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I honestly never thought I’d be writing this post…but I recently spilled half a gallon of paint on my laminate floor.
It got EVERYWHERE! The laminate floor, the subwoofer, the media console… It was a mess lol. The corner of the paint can got caught on the corner of the fireplace mantel when I was moving it, causing it to tip and pour out literally a bucket of paint. 😱
And guess what…I managed to get every last drop off the floor!
So while you may be thinking “AHHH I spilled paint on my laminate floor!!” I’m going to immediately answer the question on your mind… Yes, you can absolutely get paint off your laminate floor!
So take a deep breath, relax, and read through these extremely simple ways to clean up dried paint from your laminate floor. I’ll also cover how to clean a fresh paint spill – if you want to skip right to it, click here!
How to Get Dried Paint Off Laminate Floor
Dried paint on your floor typically comes in the form of paint splatter. This is especially true if you just painted your room with a paint roller.
Whether you have paint splatter or you have spilled an entire can of paint – guilty lol, these methods of removing paint from your laminate floor really work.
Trust me, after my paint spill, I did PLENTY of (frantic) research.
Try the following 4 tried and true methods for getting paint off of your laminate floor in order.
If one doesn’t work, try the next one!
1. Scraping (and Soapy Water + Paper Towels)
Start with your fingernail or if you have one, a plastic putty knife (make sure it’s plastic as it’s safer than metal on your floor).
Begin “itching” at the dried paint dots with your finger, or sliding your plastic putty knife under them. Typically this works pretty well at removing dried paint from your laminate flooring!
Sometimes once the dot of paint pops up, it can leave a ring of dried paint – or what I like to call, the ghost of my mistakes 👻 lol.
Get a tiny drop of dish soap or hand soap on a paper towel. Then get a tad bit of water on it. Scrub this on top of the paint splatter or paint rings. It helps to use your fingernails through the paper towel.
This should help soften the paint and allow for an easier paint cleanup.
2. Clorox Wipes
If step 1 didn’t quite get the paint off your laminate floor, have no fear!
Thanks to the cleaning ingredients that Clorox wipes contain (mainly isopropyl alcohol), these wipes are an excellent choice for removing dried paint from your laminate floors.
Simply wipe over a small section of paint splatter. Use your fingernails through the wipe to pick at the dots of paint if they are being stubborn.
While this solution should help, it’s not as easy as just lightly wiping over the paint and expecting the paint to vanish.
You will need to scrub a little bit – but it’s so worth it to get your floors back to the beautiful paint-free surface they once were!
If you don’t have Clorox wipes on hand, you can hop directly to the next step so you can save some money with products you most likely already have under your kitchen sink.
3. Homemade Mixture
When steps 1 and 2 just aren’t cutting it, this homemade mixture should hopefully seal the deal. And actually, when I was trying to figure out how to get paint off my laminate floor, this did the trick for me!
Mix together equal parts of the following ingredients:
- Vinegar
- Isopropyl Alcohol
- Water
Squeeze in just a couple of drops of Dawn dishwashing soap to your mixture. Then really mix it all together.
Dip your paper towels or a microfiber cloth into the mixture, and start to scrub over the paint splatter. Just keep wiping over the splatter, and pick at it if it’s clinging to your floor for dear life!
This mixture together should blast through the paint and help remove latex paint from your laminate floor.
Whether your paint is oil-based or water-based paint, it should help remove it from your laminate floor!
4. Krud Kutter
When thinking of how to get paint off your laminate floor, this one comes out of left field.
Krud Kutter is traditionally known as a degreaser, but its best-kept secret is dried paint removal.
A simple search online will show you that this stuff really does work on getting those stubborn paint splatters off of your laminate.
If all else fails, I’d give this a try.
Just spray the Krud Kutter over the paint that found its way onto the floor, leave it there for a few minutes, and then come in with a paper towel to wipe it up.
You can even use a soft sponge to help wipe up those more tricky dried paint splatters.
This may be the magic spray that you’ve been looking for!
Test in an inconspicuous area prior to spraying all over your floor. You always want to do this with new sprays since flooring is different from house to house.
I’ve seen that this stuff even helps get paint out of carpet – while I haven’t tested it myself, it’s definitely worth looking into if you find yourself in that situation!
While I like to stay the course of using simple cleaning solutions that involve as few chemicals as possible, sometimes you need a bit more muscle to get those tough paint spots up.
How to Clean a Fresh Paint Spill Off of Laminate Floors
If your paint spill just happened and is fresh – don’t panic! But quickly run through these steps so you can clean the wet paint off your floor before it dries.
When my massive paint spill happened, I felt like I was running in circles going nowhere trying to figure out exactly what I needed to do lol. But just take a deep breath!
- Grab a trash bag.
- Grab a roll or two of paper towels (depending on how big the spill is).
- Grab Clorox wipes (if available).
- Use paper towels to wipe up as much of the paint as possible. Don’t wipe back and forth in big motions to avoid spreading the paint further. Simply wipe up as much paint as you can with the paper towels first, and throw it in your trash bag.
- Repeat wiping and soaking paint into paper towels until you have cleaned up the majority of it (you’ll probably just have wipe marks on the floor at this point, not huge globs of paint!).
- Use Clorox wipes, or damp paper towels, and begin wiping up the last bit of paint from your flooring.
- If you don’t have Clorox wipes, and depending on how much has dried on the floor, it may be worth using some rubbing alcohol on your paper towels when wiping (but hopefully you don’t have to get to that point)!
If the paint gets any drier on your laminate flooring, you can follow all of the steps in the “How to Get Dried Paint Off Laminate Floor” section above.
And that’s it! You got this! For proof that you can clean a freshly spilled can of paint and it won’t be that way forever, check out my proof below. Trust me, it will all be okay! 🥰
Nobody wants to see tiny paint spots all over their floor after painting their walls, but it happens. And while it can seem scary, there’s no need to sound the alarm!
While I wish there was a way to get all of the paint up in one wipe, it’s still relatively easy to get paint off your laminate floors. It just takes a little bit of TLC!
Let me know which method of paint removal works for you and your laminate flooring! 😊
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