to comment.
  12. G’day from Australia.
    this is all new to me , once you are finished with the potrourri can you save it to use again please.

    Please log in or create a free account to comment.

Leave a Comment

23 Comments

    • The smell of cigarette smoke might be one of the trickiest smells to deal with, because it really adheres to fabrics and surfaces. Here’s some tips for getting rid of the smell of cigarette smoke, depending on what you’re dealing with:
      Clothing and fabric – Machine wash item(s) on a cold water cycle with 2 cups of white vinegar.
      Carpets, mattresses, and furniture – Sprinkle baking soda on the item, let it sit there overnight, then vacuum it up in the morning. Repeat if necessary.
      Walls – Clean walls with a rag soaked in equal parts water and white vinegar.
      All over – Be sure to replace the air filters in your HVAC system and clean out the air ducts thoroughly.

      Please log in or create a free account to comment.
  1. I love ogt! Can you please give me a solution for creating a natural Lysol type spray that has a pleasant scent, will kill mold and mildew, and get rid of the odors? I brought the Christmas decorations up from the basement and had to spray the garlands, silk flowers & poinsettia’s, etc with Lysol to try to get rid of the awful smell. Lysol has a bad chemical smell though, and it gave me a headache. I’d really appreciate any ideas on a safe, natural alternative.

    Please log in or create a free account to comment.
    • I’ll have to get working on one, thanks for the idea Melinda!

      Please log in or create a free account to comment.
  2. I really like and love those creative ideas its nice i will try these ideas, thanks a lot.

    Please log in or create a free account to comment.
  3. Great list you got here! I really love to have Fabric Spray because I think its smell is very impressive. Thanks for sharing!

    Please log in or create a free account to comment.
  4. The natural wax melts and the garbage disposal cubes definitely got my creative thoughts going. All 10 tips are useful and I will try them all, except the carpet cleaner as my home no longer has carpet due to my allergies. Thank you for sharing! :)

    Please log in or create a free account to comment.
  5. Great ideas!! I wanna try all of them, really, but guess I’ll start with the stovetop potpourri, that one really got my attention!

    Please log in or create a free account to comment.
  6. Love these ways to make your home smell good Thank you and God bless Please remember Texas in your prayers

    Please log in or create a free account to comment.
  7. My two favorite ways to make the house smell great aren’t on here:
    1. Put a couple drops of the essential oil of your choice on your air filter. The scent is pushed through the whole house!
    2. Clean the microwave! A lot of sites recommend the “trick” of microwaving a bowl of water with some lemon or vinegar to clean it, but I use water with a little bit of vanilla extract. This works just as well, and makes the house smell like you are baking cookies as a bonus!

    Please log in or create a free account to comment.
    • It will last longer on low, but will smell stronger on high :-)

      Please log in or create a free account to comment.
  8. Great ideas. Our basement has had kind of a funky smell. With some of our recent flooding in Missouri we had a little water get in o u r entryway and basement. I may have to try the diffuser if it’s still smelly. Great timing on this post.

    Please log in or create a free account to comment.
  9. I totally love your fantastic ideas, and tips. Thanks.

    Please log in or create a free account to comment.
  10. I have tried the fabric spray with the new laundry scents instead of the oils and added baking soda as the recipe told me too. After I sprayed it I noticed the baking soda left a residue all over everything. It was a mess to clean it all up. Next time I will leave out the soda!

    Please log in or create a free account to comment.
    • I had the same situation. What a mess the baking soda made!!

      Please log in or create a free account to comment.
  11. I have scented wax cubes and recently bought pretry plastic salt and pepper shakers (from Dollar Tree) to put the cubes in and place in an inconspicuous spot in the car. The holes release the scent and the containers hold the wax when it melts from the heat Inside!

    Please log in or create a free account to comment.
  12. G’day from Australia.
    this is all new to me , once you are finished with the potrourri can you save it to use again please.

    Please log in or create a free account to comment.