Solid, non-porous, platinum-cure silicone is about the easiest material there is to keep clean. It tolerates heat, soap and decades of use, which is why the same family of material turns up in kitchens and medical kit. The routine takes two minutes. The reasons behind it are worth another two, because they tell you which corners can be cut and which can’t.
One scope note before the sink fills: this guide covers solid platinum silicone with no electronics, which is everything on our shelf. Toys with motors, batteries, foam cores or glued-on parts follow their manufacturer’s instructions instead.
The everyday wash
After each use, while it’s still a two-minute job:
- Rinse warm. Body-temperature water, straight away if you can. Everything comes off easier before it dries.
- Soap it properly. A mild, unscented soap worked over the whole surface with your hands, chasing every ridge, scale and texture line — on a fantasy sculpt that is half the geography. Heavily perfumed or moisturising soaps can leave residues; plain is better.
- Rinse thoroughly. Soap film left in texture is the most common cause of next-time irritation on a perfectly good toy.
- Dry completely, in air. Pat with a clean lint-free towel, then let it finish in open air. Bagging a damp toy is how musty smells start.
For a non-porous toy used by one person, that is the whole requirement. The material can’t absorb anything, so a proper wash is a proper reset — the practical payoff of the porosity story in the body-safe materials guide.
How do you sanitise a silicone toy?
Washing removes; sanitising disinfects. The stronger standard belongs to four situations: sharing between partners, moving a toy between anal and vaginal use, after any infection, and buying second-hand. Three methods, in order of household convenience:
Boiling. The classic. Fully submerge the toy in gently boiling water for a few minutes; three to five is the range most guides cite. Solid platinum silicone shrugs it off, being rated well beyond 100°C. Use enough water that the toy isn’t resting hard against the pan base, and fish it out with tongs.
Bleach solution. The standard 10% dilution, one part plain household bleach to ten parts water, wiped or briefly soaked over the surface, then followed by a very thorough rinse and a full wash. Useful for toys too large for any pot, which in this hobby is a real category.
The dishwasher, with an asterisk. You’ll see “top rack, no detergent, sanitise cycle” recommended in plenty of places, and the material certainly survives it. The counterpoint: a domestic dishwasher cycle isn’t a validated sanitising process, because temperature and coverage vary machine to machine, and detergent residue is its own problem. Our reading is that boiling and a bleach solution are the two methods with unambiguous mechanisms, and the dishwasher is a convenience wash that shouldn’t be counted as sanitisation.
A note for the speciality shelf: hollow and channelled toys — ovipositors and anything with a tunnel — need the water run through the channel as well as over the surface. If water went in, wash water must go through, and drying time doubles.
What actually damages silicone
Platinum silicone’s enemies are few and specific:
- Sharp edges. The material is tear-resistant, not tear-proof: a nick from a fingernail, ring or blade can grow. Inspect occasionally, and retire a toy with a deep split, which is by then a cleaning problem with a hiding place.
- Silicone lube, sometimes. The famous rule, and the one with the most argument behind it. Fully cured platinum silicone is more resistant than the rule implies, and most melt reports involve cheap blends of unclear composition. Guidance still differs source to source, so the standing advice holds: patch-test on the base and wait a day. Water-based lube skips the question.
- Harsh solvents. An occasional alcohol wipe is fine; soaking in solvents is not a cleaning method.
- UV and heat over years. Sunlight slowly ages most polymers. A drawer beats a windowsill, which is rarely a hard sell for this particular possession.
What doesn’t damage it: boiling, freezing, soap, time. Decades-old platinum silicone toys exist and are still in service.
Can silicone toys touch in storage?
The old rule — never let toys touch — was born in the jelly-toy era, when plasticised mystery materials genuinely did react and fuse with whatever they sat against. Cured platinum silicone against cured platinum silicone is stable, so the melting scare doesn’t apply to a shelf of platinum-cure toys.
Separate storage is still worth the small effort, for unglamorous reasons:
- A cloth bag per toy (cotton, or the maker’s own drawstring bag) keeps dust and lint out of textured surfaces, which is the actual daily nuisance.
- Keep deeply coloured pours away from pale ones for long stints. Slow dye transfer between pressed-together silicone surfaces is occasionally reported.
- Cool, dark and dry, and fully dried before it goes in.
- No pressure poses. Stored bent hard under a pile, a softer pour can set a lean. Flat or supported is kinder, and the squishy end of the scale needs it most.
The two-line version
Wash with mild soap and warm water after every use, and dry it completely. Boil or bleach-wipe when sharing or switching uses. Store it clean, dry and dust-free. If a toy ever fails those steps — a split, or a surface that stays tacky after a proper wash — that’s the point to retire it.