64 Kitchen Organization Hacks to Help You Cut Back on Clutter

1. Store Strategically

Designate a space for cookware as close to the stove as possible so you’re not running across the kitchen to retrieve supplies. Keep pots and pans in lower cabinets, saving upper areas for smaller items that will be easier to find at eye level.

2. Put a Lid on It

If your space allows, store pots and pans with their lids to avoid spending time tracking down the proper mate. Otherwise nest small pots inside larger ones (never more than three to a stack) and use a rack to arrange lids vertically by size.

To buy: Bamboo wood plate rack, $9; organizeit.com.

3. Protect the Finish

Preserve the nonstick coating on nested cookware by placing felt or silicone pads between each pan.

To buy: Pan and dish protector, $24 for 3; kuhnrikonshop.com.

4. Slide out Supplies

Install pullout drawers in lower cabinets for quick access to heavy pots and pans toward the back. Stash measuring cups and mixing bowls nearby.

To buy: Rev-A-Shelf pullout drawer (shown), $263, or wire basket, from $50; homedepot.com.

5. Create Storage

If cabinet space is scarce, consider using a pot rack, pegboard, or rolling kitchen cart to keep cookware at the ready.

The kitchen is a breeding ground for clutter. It’s the most trafficked room in the house and accordingly, can rack up some serious junk, seriously fast. While the minimalist lifestyle might not be for everyone, there are a few tips you can borrow to lighten up an overloaded kitchen. When the counters are covered with random gadgets, piles of mail, and various items from every other room in the house, cooking can start to feel more hectic and stressful than it needs to. Instead, take a breath, release, and free yourself from an anxiety-inducing kitchen environment; here’s how.

Donate, Sell, or Get Rid of Appliances

Take inventory of all your big ticket and smaller appliances that have collected dust in the corners of your cabinets or on the countertop. My general rule of thumb for decluttering life is: If I have not used it in a year, I don’t need it. Check to see if these appliances are still in good working shape and have all of their necessary attachments/parts. If so, consider donating them to your local charitable organization of choice. Speaking as a true queen of gadgets, I can promise, you will feel instantly lighter the minute you rid yourself of that cotton candy machine you thought you might use for your kid’s birthday party one year. You could even put some extra cash in your pocket by selling the appliances at a yard sale, over Facebook marketplace, or using apps such as LetGo. 

Ditch Extra and Unnecessary Dishes, Cookware and Bakeware

Many of us have a collection of random, one-off dishes in the cupboard—you know, the plates belonging to friends, family, or neighbors acquired over years of occasions sharing food. Instantly free up space in your cabinets by clearing them out (and ideally returning them to their rightful owners), along with any other extraneous plates, bowls, cups and other dishes that no longer serve you. This notion also applies to old and barely used bakeware, as well as your college starter cookware set; upgrade to a couple of great saute pans and throw out the collection of scratched-up nonstick skillets. You won’t regret it. Putting away the dishes will be substantially easier when you actually have space to arrange them, instead of jamming everything on top of each other on the shelves. Oh yeah—and those pesky plastic containers that are cracked, scratched, misshapen, and have missing lids, toss them now.  

Maximize Storage  

Getting your kitchen in order does not require a big budget. Take a trip to your local dollar store to find containers that will help you organize your pantry. Smart planning combined with tossing what you don’t need will give your pantry some breathing room—making it easy to find what you need when you need it. Still using that dried oregano that you bought two years ago? Your spices and condiments have a shelf life that you should be aware of. No use in cooking with stale and less-than-fragrant seasonings. You won’t be doing your food any justice. Retail and online stores such as Amazon or Ikea, offer cute and affordable storage containers that will get your pantry off to the right start. 

Find open locations in your kitchen where you might add a shelf to maximize the space on walls, windows, or in a corner. If you have a tight pantry, consider removing items that you only use once in a while, such as chafing dishes or large platters, and finding a new home for them somewhere else in the house. 

Create Designated Spots For Certain Items  

When I walk into my house, my keys go in the same place every day. At this point, it’s a habit... and I never lose my keys. Apply the same mentality in your kitchen and make a designated spot for certain items that come in and out of the kitchen frequently. Instead of throwing daily mail on the table or counter, find a spot in the kitchen where mail goes. Make everyone in the family aware of this designated spot and reiterate that all members of the household respect this until dropping mail in this one spot becomes a habit. It truly makes things easier. Maybe shoes that are taken off in the kitchen go on the shoe rack or all room temperature fruits go in the white bowl on the counter. Whatever common items your family keeps in the kitchen area, find a permanent spot for them to live.

WATCH: How to Clean the Instant Pot

Throw Away Old Food Items

If your kitchen is cluttered, chances are that the inside of your refrigerator is also cluttered. Get into the weekly habit of throwing out old and past-its-prime food. You never ate that leftover takeout from last week? Toss it. The refrigerator is possibly the easiest place in the kitchen where food can pile up. Do yourself a favor, and practice the discipline necessary to clear out the fridge shelves as often as you can. The payoff is that once you develop a routine of casually tossing what’s no longer good, the chances of having your fridge overtaken by old food items are massively reduced, and tossing the occasional container of leftovers here and there no longer feels like a chore. You will be able to easily see what ingredients you have to work with, and are less likely to be greeted with an off-putting odor next time you open your fridge.

Attack Your Junk Drawers

We all have at least the one drawer in the kitchen where the miscellaneous items reside. The majority of what collects in this lawless drawer are items that you think you might need at some point; however, more often than not, it’s just junk. Clear out this drawer and narrow it down to items applicable for the kitchen. If you can’t find a valid use for it—chuck it. While you’re at it, go ahead and tackle all the other drawers in your kitchen. You don’t really need four of the exact same style of spatula.     

Clear Counters

Hopefully by now, if you have started cleaning out your kitchen, you also inadvertently started to clear your counters as well. By getting rid of bulky appliances and reorganizing items in the kitchen to make for more cabinet and pantry space, your counters will have more room for aesthetic additions and functional workspace. Bring in a houseplant (or two) to freshen up the kitchen and add some life to the room. A little greenery is always a good thing.

Confession time: My fridge and freezer look like something straight out of a Hoarder’s episode.

It’s not that I don’t care. Because I do. I cook all of the time and love the look of a clean, organized kitchen, but the reality is that I have no idea what’s really lurking inside of my fridge. And every time I open the door to my freezer, a wave of panic hits me as an avalanche of frozen veggie bags fall out.

Needless to say, my situation was causing me major stress and I needed to do something about it.

The good news? Apparently I’m not alone. Tracy Paye, owner of Miss Organized in San Diego and author of If Clutter Could Talk, the Stories It Would Tell, says that people usually come to her for organization tips when they’re stressed and overwhelmed.

I asked Tracy for her best tips on spring cleaning your fridge and freezer—here’s what she said.

Create Zones

First things first? Take everything out. Yes, everything. Even those old tupperware containers and half-used bottles of ketchup. “Then, sort ‘like’ with ‘like’. Put your condiments together, fruits and vegetables together, etc.” says Paye.

Out With the Old, in With the New

Once you have groups of like items together, start purging. Paye recommends throwing away all expired, old, or unwanted items, and paring down to just the necessities.

Give Everything a Wipe Down

Now that you’re working with a blank canvas, give the inside of your fridge a wipe down and clean up any spills with a disinfectant wipe. We love using Aunt Fannie’s Cleaning Vinegar wipes because they’re safe for food contact surfaces.

As for the freezer? It’s a little trickier. Paye says, “I’d carefully take a knife and scrape off the caked-on ice and chip that off. Then, I’d wipe everything down.”

Buy the Right Containers

Paye swears by storing things in “zones”. For example, create a zone for fruits, one for vegetables, another one condiments, etc. She says, “I personally like to use plastic storage bins in the fridge to keep everything contained.” She recommends using Interbins ($12.94, Amazon) because they’re clear and can stand extra-cold temps.

She says, “It’s good to get [bins] with handles, because then you can reach in and pull everything out. Refrigerators tend to be deep, so it’s good to see everything in one shot. There’s no [more] moving the milk to get something else out from behind it.”

RELATED: How to Spring Clean Your Fridge

Make Your Kids a Snack Zone

Most parents have a fridge full of their kid’skids' snacks. The problem? The snacks usually aren’t easily accessible for said kids, so parents have to do the searching and digging every day. Paye explains that placing kid-friendly items into a designated ‘snack zone’ bin conditions kids to be more organized, and takes the pressure off parents for waiting on their kids.

She says, “I have a bin for my daughter with apple slices, yogurt, and her specific snacks. It took her a few months to get in the habit, but now she makes her own lunches, because she can see her things very easily.” To make healthy snacks even easier for little hands to grab, Paye says she cuts up fruit and veggies ahead of time and stores them in green bags to ensure freshness.

Restock Your Groceries Strategically

Transparent bins—and designated zones—are great because you can see all of your groceries at once. But you still have to work on not reintroducing clutter. Paye has a tip for this: “I keep a dry-erase board on my fridge. Every time I run out of something, I write it down. Then, when it’s time to get my groceries, I know everything I need.” That way, she never buys an extra unwanted jug of orange juice.

As for me? I’ll be putting these tips to good use this weekend. After all, I don’t want my friends to call Hoarders on me.

Pantries are like clothes closets—they always seem to collect more, and despite our best efforts, they're almost impossible to keep organized. But half the battle is learning how to organize them in a way that's easy to maintain (read: less work later) and building up the motivation to start organizing. These inspiring pantries spotted on Instagram help on both fronts: They're full of practical organizing ideas you can borrow, and admiring these pretty spaces will make you want to overhaul your own. Here are 5 brilliant organizing ideas to steal from these real-life pantries.

If you know in your heart of hearts that it’s high time you finally organize your kitchen cabinets like the functional adult you are (sometimes), today is as good a day as any, my friend. Good news is, just as Pinterest would have you believe, getting an organized system in place doesn’t need to be difficult or require special equipment. Here the smart Internet-inspired hacks our editors have seen success with in their own quests for cabinet nirvana.

5 smart ways to streamline your cabinets and never lose track of anything again, from Molly Graves and Ashley Murphy, cofounders of Neat Method.

No two cooks are the same, and neither are their kitchens. In the same way that every home cook has different tastes, preferences, and culinary pursuits, we all arrive at our final product in a different fashion. Some of us start with filth, add on to that filth throughout the cooking process, and then blast the kitchen at the end with one final, all-encompassing clean swoop. On the other hand, some of us are meticulous from the moment we step into the kitchen to the moment we sit down to eat—a “clean-as-you-go” approach, if you will. Sure, the latter approach that maintains tidiness throughout seems like the safest, most desirable option, but is it actually attainable?

We recently caught up with our friend, cookbook author and all around winning human, Julia Turshen, about how she keeps things tidy in her fridge and pantry. Julia tends to keep a lot of irons in the fire at once, so it’s important that things don’t get out of control. Below, her top five tips for maintaining order in the kitchen:

Completely reorganizing your kitchen can be difficult, time-consuming, and expensive. Did you know you could simplify the process by heading to your local dollar store? That’s right, everything you need to organize your kitchen can be purchased for a buck apiece.

Most kitchen sinks have exposed piping (especially if you have a garbage disposal.) That’s why you wouldn't be able to use a freestanding cabinet shelf. However, this $20 adjustable gadget has two shelves, and is designed to fit around any existing piping.

Your freezer is a miracle worker, but that doesn’t mean it can’t be improved. Made too much for dinner? Freeze those leftovers and save them for a lazy day. Got more herbs than you need? Freeze them and use them when you do need them. 

But when we throw things in the freezer and don’t take our time to create a functional arrangement, it can cause problems. Without organization, it’s much harder to find items and distinguish between containers, and things are much more likely to fall out when you open the door. 

It sounds a little counterintuitive, but adding some of this gear to your freezer will help you keep things neat and cut down on food waste. You don’t want to add too many products to your freezer, because then you’re just creating more clutter. Instead, keep things simple and streamlined with items like these: 

Watch: We Tried and Ranked the 12 Best Frozen Pepperoni Pizzas in the Game

ClosetMaid 3456 Large Shelf

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If your freezer doesn’t have a built-in shelf, then you’re probably familiar with the Jenga-like stacks of food that form. Maybe you don’t want those wobbly stacks to topple, so you avoid them and end up wasting all that food. Add a shelf of your own, and keep containers both below and on top of it, to stay streamlined. 
$13.48, Amazon

mDesign Wide Stackable Plastic Kitchen Pantry Cabinet, Refrigerator or Freezer Food Storage Bin with Handles (set of 2) 

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These bins are the perfect size to hold smaller items that may get lost in your freezer, like produce in baggies or pints of ice cream. Plus, they stack, and the built-in handles make them easier to move around. 
$22.99, Amazon 

Stackable Ice Trays (Set of 3) 

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Don’t overlook the power of the ice tray—it’ll help you freeze so much more than water. Store extra lemon juice, coffee, or even bacon grease (perhaps label that tray) in a reusable ice tray and seriously reduce your kitchen waste. These stackable and watertight trays produce circle or stick-shaped ice and come with a latch to prevent spills. 
$26, Food52

Jokari Label Once Crafts and More Erasable Labels Kit with 160 Labels, Eraser and Pen

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When ice coats food, leftovers become unrecognizable. Colors fade, and dark red chili starts to look like bright red lasagna. Trust me, you will forget what’s in that container. You know what doesn’t change when it’s frozen? Words. Label those containers and baggies and you’ll save yourself a lot of trouble later. These labels are both reusable and erasable, so they’ll last you through the long haul. 
$7.95, Amazon

(re)zip Leak-Proof Assorted Colors Stand Up Storage Bag (Pack of 5) 

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Will a plain old Ziploc bag work when it comes to freezer storage? Yes. But these will last much longer. 
$19.99, Target

InterDesign Classico Kitchen Pantry Freezer Wire Basket Organizer

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Keep larger items, like bags of frozen veggies, in wire baskets. If organized correctly, they’ll stand upright, and the wire design lets you see what’s in there. 
$26.23, Amazon

Your freezer is a miracle worker, but that doesn’t mean it can’t be improved. Made too much for dinner? Freeze those leftovers and save them for a lazy day. Got more herbs than you need? Freeze them and use them when you do need them.

Maybe you haven't jumped aboard the Marie Kondo home organization movement. The idea of cleaning the pantry or tossing out all yours 90s concert tees doesn't appeal to you right now. Finally emptying out the garage? No thanks. Or perhaps you've watched an episode or two of the organizational guru's new Netflix show, Tidying Up with Marie Kondo, and are ready to go all-in to tackling your household clutter.

Petite kitchens definitely have their perks: they clean up quick, and you have everything you need within arms reach. You won’t feel like you've sprinted all over an industrial restaurant-style kitchen after preparing one bowl of scrambled eggs. There’s also a reason folks build out gigantic, sprawling kitchens when the opportunity presents itself. But fear not, even in the tiniest of cooking zones, there can be a space for everything. Here are a few things to ditch to make room for the real necessities.

For me, one of the most frustrating tasks that comes with any serious kitchen organization overhaul is labeling all of the containers I've purchased to get the pantry/cupboards/fridge in order. Tape or super sticky labels are the usual go-tos, however, when it’s time to shuffle a few things around and relabel, both the tape and labels are a hassle to remove. This is why I was stoked to learn that the company behind everyone's most trusted stack of 3x3 colorful stickees now offer a viable, and super convenient, solution to the tidying-up dilemma.