Cleaning is most definitely a chore━in all senses of the word━so it’s excusable if you look out for cleaning agents that look and smell good, so you can enjoy at least some parts of the process.
Enter the super viral The Pink Stuff: candy pink and fruit-scented, it looks more like kids’ slime than cleaner. But at $12.90 a tub, how does it compare to good old fashioned Cif Cream Surface Cleaner? We put both home cleaners to the test to find out.
What is The Pink Stuff?
Touted as a Miracle All-Purpose Cleaning Paste, The Pink Stuff is clearly one for the ‘gram; the hashtags #pinkstuffpaste and #thepinkstuffpaste have garnered more than 60 million views on TikTok. It’s a thick, goopy, mildly abrasive, multipurpose cleaner that works on almost all surfaces━both indoors and out━leaving you with a shiny, clean home that smells of their signature rhubarb scent.
If you were wondering, The Pink Stuff is a cruelty-free, vegetable oil-based formula made with 99% natural ingredients, making it non-hazardous and eco-friendly to boot. The list of ingredients isn’t printed on the tub, but here’s how it stands against the Cif Surface Cleaner that most of us are familiar with:
| Cleaner | Price/Weight | Ingredients | Country of Origin |
| The Pink Stuff Miracle All-Purpose Cleaning Paste | $12.90/800g | Baking Soda, Quartz, Soap, Water, Glycerin, Fragrance, Laurylamine Dipropylenediamine, Dye, Dimethicone | UK |
| Cif Surface Cleaner | $2.12/500g | Linear Alkylbenzene Sulfonate, Sodium Salt, Ethoxylated Alcohol, Sodium Oleate, Calcium Carbonate | China |
How we tested The Pink Stuff vs Cif
In the name of testing, we tested both cleaners side by side on a variety of surfaces around the house and left the formulas on for 5 minutes, then rubbed them in before rinsing them off with another viral product: the Scrub Daddy sponge.
The Pink Stuff is a thick, solid paste while Cif comes in a very liquid formula.
Do note that these are both abrasive cleaners, so it’s advisable to patch test before using them on larger surfaces. It’s also best to wear gloves to protect your hands.
1. Oven
First up on my testing sheet was the oven: grimy and oil-splattered, with years of burnt grease baked into its walls and glass door.
What I found during this process was how much I preferred the thick, paste-like consistency of The Pink Stuff, which allowed me to spread it over the vertical sides of the oven, versus Cif, which endlessly dripped onto the floor.
Getting the liquid Cif onto the walls of the oven, and in between the grilles, was not an easy task.
Because of the more liquid formula of Cif, and how it’s dispensed from a bottle, I found it highly unwieldy manoeuvring it in the tight confines of the oven.
After leaving Cif on for 5 minutes, scrubbing, and rinsing it off.
Getting the cleaner onto the oven walls, in between the grilles, was nearly impossible━even when I squeezed it onto my hand to rub it on. It just wouldn’t stick. Ultimately, it didn’t manage to clean the oven wall very well.
Conversely, because I was able to get The Pink Stuff to stay on the oven walls, I wound up with a much cleaner result.
Cif on the left, and The Pink Stuff on the right.
The oven floor: before (LHS) and after (RHS)
I went ham with Cif on the oven floor, and as the pictures show, it didn’t remove the burnt grease as well as on the side where I applied The Pink Stuff. I had managed to scrub off most of the grease when I applied The Pink Stuff, although the most stubborn bits still remained.
Had another go at the oven with only The Pink Stuff, leaving it mostly sparkling clean.
Oven light: before (LHS) and after (RHS)━the half on the left side of the yellow line was cleaned with Cif, and some oil splatters still remain.
Winner: The Pink Stuff
2. Bottom of the pan
Next on my list was an old Tefal pan, whose bottom has clearly seen better days. Half of it was completely slathered with Cif, and The Pink Stuff on the other half.
The divide is pretty clearly seen, and I might add here that I scrubbed harder with CIf than The Pink Stuff, yet the left half of the pan was still darkened, whereas the right half was significantly more shiny and silver.
Going in for a second scrub with The Pink Stuff on the whole pan.
Bottom of the pan: before (LHS) and after (RHS)
The pictures speak for themselves: after a second scrub with only The Pink Stuff, my pan was much, much improved.
Winner: The Pink Stuff
3. Kitchen tap
Kitchen taps, with their chrome finishes, are pretty high-maintenance if you love them sparkling and shiny. They’re used so often each day, they get splashed with lots of water, which then creates water marks if you don’t dry them off.
I’m happy to report that both Cif and The Pink Stuff fared similarly well on the tap, leaving it super shiny and clean, with no visible scratches from the abrasive materials in the cleaners.
Both cleaners also did a decent job of removing limescale buildup around the base of the kitchen tap.
Winner: Draw
4. Kitchen sink
Like with the oven, it was just a little more difficult to get the Cif to stay on the vertical sides of the sink.
However, some people might find the liquid formula of Cif to be more manageable since you can kind of spread it around as you would paint. You need to be a little more deliberate with spreading The Pink Stuff paste to ensure you get it everywhere.
Before (LHS) and after (RHS).
As with the kitchen mixer, both cleaners cleaned the sink well━but if I looked quite carefully, the half of the sink which I’d cleaned with The Pink Stuff gleamed just that little bit more.
Winner: Draw
5. Dustbin
I also had an old dustbin which was rather tarnished and scuffed with age. With my success on the kitchen sink and tap, I thought I might try cleaning the lid of the dustbin as well.
Here’s where the warnings against the abrasive ingredients in The Pink Stuff showed themselves to be true: the half of the lid which I scrubbed with The Pink Stuff was completely scratched up.
Lesson learned: The Pink Stuff can scratch surfaces, especially less hardy ones.
Winner: Cif
6. Bathroom tiles
Before (LHS) with visible watermarks and soap scum, and after (RHS).
Watermarks, soap scum, discoloured grout━every homeowner knows these are the battles you’ll have to face while cleaning your toilet.
Again, I appreciated how I could get The Pink Stuff everywhere and really scrub it into the crevices. Its bright pink colour also meant that it’s immediately clear visually if you’ve missed a spot.
Cleaning power wise, The Pink Stuff just edged out Cif by the slightest bit in terms of how well it cleaned the discoloured grout, restoring it close to its original colour. This is not very apparent at a glance, so you could well settle for Cif at a cheaper price.
Winner: Draw
7. Bathroom sink
After a slew of very close matches between the cleaners, the bathroom sink turned out to be one place where The Pink Stuff emerged the better cleaner.
Before (LHS) and after (RHS).
In particular, the bathroom sink tap hole cover was where The Pink Stuff demonstrated its superior cleaning power━probably due in part to its abrasive ingredients. The tap hole cover had a long-time ring of limescale buildup, which other bathroom cleaners have previously not managed to clean. It was mostly scrubbed off with The Pink Stuff.
Cif didn’t do that shabby a job, but it didn’t clean off the limescale as completely.
The faucet and sink were, expectedly, easily cleaned with both cleaning agents.
Winner: The Pink Stuff
8. Shower glass door
Against the dreaded watermarks on my shower glass door, I found both cleaners to work equally well, though some users online have advised that you shouldn’t use The Pink Stuff on glass, since it might scratch.
My workaround was to barely scrub The Pink Stuff into the glass door, using my gloved hand instead of Scrub Daddy to spread it all over the shower door. Either way, both cleaners left my door sparkly clean, even though I’d deliberately not washed it for 3 weeks in order to get it marked up enough for this experiment.
Winner: Draw
9. Bathroom rust stains
I also decided to try both cleaners on the rust stains on the wall where my rain shower head was attached.
I went in first with Cif around half, and The Pink Stuff on the other. Where The Pink Stuff did remove a little bit of it, Cif didn’t seem to work, so I reapplied The Pink Stuff all around.
Unfortunately, the rust stains would not come off, though there was a slight reduction in the ring of rust, and a slight lightening of the dark brown colour on the tiles.
Winner: Nil
10. Mould
Before (LHS) and after (RHS).
I also tried to tackle mould with both The Pink Stuff and Cif━they didn’t work. Scrubbing with both cleaners cleaned the grout, but didn’t have any impact on the spot of mould in the corner of my shower.
The rest of the bathroom was squeaky clean, save for the few spots of mould that stubbornly refused to budge.
Winner: Nil
Is the viral The Pink Stuff better than Cif Surface Cleaner?
In spite of almost similar cleaning results in quite a few tests, The Pink Stuff does do a better job in several areas. Here’s a summary table of what we tested, and which cleaner came out tops.
| Item tested | The Pink Stuff | Cif |
| Oven | Winner | – |
| Bottom of pan | Winner | – |
| Kitchen tap | Draw | |
| Kitchen sink | Draw | |
| Dustbin | – | Winner |
| Bathroom tiles | Draw | |
| Bathroom sink | Winner | |
| Shower glass door | Draw | |
| Bathroom rust stains | Nil, but The Pink Stuff is slightly better | |
| Mould | Nil | |
| Overall: | The Pink Stuff | – |
On the price front, The Pink Stuff, at $12.90 for 800g, or $1.60/100g, is significantly more costly than Cif, which rings in the till at just $0.40/100g. Economically speaking, Cif is the better choice.
However, I found myself using a lot more Cif than might be necessary, since its liquid formula would not cling to the surfaces I was trying to clean. At the end of my day of cleaning, I’d emptied the whole bottle of Cif, whereas I’d only used half a tub of The Pink Stuff━even with double cleaning certain spots.
P.S.: The Pink Stuff goes for £1.50 (~S$2.56) in the UK, where this cleaner is from, so you might want to look for this if you’re travelling, or get friends and family to carry it back for you if you want to give it a shot. With its fruity-floral scent and absolutely cute pink colour, I’d say: why not?
For more cleaning content:
- The Dyson 360 Vis Nav Robot Vacuum: is the sold-out gadget worth the hype?
- FairPrice vs Sheng Siong: where to shop to get the cheapest household cleaners
- Best cleaning products in JB that are cheaper than in SG
Photos taken by Michelle P and edited by Nicole Ang
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