The Stain Library

How to remove baby sick from a shower curtain

  • DifficultyEasy
  • OutlookUsually removable
  • MaterialShower curtain
  • Reviewed7 September 2026

The short answer

Check which you have. A polyester fabric shower curtain is machine washable on a warm setting with normal detergent. A PEVA or PVC liner is not machine washed: spray it with three parts water to one part white vinegar, leave it ten to fifteen minutes and wipe or scrub it, or hand wash it in the bath. Neither material absorbs, so the mark is on the surface and comes off easily.

If it has just happened

Rinse it off in the shower. A shower curtain is already in the right place, nothing absorbs into it, and running water over the mark deals with most of it before you have found anything else.

Heat can set this stain permanently

Do not use hot water, a tumble dryer, an iron or a steam cleaner until the mark has gone. Heat fixes this type of stain into the fibres and makes it far harder to shift.

Cleaning the mark is not the same as disinfecting

If the sickness came with a stomach bug rather than an ordinary posset, the surface may carry norovirus, which spreads easily and survives on hard surfaces. UK public health guidance is to wear gloves, avoid shaking contaminated laundry, wash affected laundry separately with normal powder at 60 C where the care label allows it, and disinfect compatible hard surfaces with a bleach based product afterwards. Do that after the stain work, not instead of it, and only where the material tolerates it.

Keep every kind of drying heat away until the mark has gone

Baby sick is mostly milk protein. Heat coagulates protein and locks it into the material, which is why a mark that would have washed out can become permanent after one hot wash, one pass with an iron, a hairdryer or a spell on a radiator. Cool or warm treatment, air drying, and a proper look in daylight before anything warm goes near it.

What you will need

  • Disposable gloves Sickness that came with a stomach bug is a hygiene job as well as a stain.
  • A spoon or blunt scraper For lifting solids off before any liquid is involved.
  • White cloths and kitchen roll White only, and several, so you can always fold to a clean face.
  • Cold water Cold. Heat sets milk protein, and every item in this family is heat sensitive as well.
  • Bicarbonate of soda The absorbent that draws moisture back out of a filling or a foam.
  • A fan Airflow is what dries a filled item. Heat is not available.

Fresh baby sick on shower curtain

Rinse it where it hangs, then decide which kind of curtain you have.

  1. Rinse it in the shower

    Run warm water over the mark where it hangs. Nothing absorbs into a shower curtain, so a rinse removes most of a fresh mark immediately.

  2. Lift any solids off with kitchen roll

    Straight into a bag rather than down the drain, particularly on a shower tray with a slow waste.

  3. Spray with vinegar and water and leave it

    Three parts water to one part white vinegar, left for ten to fifteen minutes. That is the method for a plastic liner and it works on fabric too.

  4. Wipe it down and hang it open

    A cloth or a soft brush, then spread the curtain out fully so it dries rather than drying in folds, which is where mould starts.

  • How longTen minutes
  • RepeatingRinse until nothing more comes off.
  • Stop ifthe curtain is clean and hanging open to dry

Dried baby sick on shower curtain

Now the two materials genuinely diverge.

  1. Work out whether it is fabric or plastic

    Fabric feels like cloth and usually has a stitched hem. PEVA and PVC are smooth, slightly stiff and welded rather than sewn.

  2. Machine wash a fabric curtain on a warm setting

    With normal detergent. A couple of tablespoons of white vinegar in the drum helps with mould, and adding a towel gives the curtain something to rub against.

  3. Hand clean a plastic liner instead

    Spray with the vinegar solution, leave it fifteen minutes and scrub gently, or hand wash it in the bath. Do not machine wash it, because the agitation creases and splits it.

  4. Hang it back up wet and spread out

    Both types dry best hanging in place, fully spread. Do not tumble dry a plastic liner at all.

  • How longA wash cycle, or twenty minutes by hand
  • RepeatingOne wash or one hand clean is enough.
  • Stop ifthe curtain is clean, dry and hanging open

What not to use on shower curtain

  • Machine washing a PEVA or PVC liner

    The heat and agitation crease and split plastic liners. They are cleaned in place with a vinegar spray or by hand in the bath instead.

  • Combining bleach with the vinegar

    Chlorine bleach and any acid together release chlorine gas, and a bathroom is a small room with the door usually shut. Use one or the other, and vinegar is enough here.

  • Tumble drying a shower curtain

    Plastic liners deform and fabric ones can shrink and pull at the eyelets. Both dry perfectly well hanging in place.

  • Leaving it bunched up to dry

    A curtain dried in folds stays damp in the creases, which is exactly where mould starts along the hem.

White compared with coloured shower curtain

Shower curtains are usually white or printed polyester and the prints are on the surface. Chlorine bleach lightens a coloured print and can yellow a white PEVA liner over time, and vinegar does the mould job perfectly well without either risk. Never combine the two, because bleach and any acid together release chlorine gas, which matters in a small unventilated bathroom more than almost anywhere else.

If the mark is still there

This is one of the more forgiving items on the site and there is usually nothing left to do.

If a smell or a pink or dark speckling remains along the hem, that is mould rather than the stain. White vinegar deals with mould and the hem is where it starts, because that is the part that stays wet.

If a plastic liner has creased, split or gone cloudy, replace it. Liners are consumables replaced every four to six months in normal use, and a liner that has had sick on it and been scrubbed is fairly near the end of that anyway. A fabric curtain lasts much longer and is worth the machine wash.

When to stop and call someone

There is no professional route for a shower curtain and none is needed. Replace a plastic liner rather than persisting, since they are consumables replaced every few months anyway, and replace a fabric curtain if mould has taken hold in the hem, because that is in the fibre rather than on it.

Why baby sick behaves this way on shower curtain

A shower curtain is the one household textile designed to be soaked every day.

Two different materials, two methods

Polyester fabric curtains are machine washable on a warm setting with ordinary detergent. PEVA and PVC liners are not: the heat and agitation crease and split them, and they are cleaned in place instead.

Nothing absorbs

Both materials are effectively non porous, so milk sits on the surface. There is no extraction problem and no deep stain to draw out, which makes this genuinely easy.

Mould is the standing issue

The bathroom is damp and organic residue is what mould feeds on, so the reason to clean properly is the mould rather than the appearance. White vinegar addresses it.

Bleach and vinegar must never meet

Both appear in bathroom cleaning advice, and together they release chlorine gas. In a small room with the door shut that is a real hazard rather than a theoretical one.

Sources

What we checked and when. Where a manufacturer instruction disagrees with anything here, follow the manufacturer.

  1. How to remove baby formula stains, Purex Stain Lab manufacturer

    Manufacturer guidance identifying breast milk, formula and baby spit-up as protein stains, explaining the role of enzymes, and warning that the mark should be checked before any drying heat because heat sets what remains.

    Checked 7 September 2026

  2. A guide to newborn laundry, American Cleaning Institute trade body

    Cleaning trade body guide to pre-treat breast milk, formula or spit-up with an enzyme stain remover, soak fresh marks for at least 30 minutes and older marks for several hours, launder, and keep stained items out of the dryer until the mark has gone.

    Checked 7 September 2026

  3. How to remove stains from baby clothes, Persil UK manufacturer

    UK manufacturer guidance to act quickly on formula, blot when immediate washing is impossible, rinse under cool water, soak for at least 15 minutes where the care label permits, pre-treat with detergent and then wash to the care label.

    Checked 7 September 2026

  4. Norovirus: what to do and how to stop the spread, UK Health Security Agency authority

    UK public health guidance establishing that illness related vomit can carry norovirus, that contaminated laundry should be washed with normal powder at 60 C where the care label permits, and that compatible hard surfaces should be disinfected with a bleach based product.

    Checked 7 September 2026