9 Best Dish Soaps for Sparkling Clean Dishes

Dawn cuts grease and cleans so well that it's the budget-friendly gold standard we hold others to in our tests. In fact, you'll likely find a bottle at each sink in our GH Test Kitchen and Kitchen Appliances Lab, too. Dawn produces lots of long-lasting suds and holds grease in suspension so it doesn't redeposit back onto dishes. It's great for soaking and softening burned-on messes, and it takes only a little squirt to clean a big pile of dirty dishes. And it makes a handy grease stain remover for clothing, too.

Not only does this dish soap spray out as a thick, clingy foam, but it also has serious grease-cutting powers. We recently put it to the test on a skillet we used to fry a hamburger and we deliberately burned on the grease. We found that it cut grease so well, all we had to do was wipe the pan and rinse it clean. And because it dispenses as a thick foam, a few quick spritzes are all you need to clean multiple dishes, glasses and flatware, so unlike other runny sprays, a little goes a long way. It comes in two scents — Mandarin orange and Honeycrisp apple — and is both EPA Safer Choice certified and a USDA Certified 79% Biobased Product. While we enjoyed the fruity scents, not all of our consumer testers did.

L'Avant Collective's eye-catching bottle looks great on the counter, but this dish soap has more to offer than its good looks. We found that it cuts grease very well while producing lots of rich, silky, thick, long-lasting suds. The ingredients are plant-based, and it's enhanced with a subtle fresh linen scent that's not overpowering. The glass bottle can be reused, and refills come in a pouch to help reduce plastic waste. While it is expensive, you can save by signing up for a subscription.

Of course, dish soap's primary job is to remove food and grime from dishes and cookware, but because many people don't wear rubber gloves dish soap can have a drying effect on skin. And good cleaning shouldn't come at the expense of your hands. In our test, Dawn Gentle Clean was less drying to the skin than others we tested, and it still did a great job cutting grease. Some testers reported that their hands felt softer, too, after using it.

The first dish spray to come to market, Dawn Powerwash set the bar high. With its innovative formula and concentrated spray, it blasted through dried and burned-on hamburger grease on our test skillets like nothing we'd ever seen. And because it's a spray, it reaches and clings to the hard-to-clean corners of square and rectangular casseroles where greasy residue builds up over time. But don't stop at the kitchen, Dawn Powerwash tackles greasy and charred grill and smoker grates with ease. It's so effective and versatile that it was a shoo-in to earn our Good Housekeeping Seal.

This dish spray formula from 9 Elements contains vinegar to help battle the hard water deposits that often appear on glassware and plastics, especially after air drying. We liked the fine dispensing mist that provided good coverage with just one squirt, and we were pleased with how well it cuts through grease. A tester on our consumer panel praised it for "being better at cutting baked-on residue, especially tomato sauce, than my regular detergent." The scent is lemony, not vinegary, and when the bottle is empty, just transfer the same sprayer top to a new refill bottle.

This is the same Dawn dish soap that earned our best overall pick in a unique bottle that keeps itself and your counter mess-free. The soap dispenses from the bottom through a no-drip valve. Just remove the seal and squeeze; there's no cap to open, and we found that whether you leave it on your counter or tuck it in a cabinet below the sink, it won't leak. One of our consumer testers said, "I loved the EZ-Squeeze bottle. It made it easier to put [soap] on the sponge, especially if my hands were wet!"

Plant-based cleaners are getting better all the time, and this Seventh Generation Dish Liquid proves that "green" products can clean. It was a winner — washing the most dishes before we ran out of suds — in our test of free and clear plant-based dish liquids. This formula contains no fragrances or dyes, is EPA Safer Choice certified and biodegradable, and the bottle — including the cap — is made from post-consumer recycled plastic.

Who says washing dishes has to be hard work? Caldrea was a winner in our test of best pampering dish liquids — dish liquids with skin-softening ingredients or luscious aromatherapy scents that make the task of washing dishes more pleasant — for its amazing scent and how well it cleaned. A little went a long way in our tests and we loved the use of essential oils in all nine scent varieties. A consumer tester told us, "The scent was my favorite part. It left a lasting fresh scent, even after the dishes were washed." Plus, you can get countertop spray and linen spray in the same fragrances to give your home its own signature scent.