Clothing Donation Guidelines: What's Accepted and How to Prepare It

Whichever charity you give to, the rule that decides whether your clothes get accepted is the same: would you hand this item to a friend? Thrift charities resell donations to fund their programs, so they need clothing that is clean, dry, and wearable. This guide covers the condition standard every donation center applies, how to prepare a bag so it isn't rejected, where truly worn-out textiles should go instead, and how to value clothing for a tax deduction.

The one standard behind every charity's rules

Salvation Army, Goodwill, and St. Vincent de Paul all publish slightly different lists, but underneath them is a single test: can the item be sold as-is? A donation center makes its money reselling what you drop off. Anything that can't sell — a stained shirt, a shoe with a split sole, a moldy blanket — doesn't help the charity; it becomes a disposal cost they pay to haul away.

So before a bag leaves your house, sort it into two piles. Clean and wearable goes to a donation center. Worn out, torn, or stained goes to textile recycling, which is a different destination covered further down. Mixing the two is the most common reason a well-meaning donation ends up in a landfill.

What donation centers accept

Across the major charities, the accepted list is consistent:

• Clothing for every age and size — shirts, pants, dresses, outerwear, suits — clean and ready to wear.
• Shoes in wearable condition, with pairs kept together (tie the laces or band them).
• Accessories — belts, bags, scarves, hats, ties, and costume jewelry.
• Coats and jackets, which are in especially high demand heading into winter.
• Linens — sheets, towels, and blankets in clean condition, at most locations.

If you want the exact, current list for a specific organization, we keep detailed pages for what the Salvation Army accepts and what Goodwill accepts, including their location-by-location quirks.

What they won't take

These are refused almost everywhere, because they can't be resold or carry a liability:

• Clothing with stains, holes, rips, or heavy wear
• Wet, damp, or moldy items (they can ruin a whole bag in storage)
• Undergarments and socks that are used — new-in-package is sometimes fine
• Single shoes, or shoes with worn-through soles
• Counterfeit goods and items with someone's name or ID sewn in
• Anything with a strong odor of smoke, pets, or mildew

How to prepare clothes so they're accepted

A little preparation is the difference between your donation being sold and being thrown away:

1. Launder everything first. Items should be freshly washed, fully dry, and odor-free. Charities don't clean donations.
2. Bag by category. Keep clothing, shoes, and linens in separate bags so sorters can process them fast.
3. Pair the shoes. Tie laces together or use a rubber band; loose single shoes get pulled and tossed.
4. Skip the hangers unless the store asks for them. Most don't want wire hangers — see where to donate hangers for the ones that do.
5. Fold, don't cram. Overstuffed bags wrinkle and crush items, lowering their resale value.

Where worn-out clothing actually goes

This is the part most guides skip. Clothing too worn to sell doesn't have to hit the trash. The textile recycling stream turns unwearable fabric into industrial wiping rags, furniture stuffing, insulation, and shredded fiber. A few routes take these items:

• Retail take-back programs — many large clothing retailers run in-store bins that accept any brand of textile for recycling, wearable or not.
• Municipal textile recycling — a growing number of cities run curbside or drop-off textile collection separate from regular recycling.
• Charity salvage streams — some donation centers still accept clean-but-worn clothing that they sell in bulk to salvage buyers. Ask, and label the bag "recycling" so it isn't sorted onto the sales floor.

Getting the tax deduction right

Clothing donations to a 501(c)(3) are deductible at fair market value — what the item would sell for used, not what you paid new. A coat that cost $120 is typically worth $15 to $40 secondhand; a used t-shirt, a few dollars. Overstating these values is a common audit trigger.

To claim the deduction you need to itemize on your return, get a receipt from the charity at drop-off, and keep your own list of what you gave. For any single donation valued at $250 or more, hold onto written acknowledgment from the organization. The Salvation Army publishes a clothing donation value guide with typical price ranges, and our charitable tax deduction guide walks through the itemizing rules in detail.

Frequently Asked Questions

Guidance compiled from Salvation Army and Goodwill donation policies and IRS Publication 561 (Determining the Value of Donated Property). Updated July 2026. Errors: [email protected]