Clean laundry; clean planet—it’s win-win when you wash with eco-friendly laundry detergent.
Laundry day is already a load of nasty, so who wants all the conventional laundry detergent nasties that compromise the health of our planet (or ourselves) all for a fresh t-shirt?
To gather these reviews—based on both performance and satisfaction of our green cleaning guidelines—we personally loaded our soiled sock mountains into our eco-friendly washer and tested every environmentally friendly laundry detergent listed here to ensure we’re recommending only the most superior suds
These guidelines are all within our new Brand Rating System, which contains a total of 22 criteria beyond just the key ingredient concerns of cleaners. Learn more about the system and how this will alter our brand selection process when next we refresh this piece here.
We independently research all featured brands and we ask them to confirm their claims. In many cases we personally review recommended products. This post contains affiliate links which means we may earn a commission if you buy something. Learn more here.
The Best Eco-Friendly Laundry Detergent Brands to Suds Sans Nasties
Say “good riddance” to harmful chemicals and “good morning” to Common Good’s green laundry detergent that just makes common sense: it’s refillable, it’s healthy, it’s biodegradable, and after testing, we found that it’s planty powerful enough.
Meliora ameliorates our laundry loads thanks to the Certified B Corp’s simple, powerful, environmentally-engineered, and plant-based laundry powder. The Lemon-Lavender-Clove scent is our personal favorite.
Index: Our Eco-Friendly Laundry Detergent Reviews
- SuperBee Jump to section
- Meliora Jump to section
- Blueland Jump to section
- Greatfill Jump to section
- etee Jump to section
- Common Good Jump to section
- The Good Fill Jump to section
SuperBee
Price: $50
Tried, tested, and true SuperBee offers an un-bee-lievable way to wash your wearables with their one-of-a-kind Hexawash. This stuff truly hexes your washing’s dirt and grime thanks to its magnesium pellets, which form an alkaline solution when mixed with water.
It comes as a reusable laundry pouch, which you easily toss in the drum with your dirty clothes and set to your normal wash cycle. Voilà—clean clothes with literally zero chemicals or nasties! When done, just line dry it alongside your clothes before using it again until it wears out after about 300 loads, at which point you can compost at home.
As a Certified B Corp, this Northern Thailand-based brand doubles as a conscious and caring social enterprise. The female-owned business supports its all-Thai female workers by paying 20% higher wages than the Fair Trade Association’s suggested local living wage. Additionally, they support local volunteer fire crews in Thailand (especially during burning season) and provide any needed essentials.
My Personal Review of SuperBee’s Hexawash Eco Laundry Detergent:
“Aside from its revolutionary reusability, I love the simplicity of the Hexawash cartridge. Just toss, wash, remove, and repeat. I suggest using Hexawash for lighter loads, since it’s not the absolute toughest on heavy soiling and stains; plus, it’s scent-free so toss in some essential oils if you prefer scented laundry.
“Most of all, however, I love how cost-effective this detergent is, providing an astounding 300 washes per purchase, working out to only $0.16 per load.”
Review by Lyall Mabin, SJ’s Co-founder
Meliora
Price: $20
Meliora means “better” and they do just that with their Laundry Powder Detergent, which has only four ingredients to clean your clothes: baking soda, washing soda, and vegetable soap made with organic coconut oil.
Their scented varieties include the fourth ingredient, organic essential oils—so no mysterious “fragrance” blends that contain undisclosed ingredients like conventional laundry detergents. It’s MADE SAFE certified, plastic-free, vegan, dye, palm oil, phthalate, and SLS-free, made with organic ingredients, and amazingly affordable, with one tub good for 128 loads in an HE sustainable washer, equalling less than $20 for more than a year of laundry detergent.
Ameliorate the planet and your laundry loads thanks to Meliora, a Certified B Corp launched by Kate, a female environmental engineer who grew frustrated during her Master’s degree with the lack of disclosure when it comes to household cleaning ingredients.
Not only does Meliora create amazing green products for personal care and the home, but they also do loads of advocacy work, resulting in new California legislation that mandates companies to finally ‘fess up about their complete formulas. They’re also MADE SAFE and Leaping Bunny certified, woman-owned, provide living wages, use low-impact products and packaging, and charitably give a percentage of profits through partnerships with Women’s Voices for the Earth and 1% For the Planet.
If that’s not enough, Meliora makes everything themselves at their eco factory in West Chicago, doing everything from creating the soap to packaging the finished product. Sustainability reports are also made available annually to ensure transparency about their practices and continued eco progress.
My Personal Review of Meliora’s Laundry Detergent Powder:
“Take my advice and PLEASE try the Lemon-Lavender-Clove. I am obsessed with its unique spicy and floral blend, which just works. I love how so much cleaning power takes up virtually no space on our shelves. The reusable canister packaging is mostly cardboard (with some steel components), so much of it is compostable if no longer needed. However, we recommend refilling it via their brown paper bags.
“For hardcore dirt and grime, they also offer a stain-removing soap stick, which I like to use to pretreat stains about an hour before washing. That said, their formula stand-alone is truly tremendous at dirt and odor removal.”
Review by Amber McDaniel, SJ’s Head of Content
Blueland
Price: $11–$47
Say “so long” to the home cleaning blues with Blueland , who truly make it better to be eco thanks to their huge offering of premium cleaners. The Certified B Corp is also certified by a wealth of other reputed certifications, including Climate Neutral, Cradle2Cradle, EWG Verified, USDA BioPreferred, EPA Safer Choice, and Leaping Bunny cruelty free.
They help keep our blue planet blue-tiful thanks to their PVA-free laundry detergent, which are the only laundry pods on the market to have zero PVA or nasties like chlorine bleach, ammonia, parabens, phosphates, phthalates, fake fragrances, or VOCs, plus they’re hypo-allergenic, scent-free, vegan, gluten-free, soy, and nut-free. Instead, these EPA Safer Choice, Cradle to Cradle Certified™, and Leaping Bunny cruelty-free tablets feature entirely natural ingredients, which they list and explain online.
All packaging is compostable and/or recyclable, all shipped orders are fully carbon offset, and while they still offer products with palm oil, they’re entirely RSPO certified. Their refill model has helped eliminate over 1 BILLION single-use plastic bottles, plus their manufacturing prioritizes efficient energy and water use to protect our wild blue yonder.
My Personal Review of Blueland’s Laundry Tablets:
“Whether I’m washing on cold or hot (usually the former), these tablets dissolve and clean just as well, without irritating fragrances and or residue left behind. But for extra stain lifting power, I suggest occasionally supplementing their equally-powerful Oxi Laundry Booster.
“All this goodness comes packaged in stylish ‘forever’ tins that keep my laundry shelf neat and organized. Refills are eco-packaged in home compostable envelopes which decomposed within three months in my home compost tumbler.”
Review by Amber McDaniel, SJ’s Head of Content
Greatfill
Price: $11–$52
Greatfill has what they call the “Great Fill-osophy,” their belief that to untrash our planet and build a better future for the next generation, the key to success is reusing and refilling. It comes with a chic refillable 28 oz stainless steel container and returnable liquid refill pouch, available in two sizes—one bottle full or four. When you have five empty pouches, send them back for cleaning and reuse via a prepaid envelope that comes with your first order.
There’s no synthetic fragrances, sulfates, parabens, phosphates, phthalates, SLS, triclosan, alcohol, optical brighteners, animal byproducts, artificial scents, or colors. Thanks to the potency of this plant-based and biodegradable blend, you’ll only need one small cap full on the forever bottle.
The family-run business is Leaping Bunny-certified and entirely batch-made by hand in California, with the stainless steel bottles (which have a life-time warranty) and refill pouches ethically sourced in China. Products come in recyclable boxes printed with soy-based inks, plus they’re expanding to a range of physical refill stores across the US. To give back, they give to charities protecting our oceans, rivers, and lakes via 1% For The Planet.
My Personal Review of Greatfill’s Laundry Detergent:
“Greatfill leaves my laundry feeling soft and non-starchy without chemical fabric softeners. Not only does it really work to get clothes clean and smelling fresh, I love the mess-free pour cap and the delicious Rosemary & Lavender scent, whose subtle piney rosemary and lavender fragrance is nicely balanced with crisp camphor and bergamot.”
Review by Amber McDaniel, SJ’s Head of Content
etee
Price: $30
Small but mighty, eco-friendly, AND plastic free, etee makes some of the best green laundry detergent that’s also biodegradable, septic safe, free of fragrances, sulfates, and phosphates.
The powdered laundry detergent’s paper bag packaging features a biodegradable lining— including the ‘zip’ closure—made by Tekpak. Since this compostable pouch isn’t super durable, we suggest transferring it into a reusable glass jar for long-term storage.
Canadian eco company etee caters to all your personal care and home cleaning needs, making them a favorite ethical alternative to Amazon. They hand craft all products using almost entirely organic ingredients (in a Toronto-based HQ lab-meets-factory fueled by renewables), never use plastic or test on animals, and sustainably source everything. Other than some beeswax in certain items, they’re also vegan.
They’ve prevented over 100 million pieces of single-use plastic from being produced and donate profits to local organizations like the Mississauga Food Project and Michael Garron Hospital.
My Personal Review of etee’s Eco Laundry Detergent Powder:
“One tiny pouch of their Super Concentrated Laundry Detergent packs enough cleaning power for 180 sparkling loads, with just one teaspoon needed for medium loads. At $30 a sachet, it’s incredibly affordable—especially if you have kids and pets as I do that fill the hamper before the wash cycle is even finished.
“For super stubborn stains, apply etee’s Laundry Stain Bars directly on clothes before washing. That said, I found this detergent whitens and brightens clothes and stains plenty well on its own.”
Review by Lyall Mabin, SJ’s Co-founder
Common Good
Price: $18–$76
It’s common sense to make laundry day non-toxic with Common Good’s biodegradable, septic and greywater system-safe, cruelty-free, and vegan liquid detergent. It features a subtle, natural bergamot scent, with no sulfates, harsh chlorine, phosphates, phthalates, dyes, optical brighteners, or undisclosed nasties present in the formula.
Common Good’s line of refillable cleaning products is entirely vegan, uses 100% biodegradable and plant-based ingredients, and is Leaping Bunny-certified cruelty-free.
For now, they ship exclusively within the U.S., using plastic-free recycled materials with natural, non-toxic ink. And while the refill pouches are unfortunately currently not returnable, you can cut off the pour spout and recycle them with plastic bags (so long as your local system isn’t bunk).
My Personal Review of Common Good’s Laundry Detergent:
“I tested Common Good’s Laundry Detergent and found that it performed really well. Just toss 20 mL in for front loaders and 40 mL for top loaders while dabbing some detergent to any tough stains 5 minutes before washing.
I also suggest purchasing their chic Laundry Glass Bottle Set and I hope they offer a recycling solution for the plastic refill pouch soon. While it’s now made with #7 plastic recyclable with plastic bags, we’re all pretty well aware of the shortcomings of soft plastics recycling. But I especially liked that the set also includes pure NZ wool dryer balls— the perfect natural dryer sheet alternatives. (You can also purchase sets without these if you own some already.)”
Review by Amber McDaniel, SJ’s Head of Content
The Good Fill
Price: $13–$20
Some of the most effective eco-friendly laundry detergent hails from The Good Fill via Nellie’s Detergent Powder, which TGF sells in a 32oz refillable mason jar or a compostable paper refill bag.
Featuring no scent and just four highly effective ingredients—sodium carbonate, linear alcohol ethoxylate, sodium chloride, and sodium metasilicate—it’s highly concentrated and powerful while remaining hypoallergenic, so it’s ideal for delicates and lingerie. Plus, it’s septic-safe, cruelty-free, vegan, and free from SLES, SLS, gluten, phosphates, chlorine, fragrance, optical brighteners, and all other nasties.
The Good Fill’s shop—both IRL in Nashville and online—sells much more than just non-toxic laundry detergent. They offer all kinds of items we all use or dispose of regularly—plus founder Megan Gill’s favorite low-waste essentials.
For their USPS-only shipping (reducing unnecessary trips by specialty carriers), they make sure the “fill” is truly “good” by using 100% plastic-free up-cycled, recycled, recyclable, and compostable materials, plus plant starch water-soluble packing peanuts that we found dissolve completely in just minutes under hot water.
My Personal Review of The Good Fill’s Laundry Detergent & Stain Remover Spray:
“When using this, I need just one tbsp per full load, which I can say dissolves completely in cold and hot water and rinses completely clear. If you’re washing clothes by hand, this detergent is my top pick, as just a tiny pinch is all you need! For those extra stubborn stains, I spray on a bit of their stain remover and leave it to sit for a while before washing.”
Review by Amber McDaniel, SJ’s Head of Content
