It's vitally important that you clean your sex toys after use.  Not only is it good maintenance that will help to ensure a long working life for your toys, it's also a necessary health measure.  Toys that are not cleaned can be breeding grounds for bacteria and infections.

Fortunately, it's relatively easy to keep your sex toys clean.  The following list outlines the ways to clean various different toys, based on what substance their outer layer is made of.  In every case, these are guidelines only, and if the manufacturer has included instructions for the proper care and cleaning on your sex toy, please follow those instead of the following.

Hard Sex Toys

A category that includes Plastic, Silicone, Metal and Glass toys, most of these toys can be cleaned by boiling in water, or rubbing with alcohol or bleach.  With the exception of glass toys, they can even be run through the  dishwasher (although not if they have any exposed fittings for batteries or power cords).

Also, be careful not to drop them on any hard surfaces – even a small fracture in the material will widen, and can be extremely dangerous.  For metal toys that have jeweled fittings, be careful of the glue holding the fittings in place, as it may react to cleaning chemicals.

Imitation Skin Sex Toys

Washing in mild soap and warm (never hot) water followed by air drying will be alright for most of these.  The skin may tear easily, so be careful in your handling of it.  However, there are many different varieties of imitation skin sex toys – and each of them has a slightly different artificial skin on it – so wherever possible, follow the manufacturer's instructions for cleaning in preference to these directions.

Jelly Rubber and Rubber Sex Toys

Rubber sex toys can be washed in mild soap and warm water. The rubber is porous, and it's not possible  to fully sterilise it, so be thorough when cleaning, and consider using them with condoms during sex play.  Due to the porousness of the rubber, be careful to air dry them somewhere where they will not be too exposed to the open air.

Sex toys that are a mix of silicone and jelly rubber should be cleaned as if they were solely jelly rubber.