Last updated on June 2nd, 2023
Concrete is one the toughest materials, yet ironically it has the most vulnerable surfaces. It quickly gets stained from oil, wine, and other surface spills besides mold and mildew. Do you need to be extra careful when cleaning it up to ensure you don’t damage its aesthetics or kill the surrounding grass?
It’s common to want to clean your concrete patio thoroughly, and you may need to use some strong cleaning agents. At the same time, you should know how to clean concrete patio without killing grass. One way to do it is using safer household cleaning solutions like vinegar mixed with water.
First, water all the surrounding grass and plants to minimize absorption of the cleaning formula and saturate the concrete with water. Next, apply the vinegar mixture and scrub thoroughly. Hose up the grass and the concrete surface to rinse off any remaining residual solution.
This guide will show you how to clean concrete without killing grass, different cleaning methods, and our best pick of grass-safe patio cleaners.
Table of Contents
Can You Clean Concrete Patio Without Killing Grass?
There are many ways you can clean concrete without harming the surrounding plants and grass in your yard. One way is to use a sidewalk cleaner safe for grass, such as vinegar, baking soda, and eco-friendly laundry detergents.
The methods you use depend on how dirty your outdoor space is and if the concrete is deeply stained.
You’ll need to use more potent cleaning formulas for deep tough stains, which require extra care. Thankfully there are several options in the market, and you can even find powerful yet gentle grass-safe patio cleaners.
How To Clean Concrete Patio Without Killing Grass
“How do you clean the concrete patio without harming plants” is a question often asked. We always recommend using mild patio cleaners; they are entirely harmless to grass and outdoor plants.
We often encourage our readers to use household solutions like laundry detergent, vinegar, baking soda, lemon juice, and in rare cases, a pressure washer. In this guide, we provide tips on how to use these options, starting with vinegar.
1. Using Vinegar
Vinegar is a standard DIY option where you add a cup of vinegar to a gallon of water to make—a safe cleaning formula.
You can balance the concentration accordingly depending on how powerful you want the cleaning solution to be. Still, it’s safer to work with an over-diluted solution than with something that contains high vinegar concentration.
However, for spot cleaning heavily stained, we recommend mixing water and vinegar in equal proportions to create a more balanced solution.
2. Using Baking Soda
Baking soda is relatively safe to use on concrete surrounded by grass and plants. Mix it with liquid detergent of equal proportions to water for best results. Dilute it thoroughly and apply with a mop or brush to thoroughly clean your concrete patio. Rinse with water and allow to dry.
3. Try Muriatic Acid
Muriatic acid is another easy DIY solution that can clean up your concrete surfaces so well without harming your beautifully manicured lawn grass or patio plants. Simply mix this cleaning agent with water using a 1:10 ratio of Muriatic acid to water to create an efficient destaining agent.
Remember that even with this option, care must be taken, especially if you have pets and kids, as they may be susceptible to an allergic reaction.
We recommend that you dilute the acid with ammonia solution later and be sure to put on a protective respirator for safety precautions.
While this solution is highly powerful, it’s best used as a last resort when other options fail.
These are just quick DIY projects that you can try at home when considering how to clean a concrete driveway without killing grass. And now, we still have additional tips worth trying out for better proven methods. Here is a list of what you’ll need for such a project:
Things You Will Need:
- Plant-friendly cleaning agent: We recommend a pH-neutral degreasing agent and other grass-friendly cleaners specifically for patios. You can pick any product of your choice. Just be sure it’s safe to use on plants.
- Protective clothing: You’ll be working with different chemicals and products, so you need to protect yourself from potential allergies or corrosion. The essential protective gear includes gloves, gumboots, and full-body suits where necessary.
- Spray bottle: A spray bottle is necessary when you need to spray or apply a cleaning solution on the concrete patio. It helps organize your work without wasting much of the cleaning solution or over spraying on nearby plants.
- Broom: Obviously, the first step to cleaning your concrete patio is getting rid of any loose debris, dried leaves, or other forms of litter, and a broom is an essential tool for this.
- Bucket and mop: You need a container to mix the solution and a mop during the last stages of the cleaning process.
How Do You Clean a Concrete Patio Without Harming Plants? (Step-by-step)
Cleaning solid surfaces like concrete, hardened clay, paved stone, and cement slabs require extra care. Sometimes your concrete patio may be damaged if brought into contact with acidic detergents.
That’s another reason to be extremely careful beside the plants surrounding your sidewalk, driveway, and other outdoors.
Follow these expert tips to clean your concrete patio without altering the curb appeal or killing the surrounding grass:
Step 1: Prepare Your Cleaning Solution
The best approach to ensure no plant life is compromised when cleaning out the yard is to create a cleaning solution that’s safe and eco-friendly. An even safer application procedure should be followed to maintain this goal.
While pressure washers are efficient, they’re not entirely safe and may damage your grass and plants owing to the high pressure of water it emits when in use.
A simple mistake on the washer’s outlet positioning and you’ll have uprooted nearby plants and grass, not to mention creating dents on the concrete.
So we recommend using a spray bottle instead because any potential mistakes come with minimal consequences.
Also, if you want to avoid potent errors, use well diluted, non- acidic solutions that cannot harm plants in case of an overspill.
Step 2: Saturate The Concrete
Saturating or watering the concrete helps prevent excess water absorption so that the cleaning solution stays on the surface and does not seep through the concrete. To determine if the concrete is fully saturated, touch to see if it’s thoroughly damp.
If the concrete is thoroughly wet with no water pooling on the surface, it is fully saturated and ready for use. You can apply the detergent at this point, and it will not seep into the patio.
While this step does not necessarily protect your grass and plants, it sets the ground for the next step, which is:
Step 3: Harm-proofing Outdoor Plants
As with concrete, harm-proofing the surrounding grass and other plants entails thoroughly watering to prevent the absorption of cleaning formula into the soil or nearby gardens.
Harm Proofing plants with water also helps avoid absorbing toxic cleaning solutions into the leaves and prevents costly mistakes.
Step 4: Add The Cleaning Formula Into A Spray Bottle
A spray bottle is an essential tool in this step. You need it for spot-cleaning since it reduces the risk of spraying a considerable amount of the solution onto the nearby plants, giving you complete control of how much detergent to use.
The only challenge, however, is that it does not cover a large surface area at once and can be a laborious process if you have a large concrete patio to clean.
If you have a larger space to clean, use a bucket and a mop as it is more efficient, and while at it, watch out for the grass.
Step 5: Start By Spot Cleaning
You want to be precise in cleaning to avoid harming your beautifully manicured lawn grass and outdoor plants. So the first approach for effective concrete patio cleaning is spot cleaning those visibly dirty places.
For this process, use a high-bristle-count brush. First, spray the solution on the specific spots having saturated the affected surfaces. Allow the cleaner to sit for 20 minutes until the dirt and stains are entirely dislodged.
After that, removing the dirt will be much easier, especially with a broom or brush. Check out our article to get the full insight on how to clean a concrete patio without a pressure washer.
Step 6: Wash The Entire Concrete Patio Using A Bucket And Mop
Allow the cleaning detergent to air dry to reduce its potency, then thoroughly wash the entire patio with a lot of water. This is necessary once all the stains have been removed from the surfaces.
While it’s easier to garden the patio to rinse it off, we recommend that you use a bucket and a mop instead to avoid the water running down onto the nearby grass soil and flower gardens.
Again this process is a little laborious but safe when it comes to cleaning concrete driveways without killing grass.
Step 7: Allow The Patio To Air Dry
The last step in cleaning your outdoor patio without harming your patio plants is to allow the cleaned areas to air dry naturally. This goes without saying, but you must watch over the wet, freshly-washed patio.
For example, a wet concrete surface is not conducive for use or stepping over. Not only is it a slip and fall hazard, but you want to protect your hard work from getting dirty moments after washing. So block every access to the area until fully dry and ready for use.
Can You Clean Concrete With Vinegar Without Killing Grass?
Vinegar alone is harmful to plants and pests, and that’s why most people use it on their lawns as a herbicide. Spraying directly on grass without diluting can kill both grass and weeds. The best way to use it to clean concrete without killing grass is by mixing it with water and spraying sparingly.
Can You Clean Pavers Without Chemicals?
Of course. There are several eco-friendly alternatives to cleaning pavers and driveways without using toxic products. Vinegar and baking soda are a few reliable examples that can be powerful yet safe if mixed with water. Besides, they are biodegradable, meaning they don’t cause water and soil pollution.
What Are Other Environmentally Friendly Solutions For Cleaning Concrete Patios?
So far, we have listed vinegar and baking soda as the safest and most Eco-friendly options for cleaning the concrete patio. Other options you might want to consider include:
Soda: Soda is best known as a vital stain remover thanks to its three essential ingredients:
- Citric acid
- Carbonated water, or carbonic acid;
- Phosphoric acid;
Coke is the most preferred soda as a household cleaning agent, although brands with the above ingredients can work equally fine.
Laundry Detergent: Use this for more minor food spills and even smaller amounts of grease and oil, and it is ideal for fresh spills and not challenging stains. Use a laundry detergent, scrub brush, sponge, and lots of water.
Concrete Cleaner or Degreaser: These are typically made from concentrated alkaline soap and helps dislodge oil for easy cleaning. Still, they only work on fresh spills and may not be suitable for oily stains that have stayed long on the concrete. We recommend using concrete cleaners and degreasers on porous concrete only.
Water: Sometimes, lots of water is all you need to clean up your concrete patio without harming your grass. So if you have been asking yourself, will concrete cleaner kill grass? Maybe you should grab your garden hose and thoroughly clean up everything without using harmful products.
Oxygenated Bleach: Oxygenated bleach is as effective as chlorine minus the side effects. Mix with water and watch the soapy bubbles fight the dirt and grime off your patio without hurting your grass.
Bleach: Bleach will transform your unsightly outdoor surfaces into pure white. If your concrete patio is seriously stained, dilute bleach with lots of water to watch the transformation. And yes, it’s safe on plants, but only if well diluted.
Prevent: Prevention is better than cure. Now perhaps all you have to do is keep your porous concrete patio from absorbing and retaining all the oil, moss, rust, and mold by conducting routine care. Ever thought of sealing your concrete once and for all? You can do it every five years, and your cleaning routine will only get easier.
How To Deal With Dirty Concrete Near Plants?
Once your patio is stained, rigorous cleaning is your only option for retaining its aesthetic. So how do you clean a concrete patio without killing grass?
- Start using water, degreasing detergent, and a broom with sturdy bristles.
- Harmproof the concrete and the surrounding vegetation.
- Mix an eighth cup of degreasing dishwashing liquid, a gallon of water, a half cup of baking soda, and a cup of hydrogen peroxide
Use the solution to thoroughly clean your patio, being mindful of nearby plants and grass. For tougher stains, use muriatic acid, but be sure to wear gloves and protective clothing since it is a corrosive acid.
FAQS – How to Clean Concrete Patio Without Killing Grass
How often should I clean concrete patios?
It depends on how frequently you use your patio. On average, a patio should be cleaned at least three times a year, and spring and summer are the perfect time to clean all the mud and grime from winter and the leaves they accumulate during summer.
How do you clean a concrete patio without harming plants?
By using safe and natural cleaning agents, harm-proofing the concrete and the surrounding plants with lots of water, and employing a delicate balancing act to ensure no cleaning solution overspills onto the surrounding plants
Will white vinegar clean the concrete patio without killing grass?
Yes. Vinegar is a natural and highly effective cleaning formula. To ensure it doesn’t affect your patio plants and grass, dilute it thoroughly with water to create a uniform, safe solution.
How do you clean a concrete patio naturally?
Use lots of water, dish soap, laundry detergent, and vinegar. Combining vinegar and baking soda is a natural yet powerful solution for cleaning stubborn stains without hurting your outdoor plants and surfaces.
What can I use to clean my concrete patio?
You can use anything from mild degreasers like dish soap and water, laundry detergent, white distilled vinegar, Muriatic acid, and baking soda. You can use more vital cleaning agents specifically for patio cleaning for deep stains. If you’re keen on protecting your outdoor plants, be sure to purchase eco-friendly ones strictly.
Summary – How To Clean Concrete Patio Without Killing Grass
Cleaning your concrete patio without harming your grass requires a delicate balancing act of sealing loopholes to avoid potential errors at each step. If you’re not using homemade solutions, buy non-acidic detergents.
And when thinking of the safest application methods, use a spray with a narrow nozzle. With these careful approaches, you can be sure your grass will remain unhurt in case of an error.
After all, is said and done, the concrete and the surrounding grass must be saturated with lots of water regardless of which cleaning solution you use.