The throne is probably the most valuable piece of sitting apparatus in your home (save perhaps for that Lazy Boy). And for sanitation and health purposes, it should always be kept clean.

But not all the doo-doo in your bowl is cause by urine and excrement. Hard water (with minerals like calcium) is usually the most common culprit for those irritating stains too.

Here are some of the common ways to clean your toilet bowl:

In-bowl toilet cleaners

These products usually have active ingredients that break down hard water stains and disinfect the bowl like chlorine (bleach) or acids. They can come in powder or liquid form. Most of these cleaners need to be used with brushes to hack away at the stains. And by far, this is the most effective way to clean your bowl.

One of the most effective ways to use such cleaners is to apply them, let them sit for a while (to let it do it’s work on the stains), scrub, then rinse. Read the instructions on the label. Just be careful with the stronger active ingredients.

In-tank cleaners

These products are the ones you put in the toilet tank and “cleans every time you flush.” These products don’t really clean the bowl per se. They merely mask the odors and disinfects the bowl. But these don’t usually hack away at the stains since no scrubbing is involved.

Bleach

Bleach is also an effective cleaner for those stains. However, this poses some problems especially when left in the bowl. We all know how pets wander often in the toilet and lap up the water there (Eeew!). So be careful in leaving the bleach. Plus, leaving bleach inside the tank or letting it sit too long in the bowl can damage your toilet so better scrub and rinse soon enough (same goes for acids).