Home › Home & Kitchen › Kitchen & Dining › Dining & Entertaining › Glassware & Drinkware › Tumblers & Water Glasses How to Remove Cloudiness From Glasses Published: July 8, 2026 · Updated: July 8, 2026
Soak the cloudy glass in warm white vinegar for a few minutes, then rub and rinse — if it clears, the film was hard-water mineral scale, which acid dissolves. If it stays cloudy, the glass is permanently etched by the dishwasher and can't be restored.
Recommended Soak in white vinegar to dissolve mineral film — but permanent dishwasher etching won't come back; prevent it instead — Cloudy glasses come from two different causes, and only one is reversible, so the first job is telling them apart. Most cloudiness is a hard-water mineral film (limescale) deposited by the dishwasher, and it dissolves in acid: soak the glass in warm white vinegar for 5-15 minutes, or hold a vinegar-soaked cloth against it, then rub with a soft cloth and rinse — lemon juice or citric acid works too. If the film lifts, you're done. If it doesn't, the glass is etched: the dishwasher's heat, soft water, and too much detergent have permanently pitted the surface, and nothing removes that — the glass just looks that way now. Prevent both by using less detergent, adding a rinse aid, not over-drying, and hand-washing thin or delicate glassware. Test any fix on one glass first, and never use an abrasive, which scratches glass into looking cloudy on its own.
