The Best Drain Cleaner for Grease Buildup

Grease clogs are the leading cause of blocked drains and sewer line breaks in home plumbing systems. Homeowners need a clear choice for removing grease from drains — but the Internet is flooded with hundreds of options, brands and sales offers.

Which drain cleaners are not only reliable, but simple enough for DIY use? Which brands avoid the caustic chemicals that corrode your pipes while they eat organic clogs?

At Mother, we clear hundreds of clogged drains in the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex each year. We’ve also written extensively about the damage organic clogs cause to home plumbing systems. We tested 14 different products for this article, including chemical drain cleaners, bacterial drain cleaners, enzymatic drain cleaners, powder and liquid drain cleaners.

Our team of plumbing experts ranked Endure the best drain cleaner for grease buildup in home plumbing systems. Endure’s use of helpful bacteria turns pipe buildup into harmless carbon dioxide gas — you get clear pipes without the use of toxins or chemicals. 

We believed so much in Endure, we became licensed to use it on our Dallas-Fort Worth plumbing jobs. Reach out to schedule drain cleaning and receive a complimentary bottle of Endure with your service.

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How We Chose the Best Drain Cleaner for Grease Buildup

It can be difficult for plumbers to rate and evaluate grease eating drain cleaners for home use. Homeowners are often conditioned to search for the best deals on Amazon, or rely on brands they've seen advertised on TV.

The core problem with this approach is customers are comparing products with different active ingredients and chemical construction. Brands like Drano and Liquid-Plumr offer fast-acting cleaners that use sulfuric acids and other harsh chemicals. Others, like Natural Elements and Endure, opt for bacterial and enzyme-based solutions.

Then, there are brands like Green Gobbler and Zep who offer chemical and enzyme drain cleaner products — it can prove difficult for homeowners to tell them apart when shopping online.

Our team began searching for one consistent drain cleaning product option to recommend to our DFW plumbing customers. We purchased products from 14 well-known brands and spent 2 hours field testing each product.

Then, we returned to each test site after one week to gauge long-term results. We also inspected each set of pipes for any corrosion or damage caused by the cleaning products.

After rigorous testing and comparison, we unanimously agreed on the most effective product for eliminating grease and organic clogs from drains and drain pipes.

Our plumbing experts developed 5 criteria to select the best drain cleaner for home plumbing and drain pipes:

1. Long-term effectiveness. Our plumbers valued longevity in a drain cleaning product. You can't hire a plumber to clear a clogged drain every week — we prefer products that work for at least 30 days at a time.
2. No chemicals. The chemicals used in household drain cleaners are caustic, corrosive, and often carcinogenic (cancer-causing). They eat away at your pipes while they clean — what good is a cleared drain clog if it leads to a leak or burst pipe? 
3. Chlorine and bleach resistance. Your cleaning product should resist chlorine and bleach as it works. We looked for non-caustic drain cleaners that still worked after bleach or chlorine was flushed down the pipes.
4. Scientifically proven results. We like products with the backing of the scientific community. Our plumbers prefer products tested and recommended for household use.
5. Complete elimination of organic material. You don't want to simply clean drain clogs — you want to keep them clean. Our plumbers found that drain cleaners with enzymes are best at eliminating grease and lowering drain maintenance.

Why we can’t recommend a chemical drain cleaner for home use

That chemical drain cleaner under your sink does as much harm to your plumbing system as good. The chemicals in those cleaning products are highly corrosive — they want to eat your pipes as much as the grease trapped within them. 

Chemical drain cleaners are also highly toxic. They release fumes that are harmful to humans and pets, and can lead to long-term water pollution around your home — especially if the chemicals leach out of your pipes.

Here are 4 common chemicals found in drain cleaning products, and why they're dangerous to use:

1. Sulfuric acid: Exposure leads to third-degree skin burns, gastrointestinal erosion, and eye damage. Sulfuric acid is carcinogenic.
2. Hydrochloric acid: Causes corrosive injury to the mouth, throat, stomach and kidneys. Can leave chemical burns on skin or eyes.
3. Potassium hydroxide: Causes ulcers and severe burns on contact, even in minimal amounts.
4. Sodium hydroxide: Commonly known as lye, sodium hydroxide causes severe eye burns, lung damage, skin rashes and hair loss.

In our testing process, we found that all chemical drain cleaners we tested caused damage to drain pipes within a week of exposure. The worst damage was caused by products that contain sulfuric acid and hydrochloric acid. 

Our plumbers concurred that long-term exposure to these caustic chemicals would likely lead to pinhole leaks in drain pipes and the potential for sewer line breaks caused by corrosion.

Never use chemical drain cleaners on flexible drain pipes! Their light-gauge plastic is easily melted by caustic chemicals in Drano, Zep and other chemical products.

Enzymatic cleaners offer the best long-lasting results

“Think about fat, oil and grease in your pipes like cholesterol in your body," one of our master plumbers told us. “It doesn't just stick to the walls — it hardens in place once it's there and only gets worse.”

We returned to each test site one week after applying drain cleaner to the affected areas. Several of the test sites where chemical and bacterial drain cleaners were used showed signs of existing grease — though none had been used in the time between inspections.

No grease remained in the 3 test sites where enzymatic cleaners were used. In a conversation with the makers of Endure, we discovered that enzyme formulas continue to eat away at grease for weeks after application. Monthly use is safe, encouraged and doesn't create pipe damage.

By contrast, no professional plumber we surveyed would recommend using chemical cleaning products more than once every 3-4 months. Consumer Reports labels these chemicals as “extremely hazardous”, while enzymatic drain cleaners are considered eco-friendly and safer.

🏆 Endure is the Best Drain Cleaner for Grease Buildup

Endure by American Formula is is our highest-rated enzymatic cleaner, and the best performing long-term drain cleaner for grease in our field study. 

After an extensive search process involving 14 products, 28 hours of field testing and 2 days of analysis and review, we selected Endure as the product we recommend most strongly. 

The product scored highly for long-term grease clog removal, as well as its ability for safe reuse on a monthly basis. We liked its enzymatic composition and zero reliance on caustic chemicals. Our plumbers liked the ability to recommend Endure for homeowners on the city sewer system, as well as those with a septic system.

Why we chose Endure over competing drain cleaners

Here are 3 reasons why we like Endure by American Formula:

1. Long-term effectiveness. While other products provided more immediate results against fats, oil and grease (FOG clogs), our plumbers preferred a cleaner that offered lasting protection with minimal effort. We liked Endure's combination of short-term clog removal and long-term protection against new clogs.
2. Non-toxic, non-caustic formula. Endure utilizes helpful Bacillus bacteria to transform solid fat and grease into carbon dioxide. That CO2 gas passes harmlessly through your sewer pipes and into the city sewer system or your septic.
3. Whole home application. Endure is best applied through your main shower line and kitchen sink line. However, we find excellent results through your toilet and other home plumbing lines as well.

Live in Dallas-Fort Worth? Our $299 drain cleaning service comes with complimentary video camera inspection and a free bottle of Endure for future home use.

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How Endure Drain Cleaner Works

Endure is formulated with helpful Bacillus bacteria that turns the organic clogs in your pipes into harmless carbon dioxide (CO2) gas. That change from solid fat, grease and other organic materials to CO2 gas is permanent.

Endure is unique from other non-chemical drain cleaners because it doesn’t use enzymes. Enzyme drain cleaners turn solid clogs into liquid for a temporary period of time. This facilitates your drain cleaning process — but eventually, those fats and greases retake their solid form. 

Helpful bacteria is the key to clean pipes and drains

Nutrition experts rave about healthy bacteria and its value to your digestive system. We eat yogurt and take supplements to keep these helpful microbes in our system, so they can keep our bodies clean and healthy.

Why not treat your plumbing system as well as you treat your body?

Drain cleaners like Endure offer the environmental advantages of enzyme-based products, but with longer-lasting effects.

Never Use This Chemical Drain Cleaner

Of the 14 drain cleaning products we tested, there's only one our plumbers urge homeowners to never use.

Drano Professional Strength Kitchen Crystals Clog Remover was an intriguing product due to its crystal composition, so we purchased it for our study alongside Drano Max Gel. We immediately noticed the product description stating that adding water to the can may cause its contents to “violently erupt”.

Further research found the product lingers in kitchen sink drains after use. This causes potential splashback and interaction with other liquids that can cause burns to the eyes and skin, and potential blindness or death.

The Drano kitchen crystals product is potentially so harmful, it made the Environmental Working Group's (EWG) Hall of Shame list of toxic household cleaners. 

We removed Drano Professional Strength Kitchen Crystals Clog Remover from our study at our team's request. Our plumbers did not feel comfortable using the product.

Long-Term Drain Cleaning Products Protect Against Burst Pipes

It's tempting to pour a fast-acting chemical drain cleaner down the drain and eliminate your grease clog in an hour. But the underlying problems of fats, oil and grease (FOGs) in your home plumbing system won't go away.

You may see surface level clearing in your kitchen sink drain and grease trap. But deep, persistent FOG clogs may remain in your drain pipes or underground sewer line. Installing a new grease interceptor does not resolve these issues further into your system.

FOG clogs in your pipes attract food scraps, soap scum and hair from your wastewater. These organic clogs grow in size and continue to harden against pipe walls. Over time, this causes 6 significant home plumbing concerns:

1. Wastewater and raw sewage backup into your home
2. Inefficient sewage and wastewater flow away from your house
3. Attraction of intrusive tree roots to the organic clog in your pipe
4. Pest infestation around your floor, sink and shower drain
5. Wastewater flooding in your backyard
6. Potential damage, cracks and breaks in your main sewer line

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Enzymatic cleaners work deeper into your plumbing system over time

Enzymatic cleaners like Endure are able to be applied monthly without corroding metal pipes or degrading PVC. This continuous, proactive action against FOG clogs and grease buildup allows enzymes to travel further into your sewer line and provide greater impact.

Our experts prefer the long-standing effects of enzyme cleaners to quick-acting, short-term chemical cleaner effects.

The Best Grease Eating Drain Cleaner for DFW Homes

We’re so confident Endure is the best drain cleaner for grease buildup, we became a licensed provider. Mother Modern Plumbing is proud to provide Endure drain cleaning solutions to our customers and neighbors.

Tarrant County is notorious for hard water issues — especially in towns like Fort Worth and Mansfield. Over time, hard water scaling only makes grease buildup worse in your pipes. We think it’s vital homeowners have access to products like Endure to keep their plumbing systems clean and clear.

We provide customers who schedule drain cleaning service with a free bottle of Endure for ongoing pipe and drain maintenance. It’s a long-lasting, trustworthy solution for your sluggish drains without the use of caustic cleaners. 

Give us a call or schedule service online — we’ll deliver clean pipes, clear drains and a healthier home.

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