How to Clean an Oven
Learn how to deep clean an oven without harsh chemicals. Covers the baking soda method, cleaning racks, and dealing with burnt-on grease.
We ignored our oven for longer than we care to admit. The bottom was coated in a mysterious dark layer that may have once been a pizza overflow from 2024. The door window was so cloudy we could not tell if the oven light was on without opening it.
Cleaning an oven sounds like a bigger job than it is. The actual hands-on work takes about 20 minutes. The rest is waiting for baking soda to do its thing overnight.
You do not need commercial oven cleaners. They work, but they are full of harsh chemicals, they smell terrible, and the fumes linger. The baking soda method in this guide costs about a dollar in supplies, produces no fumes, and gets nearly the same result on everything except heavy carbonized buildup.
Do this once every three to four months and your oven will never reach the "should we just buy a new one" level of gross again.
Baking soda (about half a cup). White vinegar in a spray bottle. A damp cloth or sponge. Rubber gloves to keep your hands clean. A plastic or silicone scraper for stubborn spots (an old credit card works fine). A large trash bag or bathtub for soaking the oven racks. Dish soap for the racks. Household ammonia only if you use the optional rack trick in step 6, and read the warning there first.
Remove the racks and loose debris
Take out the oven racks and set them aside. Remove any large pieces of burnt food or debris from the bottom of the oven by hand or with a damp paper towel. You do not need to get it spotless at this point. Just remove anything that is loose and will get in the way of the paste application. If there is a lot of loose ash or crumbs, use a handheld vacuum or damp cloth to clear the floor of the oven.
Make and apply the baking soda paste
Mix half a cup of baking soda with two to three tablespoons of water until you get a spreadable paste, about the consistency of toothpaste. Put on your rubber gloves and spread the paste over the entire interior of the oven. Cover the bottom, the sides, the back wall, and the inside of the door. Avoid the heating elements (the metal rods or coils at the top and bottom). Apply extra paste to areas with heavy buildup or dark grease stains. The paste will turn brown as it reacts with the grease. That is normal and means it is working.
Good to know: For stubborn spots that have been building up for years, make the paste slightly thicker and apply a heavier layer. You can also add a tablespoon of dish soap to the paste for extra grease-cutting power. The soap does not affect the chemistry but helps break down oily residue.
Wait overnight
Close the oven door and let the paste sit for at least 12 hours. Overnight is ideal. The baking soda is mildly alkaline and slowly breaks down grease and burnt food deposits over time. The longer it sits, the less scrubbing you will need to do. If you cannot wait overnight, four to six hours will still give you decent results, but very old buildup may need a second application.
Wipe out the paste
Open the oven and use a damp cloth or sponge to wipe out the baking soda paste. It will come away as a brownish sludge, taking the dissolved grease with it. For spots where the grime is still stuck, use a plastic scraper or old credit card to loosen it, then wipe again. Work from the top down so debris falls to the bottom where you clean it last. Rinse your cloth frequently. You may need to wipe the surfaces two or three times to get all the residue out.
Spray with vinegar for a final clean
Fill a spray bottle with white vinegar and spray the entire interior of the oven. The vinegar will fizz where it meets leftover baking soda, and that is the point of this step. Vinegar is an acid and baking soda is a base, so they neutralize each other into sodium acetate, water and carbon dioxide gas. The grease was already loosened by the paste overnight. What the fizz does is turn the chalky alkaline residue into something that wipes off without streaking. Wipe everything down with a clean, damp cloth. The oven should now look noticeably cleaner with no white residue. For the glass door, spray vinegar on the inside of the glass and wipe with a clean cloth. If there is grease between the glass panels, that requires removing the door panel, which is a more involved project.
Clean the racks separately
Fill the bathtub or a large basin with hot water and a few tablespoons of dish soap. Submerge the oven racks and let them soak for at least two hours, ideally overnight at the same time as the oven paste. After soaking, scrub the racks with a brush or scouring pad. Most of the baked-on grime will come off easily after a long soak. Rinse the racks, dry them, and slide them back into the oven. For racks with extremely stubborn buildup, there is an optional trick. Seal them in a large trash bag with half a cup of household ammonia and leave it outside overnight. The fumes rather than the liquid do the work on the grease. Read this before you try it. Put nothing else in that bag, and make sure the racks carry no trace of bleach or any chlorinated cleaner, because ammonia and bleach together produce chloramine gas, which Poison Control says causes coughing, a sore throat, shortness of breath and wheezing. Its advice is blunt: chemicals should never be mixed. Keep the bag away from children and pets, wear gloves and eye protection, and open it outdoors at arm's length with your face turned away, standing upwind. Then rinse the racks with a hose before they go anywhere near the kitchen.
That is the whole process. About 20 minutes of actual work, spread over two sessions with an overnight wait in between. The baking soda paste does the heavy lifting while you sleep. The first time you clean an oven this way, you will be shocked at how much grime comes off. After that, each cleaning gets easier because there is less buildup to deal with. Set a phone reminder for every three months and the job stays easy. If your oven has a self-clean function, you can use it instead. Be warned that it runs the oven at 800 to 900 degrees, produces smoke and strong odors, and can trip smoke detectors. Read the self-clean answer in the questions below first, because there are racks to take out, a kitchen to ventilate, and one real hazard if anybody in the house keeps a bird.
Questions we get asked about this
Answers from experience, not a textbook.
A deep clean every three to four months keeps the oven in good shape for most home cooks. If you roast frequently or have had spills, every two months is better. Between deep cleans, wipe up spills as soon as the oven cools. Fresh spills take seconds to clean. Month-old burnt spills take the full baking soda treatment. A foil-lined sheet pan on the lowest rack catches drips and makes weekly cleanup trivial.
You can, but there are trade-offs. The self-clean cycle heats the oven to 800 to 900 degrees Fahrenheit to incinerate food residue into ash. It works well but produces smoke, strong odors and intense heat, and it can trip smoke detectors. Three things to do before you start it. GE tells you to remove the oven racks unless they are labeled self-clean, take everything else out of the cavity including foil, probes and stored pans, and ventilate the kitchen with a window or the exhaust fan. And if anyone in the house keeps a bird, do not run it while the bird is home. The Merck Veterinary Manual lists some self-cleaning ovens among the sources of PTFE gas, says the poisoning happens commonly in birds housed in or near kitchens, and notes that small birds often die suddenly after minimal exposure. The baking soda method is gentler, quieter, and cheaper. It just requires more patience.
They are effective but contain strong chemicals like sodium hydroxide (lye). Use them in a well-ventilated area, wear gloves and eye protection, and follow the label directions exactly. Avoid getting the spray on heating elements, gaskets, or exterior surfaces. The fumes can irritate your lungs and eyes. If you have children, pets, or chemical sensitivities, the baking soda method is a safer alternative that achieves nearly the same results. One caveat that applies to both approaches. If your oven is self-cleaning, the manufacturer may tell you to keep cleaning products out of it altogether. GE's guidance is not to use cleaning products when wiping the door, window or oven interior. Baking soda paste is the mildest thing you can put in there, but check your manual before you decide, because the enamel on a self-clean interior is what that instruction exists to protect.
Most oven doors can be removed from the hinges and partially disassembled to access the space between the glass panels. Open the door fully, locate the hinge locks on each side, flip them, and lift the door off. Then remove the screws along the top or bottom of the door panel to separate the inner glass. Clean both surfaces with vinegar or glass cleaner, reassemble, and rehang the door. Check your oven manual for model-specific instructions. If you are not comfortable with this, a long, thin tool wrapped in a damp cloth can sometimes reach between the panels through the bottom vent.
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