DIY car detailing guides
Detail your own car, with the right gear.
Guides to washing, protecting and correcting your own car, built around what decides a purchase: your paint, your space and water supply, and how much time you will really spend on a weekend.
By the Detailing Gear HQ Team
Built for the driveway, not the showroom
Most detailing mistakes are made before the first wash: the wrong towel on fresh paint, a pressure washer that can't feed a foam cannon, a coating applied over swirls. Detailing Gear HQ is built to help you pick gear that fits your car and your routine, and to tell you the order to do things in.
What we cover
- 01Washing: pressure washers, foam cannons, mitts, brushes and drying towels
- 02Protection: waxes, sealants, ceramic coatings and maintenance sprays
- 03Paint correction: polishers, pads and compounds
- 04Interiors, wheels and tires
How a guide is built
Our guides start from manufacturer specifications, product labels, safety data and application instructions, then the detailing communities where owners report what holds up after months of washes. When a guide is based on our own time with a product, the article says so plainly. Every pick says who it is not for.
No scores, no printed prices
A score hides the trade-off that matters to you, and prices move every day, so every product link points to the live listing instead.
Where the money comes from
Detailing Gear HQ is reader-supported. When you buy through one of our links, we may earn a commission at no extra cost to you. Brands cannot pay for a recommendation or a placement, and if a manufacturer ever sends us a product, the article will say so. Read our affiliate disclosure.
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Spotted something out of date?
Formulas change, products get renamed and listings get swapped. If a spec or a link is wrong, tell us and we will check it and fix the page. Contact us.