5 Of The Best Engine Degreasers You Can Buy

There are so many things that a person needs to do to make sure that their vehicle continues to run properly. After all, no one wants to spend a lot of money on a car and then have it fail on you very soon because you did not want to put in the effort to take care of it. Some of these things are fairly routine, like making sure to get your engine's oil changed periodically, but others are not necessarily as front of mind for the average person, as they may not be talked about as regularly as others. One of these methods for keeping your vehicle — and specifically your vehicle's engine bay — in check is to use a degreaser.

As your engine runs, things will naturally build up underneath the hood of your vehicle. There is so much fluid, like oil, gasoline, water, and more, constantly running that you are going to see places all over your engine that become subject to grease, rust, and deposits. If these things are not properly taken care of, they could prove to be a significant hindrance on the performance of your engine, which in turn will make it not last as long or run as smoothly as it is designed to be. 

So many different companies out there offer engine degreasers that it can be a little overwhelming to know which one is the right choice for your needs. Here, we are going to recommend five different degreasers for you to check out, which have been determined by collating many different reviews and recommendations from a variety of different publications with expert opinions on the subject. You can find more as to why we chose these products at the end of the article.

The first engine degreaser on our list comes from the folks over at Aero Cosmetics. This is a company that produces all manner of cleaners, sprays, and soaps, but they aren't just for cars. It makes these for everything from airplanes to boats to your house's windows. The product that you are looking for is the Aero Cosmetics Wash All Degreaser. It also has a product called Wash Wax All, which can be a tad confusing, but that one you will want to avoid for this purpose. This Wash All degreaser comes highly recommended from The Drive, which rated it as the best degreaser on the market, and considering the 4.7-star rating on Amazon, it seems like the actual customers agree with its effectiveness as well.

One of the benefits of the Aero Cosmetics degreaser is that it is able to degrease your engine through two different methods. Either you can choose to include water in your cleaning process or not. After you have sprayed the degreaser under the hood of your car, you can either wipe it off with a damp towel followed by a dry one, or rinse off your engine with water after the damp towel stage. Whichever method you choose, the Wash All degreaser will perform the task it needs to.

A single 16 fluid ounce bottle of the degreaser retails for $11.95, and if that isn't enough for you, a 32 fluid ounce bottle is also available for $18.95. So you don't have to continue buying spray bottles, Aero Cosmetics also offers one and 5-gallon refill jugs as well, along with a massive 55-gallon tub for professionals.

Many companies out there will just have one or maybe two degreasers available for sale. After all, they have a very specific task and producing a wide variety of them may seem counterintuitive. Well, that is not the case for the 3D company, as it offers four different kinds of degreasers. While they are all liquid degreasers meant to be used in spray bottle like the previously mentioned degreaser from Aero Cosmetics, the difference between them comes down to how badly your engine needs to be degreased. Out of all of the options available, the one that comes highly recommended from the Chicago Tribune, which named this the best overall degreaser, is the 3D Car Care Grand Blast Degreaser.

Outside of its general ability to be an effective degreaser, this 3D Grand Blast solution comes highly recommended for the specific reason that it works perfectly well on painted surfaces. As you are spraying this all around your car, the fear that a degreaser could chip or ruin the paint on your car is very real, and that fear is often quite justified. So, if you are spraying your degreaser and some of it gets on the outside of your car, you can have something close to peace of mind about it.

Strangely, the only way 3D sells the Grand Blast Degreaser is in a 1-gallon jug for $31.99. You will have to get a spray bottle separately to fill up to use it, which can be rather annoying, but once you do that, the end result works well.

Next on the list is a product from a company that has a name you would expect to be in the business of degreasing: GUNK. Almost everything that GUNK makes is in service of being able to properly clean and maintain your vehicle, from the engine to the tires. Though it also has surface cleaners as well, engine maintenance is the top priority, and it is that dedication that has it come highly recommend from both the Chicago Tribune and CTech.

Unlike the previous two degreasers on this list, both of which were liquids in traditional spray bottles, the GUNK Original Engine Degreaser comes in an aerosol can. These means that easily being able to refill the bottle is out of the question. GUNK does offer a spray bottle cleaner and degreaser combination, but that is not the one that these publications are recommending. This degreaser does require a water rinse finish after you have sprayed the degreaser on your engine and waited 10 to 15 minutes for it to work its magic. That being said, if you are in a rush, GUNK also has degreasing wipes for quick jobs that act as the dry-clean experience, but the quick and easy is rarely going to be as effective as the original or heavy-duty aerosol cans.

On Amazon, the only way you are able to get the GUNK Original Degreaser is to get it in a pack of one dozen 15 ounce cans that goes for about $70, but if you go to a store like Auto Zone, you can get a single can for just $5.99.

If there is one company on this list that you have most certainly heard of before, it is WD-40. Much in the way that Kleenex has become synonymous with the word tissue, WD-40 has become the same with a lubricant. So, if you have a door hinge that is squeaky, you get your bottle of WD-40. However, the company offers a great deal of different sprays and solutions to solve a variety of different issues. Among them is the WD-40 Specialist Machine and Engine Degreaser.

Unlike all of the previously mentioned degreasers, this is a foaming spray rather than a purely liquid solution. The others do create a lather when you spray them, but this is the only one that comes out as a true foam. The benefit of this is that it will be able to stay where you spray it. The degreasers that come out more as a liquid could spread and run to the point where it isn't getting the full work done on a particular area. You are also able to spray this from up to 5-feet away from your target, allowing you to stand clear of your engine as you apply it.

Something that many of the customers on WD-40's website praise about the degreaser — to the tun of a rating of 4.65 stars — is its versatility beyond just car engine bays, citing being able to use it on everything from snowblowers to dirt bikes, with its foaming ability making it extremely effective. You are able to purchase one 18 oz. can on Amazon for $6.99 or a case of four goes for $33.

For the final entry on our list, we go back to a degreaser that utilizes a traditional spray bottle and not an aerosol can. That would be the Signature Series Orange Degreaser from the folks at Chemical Guys. What is a little strange is that both The Drive and the Chicago Tribune specifically shoutout this particular degreaser for being a great value purchase, but in reality, the cost to purchase a bottle is not all that different from just about every other product on this list. A single 16 ounce bottle retails for $11.99 — almost the same as the Aero Cosmetics degreaser — and a gallon goes for $49.99, which is quite a bit more than the 3D solution. However, that does not mean it isn't a worthwhile degreaser to get.

This is a very strong degreaser, and Chemical Guys recommends diluting it greatly with quite a lot of water. For a time where you need extensive, extreme cleaning, it still recommends having six parts water compared to one part degreaser. For more routine cleanings, you will need to up the amount of water even more. So, if you were hoping for a quick and easy clean like with the GUNK wipes or water-free Aero Cosmetics Wash All Degreaser, that is not the case with the Orange Degreaser. The orange in the name isn't just a color, but a key reason behind its power. It is a citrus-based degreaser, and any cleaning solution that features citrus will typically make it more powerful than other solutions. In a way, that makes it a good value deal in the end, as you don't need to use as much when you degrease.

Dozens upon dozens of different automotive and cleaning product companies offer degreasers, so narrowing that robust marketplace to just five different degreasers cannot just be because of personal opinion. Instead, it was done by collecting the opinions of many different outlets, such as The Drive, the Chicago Tribune, CTech, and Autoblog, to find some kind of consensus as to which degreasers stood at the top of the list. If a certain publication spotlighted a particular one as the best, it was given extra consideration to make the list.

Once the ratings and reviews of the publications were taken into account, it was then time to look at the ratings from the actual customers who use these products, as a review from a site may not perfectly capture the reliability of these products over time. These customer reviews were taken both from shops like Amazon but also from the companies' own websites themselves, if they were available.

Beyond that, it was important to have a good variety of options spotlighted. That includes demonstrating a varied price range, as not everyone's budget for these products is the same. There also needed to be a variety of application methods, which is why you have both traditional spray bottles and aerosol cans represented. The process and ease of using these products was also an important factor into making the list. Combine all of these elements together, and that is why these five degreasers were chosen.