Best Makeup Brush Cleaners in Australia (2026)

Nobody buys a makeup brush cleaner because they are excited about it. You buy one because you picked up your foundation brush, saw the grey ring at the base of the bristles, and realised you have been pushing three weeks of old product back onto your face every morning.

The good news is that this is one of the cheapest problems in an Australian bathroom to fix. The confusing part is that the phrase "makeup brush cleaner" covers three different things on Amazon Australia, and almost every guide throws them in one pile. There are electric spinners, the motorised units that whirl a brush inside a bowl of soapy water and then flick it dry. There are silicone mats and pads, a textured surface to scrub against so your palm stops doing the work. And there are the cleansers themselves, the soap bars, liquid shampoos and rinse free solutions that lift the pigment out of the bristles.

You need at least one cleanser. The mat and the machine are conveniences layered on top. Get that order right and the category stops being confusing.

Below are seven picks across all three types, with every price, star rating and review count read off the Amazon Australia listings, plus the question the beauty sites dodge: whether the machine is worth buying at all.

What is the best makeup brush cleaner in Australia?

For most people the answer is a cleanser plus a mat, and a machine only if you own a lot of brushes. If you want one purchase that handles the whole job, the StylPro Makeup Brush Cleaner and Dryer is our top pick: a bowl and a motorised spindle with silicone collars that takes a brush from loaded with foundation to dry and reshaped in about thirty seconds, which is the only version of brush cleaning people actually keep doing.

If you like the idea of a spinner but not the price, the Neeyer Makeup Brush Cleaner and Dryer is our value machine. It arrives with eight rubber collars covering brush handles from 3 mm up to 30 mm, its own bowl, a splash guard ring and a carry bag, and it holds a 4.2 star average across more than six thousand ratings.

If you want to spend as little as possible and still stop scrubbing brushes into your palm, the Jessup Silicone Makeup Brush Cleaner Mat is the cheapest of our seven picks. It gives you five textured surfaces on a round pad barely wider than a coaster, plus a dry sponge for swapping eyeshadow colours without water at all.

Everything else sits around those three: two more cleansers, one more machine, and a solid bar for people who travel.

How do our seven picks compare?

The quickest way in is to decide whether you are buying a device, a surface or a formula. Here is the shortlist in one view.

How we chose these makeup brush cleaners

• We looked only at products whose main job is cleaning brushes, sponges and puffs, leaving out brush sets, storage cases and general purpose soaps that merely mention brushes.
• We read every price, star rating and review count straight off the Amazon Australia listing, checked fresh on the day this guide was written rather than carried over from an older shortlist.
• We required a real review base. Every pick carries at least 479 ratings, because a five star average built on four reviews tells you nothing about a motor that has to survive water.
• We covered all three formats deliberately, because a spinner without a cleanser is half a purchase, and the right two items can beat a single machine.

Best overall makeup brush cleaner: StylPro Makeup Brush Cleaner and Dryer

The StylPro is the pick if you want the job finished rather than started. You clip a brush into a silicone collar, dip it into the bowl of water and cleanser, spin, lift it clear of the water and spin again, and the same motor that washed the brush flings it dry. The listing puts the full cycle at about thirty seconds a brush, and that number is the whole argument for this category. Washing by hand takes a minute and then half a day drying flat on a towel, which is why most people do it twice a year and feel guilty in between.

It is the dearest of our seven picks, and it is worth being clear about what the money buys. The unit is 386 g, the collars are silicone rather than the harder rubber used on many other spinners, and the bowl is deep enough that a large powder brush does not throw water across the vanity. The included cleanser is vegan certified according to the listing, and the unit carries a 4.5 star average from 1,696 ratings.

The reason it heads this guide rather than the other machines is repeatability. The spinning collar holds the brush square to the bowl, so the ferrule, the metal band where the bristles are glued into the handle, stays above the waterline instead of soaking. That is the most useful thing a spinner does, and it is what cheap units get wrong when the collar is loose and the brush droops.

Flaws but not dealbreakers

The obvious one is the price. This is a convenience purchase, not a cleaning upgrade, and a bar of soap plus a mat gets a brush just as clean. The collars have a working range, so very fine eyeliner brushes and very fat kabuki heads are both awkward. And it is another appliance on a shelf that is already full.

Best value electric cleaner: Neeyer Makeup Brush Cleaner and Dryer

The Neeyer does the same trick as the StylPro, and it is the pick if a spinner is a nice to have rather than a must. It is a compact unit measuring 7 x 7 x 5 cm and weighing 340 g, and the box is well specified: the machine, two spindles, a cleaning bowl, a splash guard ring, eight flexible brush collars, a collar stand, a manual and a carry bag.

Those eight collars are the specification that matters. Their internal diameters run 3 mm, 5 mm, 7 mm, 10 mm, 15 mm, 18 mm, 24 mm and 30 mm, the widest published collar range of our picks, covering everything from a spindly eyeliner brush to a dense powder head. If you have accumulated brushes from several brands, that spread is the difference between a machine you use on the whole kit and one you use on four brushes.

It holds a 4.2 star average across 6,549 ratings, and the pattern in them is consistent: people using it to wash and spin dry everyday brushes are happy, and people who expected it to deep clean a month of caked foundation in one pass are not. That gap applies to every spinner on the market.

Flaws but not dealbreakers

The 4.2 average is the equal lowest in this guide, and the complaints cluster around motor life after heavy use. The collars are rubber rather than silicone and can perish if left sitting in cleanser. And like every spinner it needs a separate cleansing liquid, so budget for one at the same time.

Best budget pick: Jessup Silicone Makeup Brush Cleaner Mat

If you buy one thing from this guide, make it a mat, and this is the one. The Jessup A005 is a round silicone pad 11.4 cm across and 2.6 cm deep, weighing 120 g, with five textured zones moulded into the surface so you can match the texture to the brush instead of grinding a delicate eyeshadow brush across the same ridges as a kabuki.

It is the cheapest of our seven picks and it changes the job more than the price suggests. Without a mat you scrub brushes into your palm, which is slow and hard on a good brush. With one you lay the pad in the sink, add warm water and a few drops of cleanser, and swirl. The listing describes the material as performance grade silicone on a plastic base, and the pad includes a colour removal sponge for dry cleaning: run an eyeshadow brush against the sponge in circles to strip the pigment and move to the next colour without water at all. It holds a 4.5 star average from 479 ratings, the smallest review base of our picks but a strong average, and it packs flat enough to live in a drawer.

Flaws but not dealbreakers

Silicone mats do not stay put in a wet sink unless you press them down, and this one relies on its weight rather than a suction cup, so it wanders if you are heavy handed. The dry sponge is a consumable and loses its bite once saturated with pigment. And it is a surface, not a cleaner, so it does nothing alone.

Best for switching colours fast: Cinema Secrets Professional Makeup Brush Cleaner

This is the bottle you have seen on every makeup artist kit table, and it is here because it does something none of the other formulas here do. It is rinse free. You dip the brush, wipe it on a towel, and it is clean and dry enough to use again inside a minute. No water, no rinsing until it runs clear, no waiting overnight.

The 8oz bottle holds 236 ml, stands 12.7 cm tall on a 5.7 cm square base and weighs 220 g, so it is a benchtop bottle rather than a handbag one. It carries a 4.5 star average from 3,174 ratings.

Who it is for: anyone who does a full face with more than one shade, and anyone whose brushes live in a kit that travels. This is the only rinse free liquid formula among our picks and it is the reason artists carry it. For the weekly wash of a foundation brush you would still reach for a shampoo or a bar, because rinse free formulas are built for speed rather than for stripping a fortnight of buildup.

Flaws but not dealbreakers

You get through a fair amount pouring it into a dish, so a bottle does not last as long as a bar. The smell is strong and distinctly solvent like, which some people find reassuring and others cannot stand in a small bathroom, so run the fan. And it is a between uses cleaner, not a substitute for a proper wash.

Best for travel and small bathrooms: e.l.f. Clean Queen Solid Brush and Sponge Cleaner

A solid bar is the most sensible format for a cleanser and almost nobody thinks of it first. Nothing to leak in a toiletry bag, nothing to decant, and no bottle going gluggy around the cap. The e.l.f. Clean Queen bar comes in its own travel case, measures 8.7 x 6.6 x 2.9 cm and weighs 90 g, and you use it by wetting the brush, swirling it on the bar and rinsing.

It is the highest rated of our seven picks at 4.7 stars from 1,052 ratings. The formula is water activated and the listing describes it as nourishing and non damaging to bristles and sponges, which matters because the fastest way to wreck a brush is to keep cleaning it with something built to strip oil. e.l.f. lists it as vegan, double certified cruelty free by Leaping Bunny and PETA, and free from phthalates, parabens, triclosan and hydroquinone. It handles sponges as well as brushes, which counts if you use a blender.

Flaws but not dealbreakers

Bars are slower than liquids on a heavily loaded brush, and you will be swirling a while on a foundation brush that has not been washed in a month. The case needs to dry out between uses or the bar goes soft. And the bar is small, so a full kit gets through it faster than a bottle.

Best fragrance free deep clean: EcoTools Makeup Brush and Sponge Shampoo

This is the pick for the proper weekly wash, and for anyone who does not want their brushes smelling of anything at all. The EcoTools shampoo is a 236 ml bottle, 17.1 cm tall, with a short readable ingredient list: water, decyl glucoside, sodium lauryl sulfoacetate, lauryl glucoside, glycerin, phenoxyethanol, sodium phytate, citric acid and potassium sorbate. Those first few are gentle plant derived surfactants rather than the harsher sulfates in hair shampoo.

It is unscented, hypoallergenic, paraben free, vegan and cruelty free according to the listing, and it holds a 4.6 star average from 1,345 ratings. The listing spells the method out: wet the bristles, squeeze a small amount on, lather gently between your fingers, rinse until the water runs clear, squeeze out the excess, reshape and lay flat to dry.

Fragrance free is the reason to choose this over a scented bar if you use brushes around your eyes, or if anyone in the house reacts to perfume. It is also the one we would pair with a spinner, because a few drops disperse into a bowl of water the way a bar simply will not.

Flaws but not dealbreakers

It is a rinse and dry cleanser, so wash brushes in the evening and leave them overnight rather than expecting to use them again in ten minutes. Fragrance free means exactly that, so if you like a nice smelling wash you will find it clinical. And the pump pushes out more than you need on the first squeeze.

Best handheld spinner: Senbowe Makeup Brush Cleaner and Dryer Machine

The Senbowe is the most reviewed product in this guide, with 7,536 ratings behind a 4.2 star average, more than four times the review base of our top pick. It is a slim wand rather than a bowl unit, 120 x 26 x 26 mm, and it runs off a 300 mAh rechargeable battery at under 3 W, charging over 5 V in about an hour for roughly five minutes of spin time.

That form factor is the point. With the motor in your hand rather than under a bowl, you can spin a brush in whatever container you already own, and there is no cord trailing across a wet vanity. It ships with eight rubber collars and the listing method could not be simpler: attach the brush, pour water and soap into the bowl, dip and spin to clean, then raise and spin to dry. It is the pick for someone who wants the spinning trick without giving up a permanent spot on the shelf.

Flaws but not dealbreakers

Five minutes of run time per charge is fine for a normal kit but not for cleaning twenty brushes in a sitting. The 4.2 average is the equal lowest here, and the recurring complaint is water getting into the housing when people submerge more than the spindle. Hold the wand above the waterline and it lasts far longer.

Which makeup brush cleaner should you buy?

Match the situation on the left to the pick on the right and you can stop reading.

What should you look for in a makeup brush cleaner?

Work out which of the three formats you are actually shopping for, then check these five things.

The format, first. A cleanser is the only non negotiable. A mat is a cheap upgrade to how you use it. A machine is a time saver that still needs a cleanser to work. Buy a spinner and nothing else and you have bought a device that spins brushes in plain water, which is not cleaning.

Collar sizes, if you are buying a machine. This decides whether a spinner works on your whole kit or on four brushes from it. Count the collars and check the diameter range against the handles you own. The Neeyer quotes 3 mm to 30 mm across eight collars, a useful benchmark. If a listing does not publish diameters at all, that tells you something.

Rinse free or rinse and dry. Rinse free solutions are built for switching colours mid face and are the professional standard. Shampoos and bars are built for the weekly wash. They are not substitutes, and plenty of people own both.

What the formula does to bristles. Brush hair, natural or synthetic, does not enjoy being stripped. Look for conditioning or non damaging wording and be wary of anything leaning hard on degreasing. It is worth reading our guide to the best makeup brushes in Australia alongside this one, because the cleaner should suit the brushes you own rather than the other way around.

Fragrance and ingredients. Unscented is the sensible default for anything you use on eye brushes, and short ingredient lists are easier to check against anything you already know you react to. Several of our picks publish the full list on the listing.

One Australian wrinkle worth knowing: where the water is hard, in Adelaide, Perth and parts of regional Queensland, brushes take longer to rinse clean and can dry slightly stiff, and a spinner helps because it flings the water out rather than leaving it to evaporate through the bristles. In a humid Brisbane or Darwin summer, air drying a dense foundation brush overnight is genuinely not enough time, which is the strongest practical argument for owning a machine up north.

How do you look after your brushes and your cleaner?

The habit matters more than the product. Here is the routine that keeps both in good shape.

• Wash foundation and concealer brushes weekly, powder, blush and eyeshadow brushes fortnightly, and sponges every couple of uses.
• Keep the ferrule out of the water. Repeatedly soaking the metal band where the bristles are glued in is why brushes start shedding, so wash and rinse bristles down and never stand a brush in a glass of water.
• Dry brushes flat with the bristles hanging over the edge of a towel, or bristles down in a rack. Drying upright sends water back into the ferrule.
• Reshape the head with your fingers while it is damp, and store solid bars out of their case until dry.
• Rinse silicone mats and collars after every session and dry them completely, because cleanser left on rubber collars makes them perish.
• Wipe a spinner unit down rather than rinsing it, and keep the motor housing above the waterline. Water in the housing is the most common reason these units fail.

What else will you want alongside a brush cleaner?

A few small extras that make the routine faster, all from Amazon Australia.

• Etercycle Foldable Silicone Brush Cleaner Bowl is a collapsible bowl with a textured base, so brushes are not cleaned in the sink you brush your teeth over.
• DUcare Solid Soap Cleanser and Silicone Pad Set pairs a bar and a mat, the complete budget setup in one purchase.
• e.l.f. Clean Queen Liquid Brush and Sponge Cleaner is the pump bottle version of our travel bar, and the easier one to use with a spinner.
• Cinema Secrets Brush Cleaner 60 ml with Cleansing Tin is the small format of our colour switching pick, with the dipping tin included.
• EKIND Dry Makeup Brush Cleaner Sponges are double sided colour removal sponges in a travel size for a handbag or work drawer.
• EcoTools XL Makeup Brush and Sponge Shampoo is the larger bottle of our fragrance free pick for households cleaning a lot of tools.

What we did not pick, and why

Plenty of well regarded products did not make the seven.

The Ogee Brush Wash Bar has the best star average we came across, but the e.l.f. bar rates 4.7 stars across a thousand ratings and covers the same job.

The Real Techniques Brush and Sponge Cleansing Gel is a good everyday gel that turns up on most Australian beauty lists. It rates 4.4 stars, a touch below the cleansers we chose, and does nothing the EcoTools shampoo does not. The Lingtoolator Daily Brush Cleaner spray rates 4.2 stars, and sprays are the weakest format for actually lifting product.

We also skipped the wave of unbranded three in one electric cleaner machines flooding the category. Several look identical, most carry single digit review counts, and a motor that works in water is the wrong place to gamble on an unknown manufacturer.

Makeup brush cleaner questions Australians ask

How often should you wash your makeup brushes?

Wash foundation and concealer brushes weekly, because they carry the most product and the most oil, and let powder, blush and eyeshadow brushes go a fortnight. Makeup sponges need washing every couple of uses because they absorb far more product than bristles do. If you are switching eyeshadow colours in the middle of a single look, that is a different job and a rinse free cleaner or a dry colour removal sponge handles it in seconds.

What is the best product to clean makeup brushes with?

For a proper weekly wash, a dedicated brush shampoo or a solid brush soap bar does the best job, because both are formulated to lift pigment and oil without stripping the bristles. Our picks are the EcoTools Makeup Brush and Sponge Shampoo, which is fragrance free with a short plant derived ingredient list, and the e.l.f. Clean Queen Solid Brush and Sponge Cleaner, which is the highest rated of our seven picks at 4.7 stars.

Do electric makeup brush cleaners actually work?

Yes, with one important caveat: the machine is a time saver, not a cleaning upgrade. A spinner still needs a cleansing liquid in the bowl to do the actual work, and it will not rescue a foundation brush that has not been washed in two months in a single pass. What it genuinely changes is drying, because spinning the water out takes seconds where air drying a dense brush takes overnight.

What do makeup artists use to clean their brushes?

Rinse free solutions are the professional standard for switching colours quickly, which is why Cinema Secrets Professional Makeup Brush Cleaner turns up on so many artist kit tables and in most Australian beauty guides. You dip, wipe on a towel and the brush is usable again in under a minute. For the deep clean at the end of a job, artists fall back on the same brush shampoos and soap bars everyone else uses.

Can you use shampoo or dish soap on makeup brushes?

Baby shampoo is the classic household substitute and it works well enough for synthetic bristles because it is mild. Dish soap we would avoid as a habit, since it is designed to strip oil completely and brush hair, especially natural hair, relies on some of its own oil to stay soft. A dedicated brush cleanser costs little and is formulated for the job.

What else should you sort out around the house?

If you are tidying up the vanity, these guides pair well with this one.

• Best makeup mirrors in Australia covers the lighting that shows you the brush marks in the first place.
• Best makeup organisers in Australia is where the clean brushes go so they stop rolling into the sink.
• Best makeup bags in Australia matters if your brushes travel, as the solid bar here does.
• Best micellar water in Australia for the other half of a night time cleanup routine.
• Best cleansing oils in Australia if you are rethinking how the makeup comes off, not just how the brushes get washed.
• Best hairbrushes in Australia because hairbrushes need the same weekly attention and rarely get it.

About the author

Anish Puri founded NestPath in 2026 after going through the Australian first-home-buyer process himself. NestPath focuses on Australian first-home buyers because the existing review sites are American, generic, or both. Anish handles editorial selection across the homeowner hub. Reach out: hello@nestpath.com.au