How often should you vacuum is a question that those of us who are living on our own needs to ask. If you’re a kid, the answer is however often mom or dad wants it vacuumed.

But for the rest of us, we need to look at a few different elements.  The first is the type of flooring, the second is the type of wear it gets, and finally, we need to look at the extra considerations.

Carpeting

To keep your carpet in good shape, it will need to be vacuumed about once a week. To take care of the carpet, your vacuum needs to be able to adjust to the pile height properly.  A too low bar could damage the carpet and the vacuum cleaner.  But if the bar is set too high, it won’t get the dirt deep down.

You should vacuum carpeting once a week. You should vacuum even if it’s in a room that doesn’t get used. Dust still travels through all areas of the house.

Low-pile is easier to clean than high-pile. But you still need to vacuum it regularly.  I don’t see much high-pile carpeting anymore. Back in the 1970’s, people would keep rakes to fluff up the carpet after vacuuming.

Non-Carpeting

For the most part, you can get away with a stick vacuum whenever you think it needs it. Non-carpeted flooring is tile, hardwood, and vinyl.

Most hard flooring can be quickly spot cleaned like if you drop a bag of coffee grounds. The key to keeping these floors clean is to pick up dust and hair regularly so you don’t have dust bunnies hanging out in the corners.

If you like it cleaner but don’t want to do the actual cleaning, get a robotic vacuum.

It will stay on top of keeping the dust and dirt picked up.

Foot Traffic

Most carpet manufacturers recommend vacuuming with a quality vacuum once a week. However, they also recommend vacuuming once a day on high-traffic areas, and areas where the pets hang out. And that leads us to the rest.

Regular vacuuming fluffs up the carpet strands so they’re not staying compressed down. It makes the carpeting look better for longer.

The Rest

You need to evaluate how much pet fur you accumulate. My aunt had seven cats and was vacuuming twice a day to stay on top of the pet hair and dander.

I vacuum the carpeting every two to three days with my Dyson stick. We only have two cats. But we all have long hair (even my husband)

So, how often should you vacuum? At least once a week, if not more.