If you’ve accidentally added extra indigo the to white cloth pile and are now worried, then don’t worry because we are here with the solution.

How to Get Dye Out of Clothes: 8 Methods

The most popular and widely effective home remedy that removes the dye from clothes is rubbing alcohol, followed closely by white vinegar. You can apply these products in several different ways depending on the type of garment and kind of stain.

1. Vinegar

Vinegar has acidic properties that make it an excellent stain remover for many different types of stains, including several types of dye. Plus, vinegar may not smell great but it does not let off dangerous fumes like some kinds of bleach. You can safely splash vinegar on your skin without causing injuries, too.

How does vinegar remove dye transfer from clothes? You can try two simple methods.

The simplest method is to soak the garment, but the second gives you an option to spot-treat clothing more quickly, or to treat a stained sofa or carpet.

2. Rubbing Alcohol

You can safely apply to rub alcohol to most types of fabric without causing any damage. Rubbing alcohol, acts as a natural stain remover for most types of stains, too!

3. Baking Soda

Like vinegar, baking soda is another common household product that has dozens of cleaning uses. You can use it as a simple, effective pre-treatment for dye stains as well!

4. Hydrogen Peroxide and Dish Soap

Hydrogen peroxide acts as a gentler form of bleach and does a great job lifting away dye stains for this reason. This happens because hydrogen peroxide contains one more oxygen molecule than a water molecule does, giving it oxidizing powers that break down many stains! Many oxygen bleaches contain a large percentage of hydrogen peroxide.

5. Ammonia and Dish Soap

In some cases, you can use a strong mixture of ammonia, water, and dish soap to remove even very stubborn red dye stains. Ammonia smells pretty awful, it’s true, but it does work! Just make sure you have a good source of ventilation nearby as you work on this method.

Also, do not ever mix ammonia with bleach. In general, mixing cleaning products is a bad idea as it could cause a dangerous chemical reaction.

6. Bleach

In almost all cases you should use oxygen bleach rather than chlorine bleach to treat dye stains in clothing. The exception to this rule is white clothing–if you carefully spot test first you may want to use chlorine bleach to fully remove dye from white clothes.

Oxygen bleach interacts with water to release oxygen particles, which lift many types of stains out of fabric. This kind of bleach will not have the super-strong fumes you would associate with chlorine bleach, and it also does not have such a caustic effect on the fabric.

7. Stain Removers

You can find a wide variety of commercial stain removers on the market.

To use either of these products, you’ll want to follow the directions on the package. This should also tell you what types of fabric you can use the product on.

In general, though, you apply the stain remover as a pre-wash treatment directly on the stain. In some cases, you may need to allow the stain remover to sit for some time. Then you wash the garment in cold water in your washing machine.

Most stain removers should not damage your clothing, but you should still perform a spot test on an inconspicuous area first to make sure you don’t see any discoloring from the product.

8. Color Run Remover

Color run removers act a lot like stain removers or oxygen bleach but are intended for use in a load of laundry that had dye bleed all over it. For example, if you accidentally washed a brand new pair of jeans with your favorite bed sheets, you probably ended up with blue stains on the sheets!

Mixing one to three packets of a color remover in with the laundry as you run it through the wash again should remove the dye, in theory.