It’s an age-old debate in households around the country: how to best stack the dishwasher.

Different designs, manufacturer advice and the shapes and sizes of dishes mean there isn’t a 100% correct way of stacking a dishwasher. But, for peace in your household, there are some golden rules you should follow.

Water needs to be able to reach your dishes to clean, so here’s how you can help it:

This is a good place for your drinking glasses and mugs. Most top baskets have dividers to keep items from knocking about in a wash to prevent chipping and cracking. Larger cooking utensils, such as spatulas and tongs, can also be laid flat in the bottom of this basket.

Generally, the top basket doesn’t get as hot as the bottom, so plastic is less likely to warp. Make sure your plastic containers are facing down so that they don’t have water pooling in them after the wash.

Most dishwashers let you drop this basket down so you can fit taller items, such as wine glasses.

Top tip: To help your dishes dry, leave the dishwasher open for a few minutes after washing to let water evaporate.

Use the tines (the prongs) to keep plates separate. This prevents damage and lets water in for cleaning (but it isn’t the end of the world if your dishes lightly touch).

Many dishwashers have folding tines in the lower basket so you can fit in oddly shaped or large dishes, such as pots and pans.

Place your plates in the bottom rack (unless they’re delicate or prone to chipping). Stack from the middle outwards as it helps avoid over-stacking.

To ensure really dirty items – such as crockery, pots, and chopping boards – get the best clean, place them towards the centre back of the bottom basket. This tends to be the warmer part of the dishwasher with a more intense clean.

Top tip: Empty the bottom drawer first so you don’t spill any water from the top basket on to dry dishes below.

Some dishwashers come with a cutlery tray (a shallow drawer above the top basket with dividers to prevent cutlery nesting). You can also place larger cooking utensils such as tongs, spatulas here. If you’re comfortable washing your kitchen knives in the dishwasher – as some knives can be damaged this way – they’re best placed in the cutlery tray so that they’re separated from other utensils and don’t become dull.

There is one simple rule to follow with cutlery – the pointy end goes down. To prevent accidental stabbing, place the pointy end down and handle up, including forks. Spoons can be placed either way and mixing direction helps stop them nesting.

You don’t need to pre-rinse dishes before placing them in the dishwasher, but do scrape off food scraps. Dishwashers often have a rinse cycle as part of their wash, so if you pre-rinse you’re just wasting water. If you think your dishes aren’t clean enough without rinsing, then next time you wash, use a more intense wash cycle or try a different detergent.

Leave these items aside for hand washing:

Every dishwasher has different wash cycles/programmes. When we test dishwashers, we test on the default or “normal” cycle, which is what the machine uses when first turned on. Here are our top tips for wash cycles.

Our Asko washer is now 28 years old (bought in 1993), and we have been fortunate to be able to move it from house to house. We have ALWAYS prerinsed all items before putting them in the diswasher and I can't but help to think that prerinsing has extended its life. We have obviously never had a blockage and the only repair has been to replace the main pump a few years ago (very cheap and easy DIY job). I am not looking forward to replacing it as I'm sure a modern appliance won't be able to match this performance or repairability. Our vote is for cutlery handles down - this avoids sharp tips damaging the cutlery basket.

I have to put my cutlery in handle down, as when I did it the other way around the pointy end of my steak knives would drop through the basket and scratch the door when pulling out the bottom basket. Yes I do have to be careful when unloading the cutlery basket but I would rather that than damaging my dishwasher door.

The F&P ELBA DW60 handbook states that you should place cutlery (except knives and other sharp utensils) with the handle downwards.

I put ALL cutlery with handles down as I figure that it is the business end that needs the most thorough wash. Yes, you do need to be a bit careful when unloading the sharp knives from the basket.

Also try to avoid having more than one item of the same piece of cutlery in the same basket slot as they can stick together.

I never put plastic containers & lids in the dishwasher - they last longer that way.

Any antique crockery (eg. Royal Albert), especially with gold rims, is always hand washed.

If in doubt about the treatment of any items do read the manufacturers handbook.

Had my Miele for 5 years and never given me problems, love my cutlery tray and the vertical tines allow me to fit all my big and long stuff including Rangehood filters. Easy to use, top up salt every 2-3 years, top up rinse up when needed and Miele powder is easy to load with no waste. Love my wine glass support in bottom basket aswell

We have washed our silver in various dishwashers over it's 40 year life with no issues. There are only two rules to follow: 1 Only have silver in the cutlery basket / tray so silver and stainless steel items are not in contact. 2 Air dry- do not use drying cycles of the machine. As soon as washing cycle finishes open the door and pull the rack partially out to dry. This keeps the silverware from drying in a hot humid atmosphere when pitting can occur. The same method can be used on expensive crockery with metallic trims.

We've always put cutlery jn the basket handle first. Otherwise there's no flow for stuff to come off. It's easy enough not to poke yourself removing them. Or tip cutlery out into the drawer and sort from there. I've had my Bosch for years and it's great.

I have had a dishdrawer and now a free standing dishwasher and I've always put the handles in first as have found they don't fully get cleaned and the cutlery basket has a handle of it's own that I grab easily without touching anything sharp. Fun part is playing which size handle will fit into which size hole in the basket - haha.

Always have handle at top. Never have stuff remaining. Would only happen if cutlery is nested together. Also, could be unhygienic if picked up by dirty hands. Nothing worse than seeing finger or thumb prints on blade of cleaned knife!

Definitely handles-up in the cutlery basket. For the sake of hygiene utensils should only be handled by their handles - especially after they've just been sanitised in the dishwasher. If the business end of a knife, fork or spoon looks particularly grubby just give it a quick wipe down with a damp cloth before you put it - handle up - in the basket.

Do NOT buy one of these , the filters don't work properly and we are having to unblock the holes in the spray arms every week. The number of cycles available is over the top , our old Elba Dishwasher did a far better job.

My Samsung dishwasher is also useless. As per other comment the arms get blocked all the time and the bottom one is particularly hard to clean out. It simply doesn't wash the dishes. I have to rinse before I put them in and often have to rewash (especially cups) when I take them out.

Many dishwashers have two places to put detergent, one of which gets used in the pre-wash and the other in the full wash. On ours the pre-wash holder shows just as a tiny marking on an indentation in the soap dispenser. We never noticed it until we knew to look for it. We had much better results when we worked that out. Use powder rather than tablets as tablets only provide soap for one cycle.

Technology Connections on Youtube stuck a window in the side of a dishwasher and did all manner of tests. It's worth a watch: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_rBO8neWw04

This site uses cookies to help us understand how visitors engage with our website. By using Consumer NZ, you accept our use of cookies.

Sorry, you need to have JavaScript enabled to use our website. Visit enable-javascript.com to learn how to enable JavaScript for your browser.

Or visit our Technical support page to find out how JavaScript is used on Consumer.