How Often Should You Wash Your Car?

Is there a rule of thumb for how frequently to wash your car? Not really. Here are some good reasons to wash your car:

• You’ve gotten salt from winter road treatments or beachfront driving on your car. Salt is terrible for your car’s finish.
• The car has come into contact with something acidic, like pine needles or bird droppings or bugs. Left unattended, any of these can eat into your paint.
• The car is visibly dusty or dirty. Think of dirt as really small pebbles. The scratches it creates on your car may be very small, but there will be a lot of them.

Of course, you don’t have to wash your car only when it needs protection from damage. Experts recommend washing your car every two weeks, and many drivers grew up with a family tradition of a weekly car wash.

CarRentals.com did a survey of drivers and discovered that nearly one third clean their cars thoroughly just once a year. Cars.com did their own survey and got geeky with their analysis. They found that nearly half of respondents who lived in L.A. washed their cars more often than they watered their plants. Drivers across the country wash their cars more often than they visit their hairstylists.

So you can wash your car when it needs washing, go with a conservative biweekly schedule, or fit that carwash in between gardening chores and personal care.

But it’s pretty clear that there is no hard and fast rule for how often you should wash your vehicle.

Diamond Wash membership

A Diamond Wash membership lets you wash your car every day that we’re open. That’s certainly enough washing to keep your car free from bugs and dirt. In another study, 74% of respondents said a freshly-washed car made them happy. That’s a strong motivation for frequent washes.

And if that’s what it takes to give you that fresh feeling, go for it! Sign up online.