How Often Do You Actually Need to Bath a Baby?

Two or three baths a week. That's the number, and it's the NHS's rather than mine.

If you are reading this at nine in the evening with a baby who smells faintly of milk, and a bathroom shelf of products somebody gave you at the shower, that's the answer you were after. You're not behind. Nobody is failing a baby by not bathing them every day.

What follows is what bathtime actually needs, what it very much doesn't, and the two bits of the official guidance that surprised me most.

How often does a newborn really need a bath?

The NHS is unusually relaxed about this. Its advice is that you don't need to bath a newborn every day, and that two or three times a week is fine. If you both love it, daily won't hurt them. The guidance is a floor, not a ceiling.

There's no deadline for starting, either. The NCT's line is that there is no set time to begin, which is worth hearing if your first week went by in a blur and you have only just noticed.

Here is the part nobody says out loud: babies do not get dirty. They get milky, and they get worse at the bottom end. Neither of those is solved by immersion, which brings us to the thing you will actually do most days.

What about the days in between?

Topping and tailing. It's a very British phrase for washing the bits that need it and leaving the rest alone, and the NHS describes it as washing your baby's face, neck, hands and bottom instead of running a bath.

You need a bowl of warm water, cotton wool and a towel. Wipe around the eyes from the nose outwards, using a fresh piece of cotton wool for each eye. That one's in the guidance for a reason, and it's the detail most people skip. Then face, neck creases, hands, and the nappy area last.

Four minutes, start to finish. On the days a bath isn't happening, it's genuinely enough.

Getting the water right

This is the bit worth reading twice, because it's the only part of bathtime with a real risk in it.

Run the cold water first, then add the hot. That order is the NHS's, and so is the instruction that follows it: mix the water well with your hand so there are no hot patches.

Then test it. Wrist or elbow, not your hand, because hands are tougher than you think. It should feel about the same as your own body temperature, which in practice is barely warm at all. The NCT make the point that a baby's skin is thin and scalds more easily than an adult's, so "warm enough for me" isn't the standard.

And the one that's absolute: never leave your baby alone in the bath, not for a second. The NCT put it more firmly still, asking for an adult in the room, within arm's reach, watching. If the doorbell goes, the baby comes out of the water with you.

Do you need any of the products?

No. And this is the fact I wish somebody had told me before I bought three of them.

The NHS advice is that you don't need liquid cleansers at all, because plain water is best for a baby's skin in the first month. It goes further on lotions and oils: avoid those until your baby is at least one month old. The NCT say the same, and add wipes to the list of things you don't need in those first weeks.

After a month you can add a simple cleanser meant for babies if you want to. Want to is the operative bit. No product on that shelf will make bathtime go better than a warm room and an unhurried ten minutes. If somebody gave you a bath set, enjoy it after the first month.

What about washing their hair?

Plain water, supporting them over the bowl. That's the whole of the NHS instruction, and for most newborns it's all that's needed. There isn't much hair to wash, and shampoo does nothing useful to it.

Where the guidance goes quiet is texture. NHS advice on baby hair is written without reference to hair type, and afro-textured and mixed-texture hair doesn't behave like straight hair in water: it dries out faster, it wants less frequent washing and more moisture, and detangling is a different job entirely. I'm not going to invent a schedule for you, and I'd be wary of any baby brand that does. If that is your baby's hair, the useful people to ask are a hairdresser who works with that texture, or family who have done it. It's worth saying that the absence of this from mainstream guidance is a gap, not a sign that it doesn't matter.

If you have noticed something on your baby's scalp and you are not sure what it is, that is a question for your health visitor or the NHS website rather than a blog. Cradle cap is very common and usually needs nothing done to it, but I'm not going to describe it and have you diagnose from a paragraph.

What you actually need in the bathroom

Short list. Everything else is optional.

A baby bath isn't on that list on purpose. The NCT point out that plenty of people use a clean sink or the adult bath, and both are fine.

The towel is the bit that earns its money, and the thing nobody buys themselves. If you are the friend or the auntie wondering what to send, a hooded towel and a set of muslins beats a fourth sleepsuit, and it gets used twice a week for a year.

If you would rather send something smaller, the Nursery Collection gift box pairs cotton muslins with a fleece wrap and a comforter, which covers the drying and the cuddle afterwards. And if you are buying for somebody else on a budget, most of the practical sets sit in baby gifts under £25.

Questions people actually ask

Bathtime is one of the few bits of the first year where the official advice is less work than you feared, not more. Twice a week, plain water, a warm towel and somebody's full attention. That's it.

If your evenings are the part you are trying to sort out, the honest next stop is what actually helps at bedtime, and what to keep out of the cot, because a bath isn't a sleep aid and it's worth knowing what the guidance says before you build a routine around it.

What's the one thing you'd tell a new parent to have ready before they start running the bath? Mine is the second towel on the floor. Put it in the comments, though they are checked before they appear so give it a day, or come and tell me on Instagram.