‘All my life I’ve been living a lie’: dishwasher tablet’s viral ‘trick’ sparks heated debate

Who knew that dishwashers could be so controversial?

A debate over dishwater has been irritating people on TikTok after a video went viral of a father showing the “correct” way to put dishwasher tablets into the machine.

In the video, which has been viewed more than 3.7 million times, Scott Jeffreys, a father of three, places his dishwasher tablet in the smallest section of the tablet dispenser rather than the largest section.

“Who knew? I’ve been doing it wrong forever!” He captioned the video.

The video received hundreds of comments, and many people were amazed that they too had been “doing it wrong.”

“It seems I have been doing it wrong; I wonder why my dishes are not clean,” wrote one person, while another added: “What, all my life I have been living in a lie.”

But not so fast.

As views mounted, more comments came in to correct the alleged stunt and accuse Jeffreys’ video of starting an “intense discussion.”

“That’s totally wrong, you did right the first time,” one person commented.

Another commenter even went to the source to verify and clarified: “After seeing this, I had to go through the manual. Unfortunately, you are wrong. It is for the pre-cleaning program.”

With all that confusion, news.com.au thought it best to consult an expert.

Colin Jones of Appliances Online said that while putting a tablet in the wrong slot probably won’t harm your dishwasher, it won’t clean your dishes properly either.

“While the location of the tablet will not necessarily have an impact on your dishwasher, it could affect cleaning results,” he said.

“Older dishwashers, around five years old or older, weren’t designed for three-in-one tablets. In older dishwashers, there used to be three sections to dispense, which stands out on this dishwasher in the video, including a compartment prewash, compartment for main wash and compartment for rinse aid.

“The smallest section of this dishwasher in the video is a prewash compartment.”

Jeffreys has since responded to the confusion and admitted that he was wrong. “I know, I realized about 300,000 views ago. He has gone crazy,” he wrote.

However, many people stated that it probably didn’t matter and said that they had been told not to bother putting the tablet in the slot.

“Our neighbor plumber said it’s always better deep down … our stuff is always sparkling clean,” wrote one person.

“I mean … it probably doesn’t matter where you put it, but that bigger slot is obviously correct,” read another comment.

For optimal cleaning, Jones told news.com.au that he recommended two options.

“In current dishwasher models on the market and sold in Australia, you place or dispense the three-in-one tablet at the bottom of the machine and it will break down each section (pre-wash, main wash, and rinse aid) as needed., Or your machine can have a tablet button on its control panel, so your machine knows that you are using a tablet instead of powder and will dispense the tablet at the correct time for the cycle. “