To start off, here’s a tip to keep your lenses clean and free of scratches for as long as possible:
Don’t let anything other than dedicated optical cloths touch your lenses!
That means never clean your glasses with anything other than a clean microfiber cloth or a disposable cleaning tissue.
If you don’t have any at your disposal and you absolutely have to clean your glasses, use hand soap in running water and air-dry your glasses. Don’t dry them with toiler paper or paper towels: they’re a lot more abrasive than they appear and they will leave microscopic scratches on your lenses. Especially since most lenses are made of soft plastic nowadays.
I know it’s hard to resist the temptation of blowing gently on your dirty lenses and cleaning them with your shirt, because you really want to remove that smudge of that piece of dirt that’s been bugging you. But you absolutely need to resist the temptation: wait until you can clean your glasses properly. If you don’t, the dirt that’s already on the lenses will act as an abrasive and scratch them.
Me, I usually carry a disposable, pre-moistened wipe in my wallet in case of an emergency. But those things are expensive and I’m usually never far from a public bathroom with soap and water, so I never use it. But I have one if I need it.
The rest of the time, I buy lens cleaning fluid and microfiber cloths in bulk. I usually keep a bottle of fluid and a pack of microfiber cloths at work, and another at home. They last me and my family a very long time and ultimately bring the cost of always cleaning our glasses safely down to almost nothing.
My favorite brand is this one:
But really you can use any fluid to clean lenses or optical equipment. They’re available in all supermarkets and opticians.
I appreciate the work put into this guide. But I’m going to be honest, there are simply no words you can type that will prevent me from cleaning my glasses on my shirt when they get smudged.
there are simply no words you can type that will prevent me from cleaning my glasses on my shirt when they get smudged
Well I tried 🙂
Yup
Just as an alternative, dish soap and water works better than any of these cleaning fluids in my experience.
You’re spot on with what to rub with though.
The cleaning fluid is convenient because it’s always on the shelf in the living room, and it’s just one quick spritz, one quick wipe and it dries in seconds when we pass by it.
What is that fluid anyway? I use a big jug of isopropyl I put into spray bottles.
The label says:
- Distilled water
- 2-butoxyethanol (solvent and surfactant)
- Methylisothiazolinone (bactericide)
- Methylchloroisothiazolinone (bactericide, usually used with methylisothiazolinone)
- Perfumes
Basically it’s a water-based solvent that is safe for plastics. IPA is quite harsh and known to dissolve certain plastics.
Tap water, dish detergent (not dishwasher detergent!), and blot dry with a paper towel, and you’re fine. If you’re rinsing with distilled water, then air drying will work; tap water can end up leaving distracting mineral deposits if you air dry.
That’s a good point if your home has hard water.
Replace the paper towels with a Kimwipe and you’re golden. Paper towel fibers are effectively very fine sandpaper and will gradually erode your lens coating, then they’ll make miscroscratches on your lenses that make things foggy. Kimwipes are designed for cleaning and drying lab glassware, so they don’t leave scratches.
That’s why you blot with a paper towel, and don’t rub.
Blotting is ineffective with harder water because you leave randomly distributed droplets that result in mineral deposit fogginess. Drying by wiping with Kimwipes absorbs better and doesn’t hurt coatings or lenses, while also absorbing any oils the washing might have missed. Try it if you haven’t. It makes a visible difference and keeps your lenses cherry for a long time.
This probably works okay… if oils are the only source of smudges on your lenses. Any cloth or tissue will rub solid dirt into the plastic, creating scratches by that sort of indirect action.
Ideally, you’d clean your glasses with soapy water, use laminar flow to rinse off any leftover droplets, and blow off any water that’s still left on the surface. And I suspect even that is just a 99% solution.
This probably works okay… if oils are the only source of smudges on your lenses
Yeah but the thing is, you can’t really tell what’s on the lenses. Some micro particles are probably on them that you can’t even see without a microscope, like lint floating in the air that stuck to the surface. And it doesn’t take long for freshly-cleaned lenses to start attracting dust.
i think i saw some lens cleaner that claimed to be dust-repellant. if that’s true, i guess it’s a reason to use the cleaner. but dust really isnt the most common issue, it’s face grease.
Ok i use my dry shirt for 99 percent of my cleaning…
Just running tap water and microfibre cloth, soap actually reacts with the oleophobic coating of the lens leaving strange marks like oil stains so something to not universally advise. As long as you’ve a microfibre cloth, it’s fine but still… don’t rub dry - one side is to wipe the water, other side is to polish after.
