By Zach Pozniak, VP of Operations at Jeeves of Belgravia New York and fourth-generation dry cleaner · @jeeves_ny
Last reviewed October 2026 · Advanced Clean liquid tested November 2025; the other Persil scores come from my testing through 2026 · As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.
Tide Odor Refresh liquid is out of stock on Amazon, so its links go to the pods version; the score is for the liquid I tested.
Quick answer: The Persil to buy in the US is Persil Advanced Clean ↗. It scored 87.2 in my lab test, costs about 15 cents a load, and it is one of the few liquid detergents I actually use. I recommend it.
"Persil" on its own does not tell you much, though. The five Persil products I have scored run from 56.0 (the UK's Persil Ultimate) to 97.8 (the German 4-in-1 discs, which you can't buy in the States). The scent is polarizing, and ingredient safety is where it loses points.
| Product | Persil Advanced Clean (liquid) ↗ |
|---|---|
| Performance score | 87.2 |
| Measured against | Tide Hygienic Pods ↗ at 100, washing with water alone at 1 |
| Cold water | Stellar. It performed really well in cold. |
| Cost per load | About 15 cents, below the 20 cent average |
| Ingredient safety | 5 out of 10. Cyclomethicone is a notable pollutant, and there are quite a few skin sensitizers, so make sure it rinses out properly. |
| Dosing | Use 1 oz (2 tablespoons). The bottle says 20 loads; at that dose you will get closer to 40. Overdo it and it suds a lot. |
| Scent | Quite polarizing. There is a Free & Clear version, which I suggest if heavy fragrance bothers you. The 87.2 is not for that version. |
| My verdict | "An excellent product and one of the few liquid detergents I actually use. It would be near perfect if its ingredients were a little less harsh. I recommend it." |
Persil changed the formula, so I re-tested the new Advanced Clean liquid properly in November 2025, and it came back at 87.2. At the time that made it my second-best liquid. Since then the reformulated Tide Original ↗ (92.7) and Gain Plus ↗ (95.2) have both scored higher, and Tide Odor Refresh ↗ (96.9) was already ahead, so by the numbers it is fourth among the liquids on my board today. It still made my top five overall for 2025 and my best-liquids list at the 2025 award show.
Two things make it better value than the price suggests. It is super concentrated, so less is more: 2 tablespoons is plenty, and dosed that way the "20-load" bottle stretches to about 40 loads. And it is cheap to begin with at 15 cents a load. The catch is the ingredients. I gave it 5 out of 10 for ingredient safety because of the environmental concerns and the skin sensitizers, with Cyclomethicone being the notable pollutant. If Persil cleaned up the formula a bit, it would be near perfect.
Persil is not one formula. It is made by different companies in different countries, and the scores show it.
| Persil product | Where it is sold | Score |
|---|---|---|
| Persil 4-in-1 discs (German edition) | Germany, not the US | 97.8 |
| Persil Advanced Clean (liquid) ↗ | US | 87.2 |
| Persil Original (liquid) ↗ | US | 62.6 |
| Persil pods ↗ | US | 57.7 |
| Persil Ultimate (UK edition) | UK | 56.0 |
The German Persil discs are really excellent. They scored 97.8, which put them top three against the US products and first on my international board, and I named Germany's Persil pod the best international product of 2025. I tested the smaller 17 gram discs, not the 25 gram ones, so that is a lot of cleaning in a small dose. Sadly they are not sold in America.
The UK edition of Persil Ultimate is a different story: 56.0, very average, at around 20p a load. In the UK, Persil is owned by Unilever, while Henkel owns it in most other regions, and that likely explains the spread. The bottle's 14-day freshness claim is about how long the perfume stays on your clothes in the closet, not 14 days of wear. It is a bio product, meaning it has enzymes. I'd probably skip this one; there are much better options out there.
Both sit well below Advanced Clean on my board: Persil Original ↗ liquid at 62.6 and Persil pods ↗ at 57.7. I'd call the pods solid, above average, and clearly not as good as the Advanced Clean liquid. If you are buying Persil in the US, Advanced Clean is the one I would pick.
I use the AISE industry-standard method that the big testing labs use. Cotton swatches get 18 different stains across five categories, including artificial body oil, and are washed in cold, warm and hot water. Then I read each stain with a spectrometer before and after, and the colour difference tells me how much of it actually came out. I don't judge by eye, because eyes are unreliable. In 2025 I put about 78 detergents from around the world through it.
The score is purely stain removal performance. Price, formulation, ingredient safety and packaging belong in your decision too, and none of them are in that number.
Tide wins this one on cleaning. Here is how the US products line up on my board:
| Product | Form | Score | Cost per load |
|---|---|---|---|
| Tide Hygienic Pods ↗ | Pods | 100 | Not quoted |
| Tide Odor Refresh ↗ | Liquid | 96.9 | 22 cents |
| Tide Original ↗ | Liquid | 92.7 | Not quoted |
| Persil Advanced Clean ↗ | Liquid | 87.2 | 15 cents |
| Persil pods ↗ | Pods | 57.7 | Not quoted |
On cleaning, Tide is ahead in both forms I can compare. Tide's two best liquids beat Persil Advanced Clean ↗, and in pods the gap is much bigger: Tide Hygienic Pods ↗ at 100 against Persil pods ↗ at 57.7. Of the Persils I have scored, the German disc is the one that beats a Tide liquid, and you can't buy it here.
On price, Persil wins. Advanced Clean is about 15 cents a load. Tide Odor Refresh ↗, my top liquid, is 22 cents.
On fragrance, it depends which Tide. Tide Odor Refresh ↗ only comes free and clear, and that is the main reason it is my everyday detergent. Persil's scent is polarizing and they don't make a lot of free and clear products, which is disappointing, although Advanced Clean does come in a Free & Clear version.
So my answer: if you want the best clean and no fragrance, buy Tide Odor Refresh ↗. If you want a strong cleaner that costs less and you like the Persil smell, Persil Advanced Clean ↗ is an excellent choice. I use both. My full write-up of the Tide side is in my Tide Odor Refresh review.
The rivalry is old. Back in 2022, before either brand's current formulas, I ran a stain test on seven detergents and Tide Hygienic Clean narrowly beat Persil for gold. Tide was the best on makeup stains; Persil did a little better on food stains. Tide Hygienic Clean liquid has since been discontinued, so that result is history.
They used to be slow. In my 2022 dissolving race the Persil disc came dead last of nine pods: 9 minutes 8 seconds in cold water and 1 minute 10 seconds in hot. Persil then redesigned the pod, and the new one dissolved about 3.4 times faster than the old one in cold water. In a head-to-head with a Tide pod in 2025, Tide still won by a decent margin, and Persil took about another twenty seconds. That is still a fine time given that most wash cycles run over an hour.
None of these races recreate a washing machine; they only time how fast a pod breaks down. If your pods are leaving residue, put the pod in the drum before the clothes, run it under some water first, and don't overload the machine. More on that in my guide to laundry pods that won't dissolve.
A good liquid detergent doubles as a pretreatment. When I tested ten stain removers, high quality liquid laundry detergent like Persil or Tide Stain Release hung with the best of the dedicated products. Rub a little into the stain and let it sit before washing. The full results are in my stain remover rankings.
Henkel, the German company behind Persil in most of the world, also makes All, Snuggle and Purex, and it used to manufacture Kirkland's laundry products, though no longer. Shared ownership does not mean shared results. Purex made my worst detergents list for 2025, which shocked me because it's basically the budget version of Persil; maybe it's just too watered down. The details are in my Purex review.
You want a strong liquid at a low price per load, you mostly wash in cold water, and you like the scent. Dose it at 2 tablespoons.
You have sensitive skin or care most about ingredient safety. It scored 5 out of 10 there. Try the Free & Clear version, or look at my free and clear picks, which are all lab-tested. And if you want the most cleaning per load regardless of anything else, the Tides above and Ariel 2X powder ↗ score higher.
Everything I have scored, with the numbers, is in my tested laundry detergent rankings.
Persil Advanced Clean ↗ liquid is. It scored 87.2 in my lab testing, against Tide Hygienic Pods ↗ at 100 and water alone at 1, it costs about 15 cents a load, and I use it myself. Other Persil products score lower: Persil Original ↗ liquid 62.6, Persil pods ↗ 57.7, and the UK's Persil Ultimate 56.0.
On cleaning, no. Tide Odor Refresh ↗ (96.9) and Tide Original ↗ (92.7) both outscored Persil Advanced Clean ↗ (87.2), and Tide Hygienic Pods ↗ (100) beat Persil pods ↗ (57.7) by a wide margin. Persil is cheaper, at about 15 cents a load against 22 cents for Tide Odor Refresh.
The German 4-in-1 discs at 97.8, but they are not sold in the US. Of the Persil products you can buy here, Advanced Clean liquid at 87.2 is clearly the best of the ones I have scored.
Persil is owned by Unilever in the UK and by Henkel in most other regions, so the formulas are not the same product. That likely explains why the UK's Persil Ultimate scored 56.0 while the German discs scored 97.8.
Advanced Clean got 5 out of 10 for ingredient safety from me. It has quite a few skin sensitizers, so make sure it rinses out properly. If heavy fragrance bothers you, try the Free & Clear version, which I have not scored.
About 1 oz, or 2 tablespoons, per load. It is very concentrated, so less is more. Used that way, the bottle that says 20 loads gets you closer to 40, and you avoid the heavy sudsing I noticed with this one.
The current ones do. The old Persil disc was the slowest pod in my 2022 test at over 9 minutes in cold water. The redesigned pod dissolved about 3.4 times faster, and in 2025 it finished about twenty seconds behind a Tide pod.
Persil Advanced Clean ↗ is an excellent liquid at a low price, and I use it. It cleans well in cold water and a little goes a long way. It would be near perfect if its ingredients were a little less harsh. Just make sure the Persil you pick up is the Advanced Clean, because the other US Persils I have scored are far behind it, and the best Persil of all is only sold in Germany.
Or ask about any laundry or garment care question
Zach Pozniak is VP of Operations and co-owner of Jeeves of Belgravia New York, the Madison Avenue dry cleaner serving New York since 1979, and the fourth generation of his family in the trade. Zach posts garment care techniques as @jeeves_ny on TikTok to over 900,000 followers, and his book The Laundry Book, co-written with his father Jerry Pozniak, was featured on Good Morning America in October 2024. Jeeves NY's clients include the Metropolitan Opera, the Met Museum, and FIT, and the business has been featured in The Wall Street Journal and New York Magazine.