TikTok Video Exposes How Dirty Public Hand-Dryers Are - Leaving Viewers 'Sick'

Hand dryers are standard in just about every public and communal bathroom, but they could be doing a lot more than just blasting water away from your hands.

A cleaning-obsessed TikTok user has revealed the disgusting truth of how dirty the hand-dryers are in public toilets.

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TikTok account PhoneSoap posted a clip earlier this week with the results of an experiment that showed viewers what really happens when people use a dryer after washing their hands.

Following an experiment conducted by comparing residual germs from a standard hand air drying method with a variety of hand dryers, there were staggering results.

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The test involved collecting air blasted from a Columbia Vortex, Dyson Airblade, and two Xlerator hand dryers with an experiment tray. During the experiment, five trays were held in the air and shaken around to simulate someone shaking their hands dry, before being placed in an incubator for the germs to “grow” for three days.

Xlerator dryer tray

After being removed, each was placed under a microscope so germ particles could be analysed. While there was “no visible growth” on the tray that was just shaken around, the same certainly couldn’t be said for the wall hand dryers.

There was “quite a bit of nasty stuff” on the tray tested with the first Xlerator dryer, while the Columbia Vortex – found in a petrol station bathroom – was completely covered in “nasty” germs.

cinema bathroom dryer tray

The Dyson Airblade, inside a cinema bathroom, was dotted in germs too but not quite as significantly as its counterparts. The final Xlerator dryer, inside a shopping centre, was the least offensive of the dryers, with just a few specks of germs on the tray. 

“Based off this test, it looks like waving your hands dry is the best option,” a man narrating the video said.

Petrol station dryer tray

The shocking clip has been viewed more than six million times and has received close to 8000 comments.  Viewers couldn’t believe the outcome of the experiment, with many swearing off ever using hand dryers again.

“I love how we wash our hands and then just blow bacteria on them,” one comment read.

“Whelp. I will be doing the shaking from now on,” someone else said.

The video came as welcome news however to people who always avoided hand dryers because of the noise or concern over germ spreading.

“Thank you for this! Literally never use those after I realised it’s literally blowing all the bathroom germs everywhere,” one wrote.

“I stopped using air dryers after I heard them described as ‘the wind of a thousand farts’,” another said.

“I never use the hand dryers because they are obnoxiously loud. Now I’m glad I don’t,” a third commented.