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Homemade Room Spray With Essential Oils & Vodka (8 Recipes)

Learn how to make room spray with essential oils and say goodbye to toxic air freshener sprays. We formulated this natural DIY room spray recipe with vodka instead of witch hazel or rubbing alcohol for a truly long-lasting scent. Read on to learn how to safely scent your home with a natural homemade essential oil room spray. Plus, discover 8 unique room spray essential oil blends that smell amazing, including pumpkin spice, vanilla latte, cola, mulled cider and more.

DIY vodka essential oil room spray without witch hazel

Store-bought room sprays or deodorizers may smell good, but they can be very bad for your upper respiratory system, as well as your overall health.

The toxic ingredients found in many commercial air freshening products include formaldehyde, phthalates, artificial fragrance oil, and dangerous aerosol propellants such as butane and propane — not to mention the thousands of other endocrine-disrupting chemicals that aren’t required to be disclosed on the product’s label.

Unfortunately, exposure to these ingredients has been linked to cancer, pulmonary damage, asthma, and skin irritations. Which is why we make our own room sprays because we believe there are much safer ways to freshen the air and fragrance your home.

By following a few simple steps and using natural ingredients, we will show you how to make room sprays with essential oils but without those harsh ingredients. Below, you’ll also find a selection of essential oil blends that are perfect for personalizing your homemade room spray.

Why Use a DIY Room Spray with Essential Oils?

It doesn’t matter how clean your house is — sometimes odours happen, and essential oils are a great way to lightly fragrance your home naturally and without harsh chemicals.

Homemade room sprays with essential oils are not only easy to make, but they can be spritzed in all areas of your home prone to odours, such as kitchens, bathrooms and laundry rooms.

While a diffuser also works wonderfully to safely freshen your living space, room sprays made with essential oils are an affordable alternative to purchasing an essential oil diffuser. Room sprays are also a great way to enjoy the aromatherapeutic benefits of essential oils quickly and easily!

Natural DIY essential oil room spray

How to Make DIY Room Spray with Essential Oils

Making an essential oil room spray requires two accessible and simple ingredients – vodka and your favorite essential oils.

Vodka is the perfect base for a room spray recipe as it’s more natural when compared to rubbing alcohol. It also helps disperse the essential oils, as well as maintain their freshness, because it’s a natural preservative. Plus, grain alcohol will help the smell of your room spray last a lot longer!

High-proof vodka is the best choice for a room spray. However, cheap vodka works just as well as the more expensive brands. Vodka is also the base for our DIY sleep spray which doubles as a homemade linen spray to quickly refresh the air in your bedroom.

If you’re wondering if you can substitute rubbing alcohol for the vodka in this room spray recipe?

Technically, yes. Rubbing alcohol (isopropyl alcohol) is commonly used in homemade room sprays but we don’t recommend it as a substitute. Inhalation or exposure to rubbing alcohol fumes may cause headaches, migraines, vomiting, and nausea in some people. So, we avoid using it in our room spray recipes and use grain alcohol as a more natural alternative.

Packaging for Essential Oil Room Spray

Use a glass spray bottle for dispensing your room spray. We like to repurpose small brown glass bottles to save on costs.

But rather than clear glass, we recommend using a dark colored glass bottle (such as the amber one pictured in this post). A cobalt blue glass bottle works as well. This is because a darker color of glass prevents light and UV rays from breaking down the essential oils which helps your room spray smell stronger a lot longer.

It’s also important not to use plastic spray bottles for storing natural room sprays, or for any recipe that contains essential oils. Potent essential oils can erode plastic, causing the toxic chemicals in the bottle to leach into the product. Definitely not what you want, especially if you’re trying to avoid harmful chemicals.

Essential Oil Room Spray Recipe

1/2 cup / 4oz high-proof vodka
30-40 drops essential oils (see our recipe suggestions below)
Dark glass spray bottle
Small funnel

  1. Using a small funnel, pour vodka into your sterilized spray bottle.
  2. Drop in your essential oils, replace the spray nozzle, and shake the mixture vigorously to combine. Your essential oil DIY room spray is finished! Separation is normal, so please shake your room spray well prior to use to re-distribute the essential oils.

Essential Oil Blends for DIY Room Sprays

Below you will find our favorite essential oil blends for the best smelling natural room sprays. 

Mulled Orange Cider Room Spray

15 drops cinnamon bark essential oil
10 drops sweet orange essential oil
5 drops clove essential oil

This aromatic citrus room spray blend is spicy with notes of sweet orange. Add it to your room spray and use it to refresh the air in your home during the fall or holiday season.

DIY mulled cider holiday room spray with essential oils

Peppermint Hot Cocoa Room Spray

15 drops cacao absolute
7 drops peppermint essential oil

This delicious essential oil blend smells almost like a warm cup of peppermint hot cocoa. The perfect homemade room spray blend to use during the cold winter months as it evokes cozy vibes.

DIY peppermint hot cocoa room spray with essential oils

Pumpkin Spice Room Spray

15 drops copaiba oleoresin
15 drops vanilla oleoresin
5 drops cardamom essential oil
2 drops cinnamon bark essential oil
2 drops ginger essential oil
2 drops nutmeg essential oil
2 drops clove bud essential oil

This quintessential fall favorite will bring the sweet and spicy aroma of pumpkin spice into any room of your home. It’s the perfect autumn room spray scent for pumpkin spice lovers. Alternatively, you can also buy a pre-made pumpkin spice essential oil blend.

DIY pumpkin spice room spray

Sweet Cola Room Spray

15 drops lime essential oil
10 drops sweet orange essential oil

This essential oil blend smells like a crisp glass of cola, without the calories. It’s surprisingly easy to make a natural yet realistic cola scented room spray with essential oils!

Vanilla Latte Room Spray

15 drops coffee essential oil
15 drops vanilla essential oil

A simple aromatherapy room spray blend that is reminiscent of a warm caffè latte. It creates a decadent vanilla scented spray that refreshes the air with a sweet aroma.

Natural DIY room spray with essential oils and vodka

Vanilla Cola Room Spray

15 drops lime essential oil
10 drops sweet orange essential oil
5 drops vanilla essential oil

Another cola essential oil blend that smells fresh and fragrant, but this variation has notes of vanilla. If you enjoy sweet smelling fragrances, you will want to make a DIY room spray with this vanilla cola essential oil blend.

Tropical Room Spray

10 drops of lime essential oil
10 drops of sweet orange essential oil
10 drops vanilla essential oil

A room freshening blend that evokes memories of a bright tropical holiday. This zesty room spray lends a fresh smell to your home and is the perfect scent for use during the spring or summer.

Lemon Lavender Room Spray

10 drops of lemon essential oil
10 drops of lavender essential oil
5 drops vanilla woods essential oil

A classic citrus blend with warm notes of vanilla. This room spray has a clean home fragrance that instantly freshens the air. It’s wonderful for use in the kitchen.

DIY homemade air freshener room spray with essential oils

DIY essential oil room spray
Yield: 1 room spray

DIY Essential Oil Room Spray

Cook Time: 2 minutes
Total Time: 2 minutes

Learn to make a DIY room spray with essential oils. This natural recipe uses vodka instead of rubbing alcohol for a long-lasting, non-toxic scent that won’t harm your health.

Ingredients

  • 1/2 cup / 4oz high-proof vodka
  • 30-40 drops essential oils
  • Dark glass spray bottle
  • Small funnel

Instructions

    1. Using a small funnel, pour vodka into your sterilized spray bottle.
    2. Drop in your essential oils, replace the bottle's spray nozzle, and shake the mixture vigorously to combine. It's that simple – your essential oil room spray is finished!

Notes

  • Before making your room spray, see our essential oil blends above.
  • Separation is normal, so please shake your room spray well prior to use to re-distribute the essential oils and ensure an even spritz.
  • Be careful with darker coloured essential oils (such as vanilla oleoresin and coffee essential oil) as they are more likely to stain fabrics, rugs and carpets.
  • As well, please don’t spritz your room spray on, or near wood furniture.

Did you make this recipe?

Please leave a comment on the blog or share a photo on Pinterest

More ways to scent your home with essential oils

Looking for more non-toxic ways to naturally fragrance your home? These homemade air freshener recipes can also help freshen your living space:

For even more natural home ideas, follow us on Pinterest! You can also find us on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter.

Pin it for later

DIY vodka room spray air freshener spray with essential oils

Bonnie

Tuesday 11th of August 2020

I can’t find the size of the spray bottle in the post. 2oz? 4 oz? I can’t wait to make these recipes. They sound wonderful. Thanks, Bonnie

Kim

Tuesday 11th of August 2020

Hi Bonnie! The spray bottle we used and which is pictured is a 4oz bottle. Hope that helps and we hope you enjoy our room spray recipes! We will update the post with the size. Thanks for bringing it to our attention.

Amanda Klecker

Tuesday 5th of March 2019

Those combinations sound AMAZING! What a fun gift to give too! I'm going to pin this so I can try these scent combinations later on -- thank you so much for sharing!

Kim

Monday 11th of March 2019

Hi Amanda, We are glad you enjoyed the scent combinations! Thanks for reading and sharing!

Nat

Wednesday 17th of January 2018

Love making my own room sprays! I didn't know about the dark colour of the glass to keep out the uv rays that's super interesting. My fave blend has got to be lavender peppermint, but I'll be trying that tropical blend ;)

Kim and Kyla

Wednesday 17th of January 2018

Lavender peppermint is a very relaxing combo. We'd love to hear how it goes with the Tropical spray! ?

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