How to Do Zone Cleaning + Free Printable Zone Cleaning Schedule

Keeping a home clean can be difficult, even if your home is small! There are just so many things that need to be cleaned, so much stuff that gets out of place and has to be put back. You can easily spend hours cleaning your home every day, especially if you have kids! But no one wants to spend half a day every day trying to keep their home clean. Which is why methods like zone cleaning exist! Here is How to Do Zone Cleaning! I’ve also included a free printable zone cleaning schedule to help get you started!

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Zone cleaning works well for homes of any size, and can fit into anyone’s schedule! And the great thing about it is that not only does zone cleaning help you keep your home clean, it also reduces how much time you spend cleaning every day! It also makes it so that the idea of keeping your home clean doesn’t feel overwhelming. If you’re struggling to keep your home clean, or dislike how much time you spend cleaning it, you need a zone cleaning schedule!

How to Do Zone Cleaning + Free Printable

What is Zone Cleaning?

If you’re wondering about how to do zone cleaning, you don’t need to worry about it being hard to do. Zone cleaning isn’t any crazily complicated system, and you don’t need any special products. All you need to do is break your home apart into five different zones. You will clean one zone on each day (most people choose to just clean on weekdays). So for example, maybe each Monday you tackle the bathrooms and kitchen, Tuesdays you deal with the bedrooms, and so on. I suggest that you set a timer for 1 hour for each zone each day. One hour is all you really need for each zone in most homes, and the timer will make sure you move fast so that an hour long task doesn’t drag out into 2 hours.

Also, remember that just because you clean a certain zone on a certain day doesn’t mean you shouldn’t do your usual home tidying tasks every day, like wiping down bathroom sinks, making your bed, or wiping down your shower after each use. Doing those little 5 minute things every day helps make it so you can clean each zone in one hour. Without those tasks, you might have to do deep cleans often, and those take more time. Also try to keep your home relatively neat. It’ll be hard to clean everything in one hour if you have to spend half that time putting things back where they belong!

Different Possible Zone Rooms

Now that you know the general ideas behind how to do zone cleaning, you need to figure out what zones you have to clean! Not every home is the same. Some people have basements and attics, other people don’t. Some people have relatively small master bedrooms, others have huge master bedrooms that take a while to clean. You know your home and how long it usually takes you to clean things, so keep that in mind when setting up your zones.

So that you don’t forget an area when planning out your cleaning, here are the possible rooms. Remember, you need to create 5 zones. Some times it may make sense to break rooms into zones by location (they’re all on the top floor, for example), while in other cases you may want to group them by purpose (like all the bathrooms, even if they’re on different floors). And some rooms you may just want to leave out, like the basement or garage, because they don’t truly need cleaning every week.

Master bedroom
Kids bedrooms
Guest bedroom
Master bathroom
Kids bathrooms
Guest bathroom
Home office
Living room
Family room
Dining Room
Kitchen
Pantry
Laundry room
Exercise room
Garage
Attic
Basement
Foyer
Porch

My Zone Cleaning Schedule

This is what my cleaning schedule looks like on my free printable zone cleaning schedule. In the example below, I’ve already finished my tasks for Monday (Zone #1), so they’re checked off.

Here are the details for the tasks on my schedule. You may want to copy some of my tasks, build on some tasks, or remove some tasks as you plan out how to do zone cleaning in your own home.

Monday- Zone 1- Master Bedroom, Kids Bedrooms, Guest Bedroom
Disinfect doorknobs and light switches
Declutter
Dust furniture, knick-knacks, blinds, etc.
Vacuum
Clean baseboards
Wash Windows
Reorganize closets as necessary
Reorganize dressers as necessary

Tuesday- Zone 2- Kitchen, Dining Room, Living Room
Disinfect doorknobs and light switches
Declutter
Dust furniture, decor, blinds, etc.
Vacuum
Wash kitchen + dining room floors
Clean baseboards
Refill hand soap and dish soap dispensers
Straighten pantry
Check for expired food
Wipe down cabinets

Wednesday- Zone 3- Home Office, Family Room
Disinfect doorknobs and light switches
Declutter
Dust furniture, blinds, computer, TV, etc.
Vacuum
Clean baseboards

Thursday- Zone 4- Bathrooms
Disinfect doorknobs and light switches
Declutter
Dust furniture, blinds, decor, etc.
Vacuum
Wash floors
Clean baseboards
Clean mirrors, toilets, countertops, bathtubs, and showers
Refill hand soap dispenser
Wash bath mats
Wipe down cabinets

Friday- Zone 5- Foyer, Porch
Disinfect doorknobs and light switches
Declutter
Dust furniture, blinds, decor, etc.
Vacuum
Sweep porch
Clean baseboards

You’ll notice that many of these tasks are the same for each zone. Also, note that according to this schedule, Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday are my busiest days, while Friday is the lightest. I’ve set it up like that to fit in better with how my week usually goes. But even on my busiest days, I rarely spend more than 45 minutes cleaning a zone.

To get started with zone cleaning, download my free printable zone cleaning schedule below. Fill it out with your zones and tasks, and you’ll be ready to keep your home clean, one zone at a time!

Free Printable Zone Cleaning Schedule (Download Here)

This system works really well for me, and I’m sure it will work great for you, too!

How do you currently plan out your cleaning tasks?

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