Said It Here

How to get old magnetic whiteboard residue off a fridge

Old magnetic whiteboards often disintegrate, leaving behind stuck magnetic material and failed adhesive that resists standard solvents. This leaves people scraping away the residue by hand with razors or cards, which makes cleanup frustrating and time-consuming.

Overview
People affected2 accounts across 1 forum
Workarounds found5 items attempted
Community agreement31 total upvotes

What people tried

Every workaround mentioned in the threads below. We haven’t tested any of them — and nobody here is claiming they worked.

Found another way around this?

Share your steps and trade-offs so fellow engineers don't have to reinvent the wheel. No account required.

  1. 1
    Chipping away at the residue using a credit card or razor along with elbow grease
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  2. 2
    Using WD-40 and rubbing alcohol
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  3. 3
    Applying vegetable oil, heat from a blow dryer, and a plastic scraper
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  4. 4
    Using Spray Nine Heavy Duty Cleaner and a stainless steel sponge
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  5. 5
    Saturating with Goo Gone and scraping with a plastic drywall knife
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Tried another approach not listed above?+ Share your workaround ↑

In their words

Unedited, grouped by where they were said, most upvoted first within each place, each linked to the thread it came from.

r/CleaningTips2 people · September 2026

“Upon attempting to remove it, the majority of the magnetic material was still stuck to the fridge door!”source ↗

“Tried GOOGONE and I can’t even tell if it’s helping. Got about half off slowly chipping away with a credit card/razor and a lot of elbow grease.”source ↗

Bellistoned · r/CleaningTips · 24,420 upvotes

“It was like the adhesive used on the front side failed and somehow went through the magnet and glued it all to the fridge”source ↗

LHR-Daniels · r/CleaningTips · 1 upvotes

Where this came up

People with this problem also raised