How often should you clean windows in Malta?

The short answer for a typical Maltese home

For most homes in Malta and Gozo, cleaning the outside glass every two to three months keeps windows looking good, with the inside cleaned whenever it starts to look dull. That is a starting point, not a rule. Where your home is, which way it faces and what is happening around it can halve that interval.

Outside glass gets dirty much faster than inside glass, because it takes everything the weather and the street throw at it:

• Dust, which hangs in the air through the long dry summer.
• Salt, carried inland from the sea on the wind.
• Saharan dust and red rain, a few times a year.
• Traffic grime on busy roads.
• Construction dust, which in most Maltese towns is never far away.

Inside glass only deals with household dust, fingerprints and, near the kitchen, a film of cooking grease.

Seafront homes and the majjistral

If you live on the seafront in Sliema, St Julian’s, St Paul’s Bay, Marsaskala or Marsalforn, you already know the problem: windows that look fine after a clean go cloudy again within weeks.

The cause is the majjistral, Malta’s prevailing north-west wind. It picks up fine spray from the sea and drops it as salt on glass, frames and balcony railings. On its own a thin salt film looks like a dull haze. It also attracts dust, so the haze thickens quickly.

For seafront homes, every four to six weeks is a more realistic interval, and monthly for glass that faces the sea directly. Two things matter as much as frequency:

• Rinse before you wipe. Rubbing dry salt across glass can leave fine scratches. Flood the glass with clean water first.
• Do not forget the frames and tracks. Salt left in aluminium tracks and around rubber seals shortens their life. A quick rinse of the tracks at every clean helps.

Glass balustrades on seafront balconies get salt on both sides and show every mark against the light, so they often need attention more often than the windows themselves. Our guide on removing salt from sea-facing windows covers the method, and our page on window cleaning in Sliema covers seafront homes there.

Red rain and the xlokk

The xlokk, the warm south-east wind, brings a different problem: fine Saharan dust. Sometimes it hangs as a yellow haze. When it meets rain, it comes down as red rain and dries into a gritty reddish film on every window, sill and balcony.

These episodes happen a few times a year, most often in spring and autumn. Three rules make them easier to deal with:

1. Clean after the episode, not during it. Dust often comes in waves over several days. Wait until the haze has cleared and the wind has changed.
2. Never wipe red rain dust dry. It is gritty. Rinse it off first, then wash and dry the glass.
3. Clean the sills and tracks too. Otherwise the next shower washes the dust straight back onto the glass.

Our guide to red rain and Saharan dust covers this in more detail, including what it does to solar panels.

Busy roads and building work next door

Inland homes are not automatically low maintenance. Two things push the interval down to every four to six weeks:

• Busy roads. Traffic leaves an oily grey film on street-facing windows, especially on ground and first floors in towns like Birkirkara, Ħamrun and Qormi.
• Building work. Construction is constant across Malta, and a site next door fills the air with fine limestone and cement dust for months. It settles on glass, sills and balconies within days.

When there is building work next door, there is little point cleaning every week while the dust is still flying. A better approach is to rinse the worst off when it builds up, then book a thorough clean once the noisy phase of the work is over. If paint, cement or silicone has landed on your own glass, do not scrape it dry, because that scratches the glass. See how to remove paint, cement and silicone from windows and cleaning up after building work.

Which way your windows face

The direction your windows face changes how quickly they get dirty:

• North and north-west facing windows near the coast catch the salt carried by the majjistral.
• South and south-east facing windows catch more of the Saharan dust that arrives on the xlokk.
• Windows facing an internal yard or shaft are sheltered from both and can go much longer between cleans.

In practice, many homes end up with two schedules: the exposed side cleaned more often, the sheltered side less.

Flats, townhouses and villas

The type of home also makes a difference:

• Apartments often have windows and balcony glass that can only be cleaned from outside, plus common-area glass in stairwells and entrances that the block administrator arranges.
• Townhouses usually have street-facing windows that collect traffic dust, persjani that hide dirty glass behind them, and sometimes traditional gallariji with many small panes. Our guide on how to clean Maltese balconies covers those.
• Villas and farmhouses tend to have large areas of glass, patio doors and sometimes skylights, which take longer but are usually easier to reach.

Upper floors and stairwells need the right equipment. See how high windows are cleaned in Malta. For shops, cafés and offices, see how often a shopfront should be cleaned.

A simple seasonal routine

If you would rather follow a calendar than watch the glass, this routine works for most homes:

• Spring: a full clean once the winter storms and spring dust episodes have passed.
• Summer: a mid-summer clean of the outside glass, more often on the seafront.
• Autumn: a full clean after the dry summer and before the winter rain.
• Winter: a clean after big storms, especially on the seafront where storms leave salt behind.

Then add an extra clean after any heavy red rain episode. For the rest of the house, see our seasonal home maintenance calendar for Malta.

Signs your windows need cleaning sooner

Whatever the schedule says, clean early if you notice any of these:

• A milky haze on sea-facing glass.
• Red or brown spots after rain.
• Rooms that feel darker than usual on a sunny day.
• Grit in the sliding door tracks, or doors that stick. See how to clean aluminium sliding door tracks.
• Dust or paint spots after work nearby.

When to call a professional

Most people can keep on top of ground-floor windows and glass that is easy to reach from inside. It makes sense to book a window cleaner when:

• Windows are on upper floors or can only be reached from outside. Never lean out of a window or stand on a balcony railing or chair to reach glass.
• There is a lot of glass, such as a villa, a large apartment or a whole block.
• Salt or dust has built up for months and needs more than a quick wipe.
• You would like a regular schedule without having to think about it.

Regular cleans are usually quicker, and so cheaper per visit, than one-off cleans after a long gap. For shops, offices and apartment blocks, see commercial window cleaning. clear.mt arranges regular window cleaning for homes, apartment blocks and businesses across Malta and Gozo, and you can ask for a free quote with a few photos of your windows.