This $20 Find Prevents My Bed Sheets from Being a Tangled Mess in the Dryer — and They Never Come Out Damp!

I’ll admit it: I actually like doing laundry. When I think about what laundry day looked like before washing machines and dryers were invented, you bet I don’t mind tossing in load after load of clothing and letting technology do the dirty work for me.

Of course, there is the matter of folding the laundry. Towels are easy, of course, and I don’t even mind sorting through all those socks, either. But when it comes to folding the sheets for our king-size bed, I’ve sort of given up. Lately, the sheets have been coming out of the dryer in such a balled-up, wrinkled mess that I’ll just run the whole bundle fresh out of the dryer up to the bedroom to make the bed right away. 

In fact, just last week, the entire sheet set came out of the dryer in a burrito-like shape that I could tuck under one arm like an oversized football. Was it even dry? Sure enough, I unrolled the fitted sheet to find a damp flat sheet and pillowcases nestled in. Back into the dryer they went.

Then I was given the chance to try out Wad-Free, a product success story from “Shark Tank” that promised “no more tangled, twisted, balled-up laundry.” Yes, please.

The bed sheet detangler looks rather unassuming for what it professes to do. It’s a four-inch plastic square with four small holes and corresponding fasteners in the corners. The product comes in pairs so you have one each for your fitted and flat sheets. 

1. Release the plastic fasteners from the four holes.
2. Grab a corner of the sheet and place it over the fastener. Then, push the fastener through the hole and slide it into place so the sheet stays firmly attached to the Wad-Free. Note: For fitted sheets, especially those with thick plastic edges, the instructions say to find the corner of the sheet — the one that matches up to the top of the mattress corner — and use that smooth part to pull through the hole instead of wrangling the thicker elastic through the hole. Works like a charm.
3. Repeat for all four corners so that when you pick up the product, you’re picking up the sheet by all four corners.
4. Toss your sheets with the Wad-Free attached into the washing machine. Provided you grabbed enough of the sheet to pull it through and secure it in the Wad-Free, you should be able to pull out the wet sheet with the Wad-Free still attached — and yes, the sheet will indeed not be wadded or balled up. Transfer the sheets to the dryer.

I saw the brilliance of this product as soon as I got the sheet corners attached to it. The only thing left was to see whether it would remain attached after each cycle. And they did! I pulled out two completely dry, unwadded sheets. I gently pulled off the Wad-Free from the corners and shook out the wrinkle-free sheets. They felt so light and airy, not like before when they came out of the dryer looking like a 600-thread count burrito. I even folded the sheets — yes, the fitted ones, too! — right away into a compact stack that I could put away in the linen closet. What a great little product.

The Wad-Free makes for a hassle-free experience with sheets. It not only saves time, but it also saves energy. There have been numerous times when the sheets came out so wadded up that I had to untangle them and reset the dryer for another round. Not an issue at all with this product.

Though Wad-Free was indeed made for sheets, I could also see using it for any clothing you don’t want to end up as a balled-up mess in the wash. And if your socks tend to come uncoupled in the wash, you could hook them up to the Wad-Frees to ensure, at the very least, you can locate four complete pairs of socks easily after a wash. I’ll probably take my chances with my socks, but I can guarantee that I’ll keep that Wad-Free handy whenever it’s time to wash the bedding.