Decipher those confusing laundry symbols on your clothes with this handy chart.
Fortunately, we created a laundry symbol cheat sheet to help you decipher the most common laundry symbols.
You might find yourself checking it when you’re shopping to confirm that trendy boyfriend blazer isn’tdry clean only.
Photo: Vast Photography/Getty Images
Save our laundry symbol cheat sheet printable.
It’s one dot for cold, two dots for medium/warm, and three dots for hot.
Washing symbol with an X through it
you’re free to’t wash this item.
Getty Images
(There’s likely a dry-cleaning symbol in the mix then.)
Washing symbols with lines beneath them
These washing symbols indicate specialized wash configs.
One line means permanent press setting, while two lines means gentle or delicate configs.
RealSimple.com
Laundry Symbols for Drying
The square symbols give you the details on how to dry your laundry.
If it’s a flat, horizontal line, dry the item flat.
If it’s a curved line, you’ve got the option to line dry.
If the circle is solid with an empty square around it, it means no heat on the dryer.
Drying symbols with lines
You’ll sometimes see lines below the clothes drying symbol.
A single line indicates using the permanent press cycle, while double lines indicate the delicate or gentle cycle.
Again, one dot is low, two dots mean medium, and three dots is high.
If the X is over the iron proper, it means the item can’t be ironed.
If it’s below the iron, it means not to use steam.
Circle laundry symbols
The circlewithout a square around itis all about dry cleaning.
Bowtie laundry symbol
You might see a bowtie-shaped symbol with a big X through it.
That indicates that you shouldn’t wring out the clothes, or you might risk damaging them.