I Tried Those Wacky-Looking Dishwashing Gloves That Are All Over Instagram — Here’s What I Thought

Can you put your bare hands into a sink full of greasy, scummy dishwater with unidentified water-logged food particles? (Shudder!) Truly, I do not know how people do it. I would rather clean a toilet any day than plunge my hands into a sink piled with dirty dishes. I haven’t gotten on board with gloves because I find that they make it too hard to hold onto a scrubbing brush. We won’t go into my typical method of washing dishes, but allow me to say this: I’m happy to have a partner who is willing to assume dishwashing duty most of the time. 

Buy: WunderBright Cleaning Gloves, $25 at WunderHaas

At least the chore used to fall to him — until I found these funky-looking dishwashing gloves from WunderHaas. You may have seen them on Instagram; the palms and fingers are all bristly and they come in mint green/light blue, pink, and gray (except they’re perennially out of pink and gray). The idea is that you don’t even need a sponge because the built-in bristles do the scrubbing for you. (There’s even a cute/funny photo of a small dog getting a face massage on the company’s website.) I’m a sucker for a gimmick, and have I mentioned that I really hate coming into contact with disgusting dishwater? So I decided to give them a shot and am here with my honest review.

Related: The Best Dishwashing Gloves for Less than $5 per Pair

First, I would have been here sooner, but there was some sort of hiccup with shipping and the gloves got stuck for a few weeks en route. The best I could tell was maybe they were stopped at customs? Because the gloves are shipped from China. The website says to allow seven to 15 days, but I’d caution you to be patient. 

Once they finally arrived, I was actually excited to do dishes so I could give them a try.

So, do they work as promised? They actually do. The little scrubby things totally remove all the gunk from dishes while keeping my hands blissfully free and clear of the dishwater. But they do something I like even better than that. As much as I love our farm sink, it’s a bit of a chore to keep it shiny and clean. And the grid that I keep on the bottom to protect the sink, well, it gets extremely gross extremely fast. I’ve found that when I’m done washing dishes, I can just keep going and do a quick scrub of the sink and the grid. Boom! It’s all clean and nice. I find myself less likely to leave things in the sink because I don’t dread washing dishes as much. The gloves get a quick rinse with hot water, and hang out on the sink till next time.

Also, the gloves can go in the dishwasher, so there’s none of that funk like you get from a too-old dish sponge. And they’re long enough to even protect my forearms from coming into contact with that gross water (please tell me I’m not the only person with this hang-up).

I haven’t taken these gloves out of the kitchen, but based on the photos on their website, these would also be handy for cleaning other places (think: the bathroom and even a car!).

One ding against these gloves: They’re not as non-slip as the website will have you believe. I like that I don’t have to worry about gripping onto a scrub brush, but you do have to be careful with the dishes you pick up.

Overall, though, I’d definitely recommend these wacky-looking gloves … especially for my fellow dishwater-phobes.

Do you have a pair of dish gloves you love? Tell us about them in the comments below.