Life hacks: Will toothpaste really clean anything?

TAMPA (FOX 13) - So-called life hacks are all over the internet, but it’s hard to tell which ones are helpful and which ones are just fancy video.

A life hack is "a strategy or technique adopted in order to manage one's time and daily activities in a more efficient way."

To make your life easier we’ve hacked the hacks. FOX 13 Consumer Reporter Sorboni Banerjee blew up her kitchen, spilled on her rug and exposed her sloppy pantry – all in an effort to uncover which hacks are hits.

HACK: Toothpaste

This is a hack we found might really work and now we’re cleaning everything but teeth.

Traditional white toothpaste works best. Gel toothpaste didn’t do the trick.

Try it on your sneakers. Grab an old brush and use a little toothpaste to scrub scuff marks from the rubber. Wipe it clean with a wet cloth.

Toothpaste also works on silver jewelry. Once you give it a good scrub, run it under water, and polish it with a clean cloth to make it shiny as new.

Another thing toothpaste is supposed to remove is lipstick on clothing, so we took bright red lipstick and smeared it on a tee shirt. It took some scrubbing and worked best when we scrubbed while holding the shirt under cold running water.

But it worked.

For the ultimate test - red wine on a white rug.

While the toothpaste removed the bulk of the red, a grayish pink stain remained.

So we suggest using a traditional carpet cleaner or carbonated water to raise the stain to the surface and blot.

And that's how you put a (minty) fresh spin on toothpaste.