The Brilliant Way I Clean Under My Kitchen Appliances Without Moving Them (It’s So Easy!)

I clean my kitchen daily and deep-clean it at least weekly. I have to — with a family of seven, including a teenage boy (IYKYK), my kitchen (and I!) work hard, nearly all day long. I have my regular kitchen shutdown routine: sweeping and mopping the floors, cleaning my oven and fridge interiors, and wiping down cabinets. I also do organizational tasks like straightening up the pantry, decluttering the junk drawer, and sorting through our under-sink cabinet space. There’s one area, though, that I hardly ever think about, let alone clean. I confess that I actually haven’t cleaned this spot once in the two years we’ve lived in our new house: underneath our appliances. 

I recently realized that my neglect of this under-appliance floor space could spell trouble. The dirt and crumbs that collect aren’t just gross; they can actually attract pests. The last thing I want to deal with in our kitchen is ants, cockroaches, or worse!

But I also don’t want to move the appliances. They’re heavy, I don’t want to have to ask my husband to help me, and I’m worried about scratching or denting the floors. I know the trick of removing the oven drawer to clean “under” it, but again, I had otherwise truly forgotten about this space. 

When I saw this video on @thecleaningchannel, I remembered, and knew it was time to address this out-of-sight mess. I immediately ordered this retractable gap dust cleaner tool, which consists of a stiff microfiber cloth-covered rectangle that’s slim enough to fit underneath appliances. A telescoping handle makes the tool both long enough to reach all the way to the wall and easy to store between uses — swiftly going from 31 to 61 inches. At just $9.99, testing it out was a no-brainer. 

I first tried the tool under my fridge, and was surprised that hardly anything came out. Was I doing something wrong? Maybe the telescoping handle was retracting when I pushed the tool under the fridge, or maybe something was blocking the tool as I slid it under. But nope, I was doing everything right. Could the floor under my fridge really be that clean? It wasn’t. I eventually remembered that my husband had recently had to fix a “pinhole leak” in some fridge tubing and must have cleaned under the fridge when he moved it. (Gold star for that!).

I moved on to the oven. Surely that would yield more satisfying results. It did! Each time I swept the tool under the unit, it pulled out more junk, including what looked like a swollen Skittle, some red wax from a Babybel cheese, and a marble. These came out along with tons of crumbs, dirt, and fur. Yuck! I found that several sweeps of the tool, at different angles or from different sides each time, kept bringing out more junk. Compared to other methods I’ve tried in the past (like a yardstick, for instance) the microfiber was great at pulling dust and having it cling to it, even as I moved the tool around. 

After sweeping up the mess that I was so glad to remove from underneath the oven, I turned to clean the tool. I was happy to see that the microfiber was attached to the plastic rectangle with an elasticized edge that was easy to pull off the tool, much like pulling a sock off of a foot. The tool came with a second microfiber “sock,” so I can have it all ready to use even while the dirty one is in the wash pile. You can use the microfiber cloth both wet or dry, and there’s a convenient hole at the end of the handle for easy hanging, drying, and storing.

Although I got this tool for cleaning under my appliances, I’m looking forward to using it where any “gap dust” collects, like between blinds or the top of cabinets. That scary section of floor under the couches is next.

Buy: Retractable Gap Dust Cleaner, $9.99