Use Petroleum Jelly to Get Suction Cups to Stay Put

When they do their job properly, suction cups are great. Extra storage in the shower? Don’t mind if I do. But sometimes, suction cups lose their ability to stick to the wall. Try as you might to get them to stay put, they keep sliding down the tile in your bathroom or the kitchen window, and it’s a problem. Fortunately, a quick and easy hack will fix that. Here’s what to know.

How to use petroleum jelly to get suction cups to work again

Though this hack is by no means new, it’s making the rounds again, courtesy of (you guessed it) TikTok — specifically, user @alroessler. In the video, they’re faced with a sink situation: a sponge holder with suction cups won’t stick to the side of the sink. But a quick dab of petroleum jelly on the underside of the suction cups later, and the sponge holder stays in place.

Other methods for getting suction cups to work again

In an article for Hunker, Kirsten Nunez shares a few other ways to get suction cups to work again:

• Make sure the surface is smooth and flat, like a mirror
• Remove lint and grease on both the surface and suction cup
• Rinse the cup in warm water to make it more pliable
• Press on the suction cup every now and then to get rid of air pockets
• Make sure the temperature is above 40 degrees Fahrenheit

Meanwhile, according to a different article on Hunker (this one’s by Kathy Adams ), you can use a small amount of cooking oil in lieu of petroleum jelly to get a suction cup to stick. Here’s how: “Apply the chosen substance to the perimeter of the cup on the side of the lip that sticks to another surface,” she writes. “Use as little as possible, otherwise the cup may lose its suction power.”