What You Need
for Cloth Diapers

What you need to cloth diaper will depend on the cloth diapering system that you plan to use and how often you want to be doing cloth diaper laundry.

Also what accessories you need will be determined by the kind of cloth diapers you are using and what you would like to have while you are diapering your baby. In our cloth diaper accessories page we have labeled each accessories with the words absolutely, most likely and possibly to help you decide if they are something that you will have to have to diaper your baby. Below is a list of the items you absolutely need, the ones you most likely need and the ones that you really only need if that is something that is important to you. Below that you will find how many diapers you will need. To save time you can view our cost of cloth diapers chart and see how many diapers you need as well as compare the cost of the different types.

If you are going to be using prefolds or flatfolds with covers it is a good idea to get a dozen regular prefolds and a dozen premium prefolds or four dozen flatfolds if you don't mind doing laundry everyday. If you would rather wash laundry every other day you will have to get two dozen regular prefolds and a dozen premium prefolds or seven dozen flatfolds. You will need to get two dozen regular prefolds and two premium prefolds or ten dozen flatfolds to have enough cloth diapers to do laundry once a week.

When it comes to choosing the cover to use with your fitted, contour, prefolds or flatfolds cloth diapers again you will have to think about how often you want to do laundry. Pull up diaper covers can't not be used as much and so you'll need to get eight size small, six size medium and five size large to wash laundry everyday. To wash laundry every other day you will need to get twice as much and to wash laundry about twice a week you'll need to get three times as much.

In order to get enough velcro diaper covers to wash diapers everyday you will need to get four to six newborn and small size covers each and four to five medium and large size covers each. If you plan on washing diapers every other day you want to get an additional cover in each size and if you want to wash diapers twice a week you will need to add two additional covers to each size. Technically you can save money and get less covers if you don't mind washing them by hand if they get poop on them.

Although snap diaper covers are more expensive they have less sizes that you have to use. You'll have to wash diapers every day with seven small, six medium and five large covers. With ten small, eight medium and size large you should be able to do laundry only every other day and to wash diapers twice a week you'll need twelve small, nine medium and seven large snap diaper covers.

Wool diaper covers can be used more than other covers before they have to be washed but they are very expensive. Washing them everyday you will need five newborn, four small, three medium, large and extra-large each. With three more newborn covers, two more small covers and 1 more medium, large and extra-large each you can have enough to wash them every other day. To wash them twice a week you'll need about ten small,eight small, seven medium and six large and extra-large each. You need a lot because they can take as much as three days to dry.

Since you can find fitted cloth diapers in three sizes you'll need fourteen small, twelve medium and ten large and have to wash diaper everyday but by doubling this amount you can wait to wash diapers every other day and by tripling this amount you can wait to wash diapers twice a week.

Contour diapers are half the price of fitted diapers and only have two separate sizes. With fourteen small and a dozen medium you can cloth diaper your child and have to wash diapers every day. When you double the amount you can wait to wash diapers until every other day and tripling the amount will allow you to wait to wash diapers until twice a week.

One size diapers really do save you a ton of money, as you only have to buy one size. If you want to wash diapers once a day you will need get about fourteen. You'll need twenty eight if you want to wash diapers every other day, and forty two if you want to wash diapers twice a week. Of course as your child starts uses less diapers everyday you will be able to wash diapers less.

Pocket diapers are a nifty little cloth diaper and you can find them in just three sizes. You need fourteen small, twelve small and ten large pocket diapers to wash diapers every day. In order to wash diapers every other day you'll need to double that and in order to be able to wait until twice a week to wash diapers you'll need to triple that amount.

All in one diapers are essentially a cloth diaper that is identical to a non cloth diaper. You can find them in three sizes and will have to wash diapers everyday with fourteen small, twelve medium and ten large all in one diapers. By doubling the amount you can wash diapers every other day and by having three times as much you will be able to wait a wash your diapers twice a week.