What Type of Leather Is in Your Car, and How to Clean It

The polished patch on the driver's side bolster where your shoulder rests, and a dark stain from spilled coffee – you see and feel both on your own car. Yet with two cars carrying the same stain we do something different every time. The word "leather" in a car covers several materials, and each takes different chemistry, different heat and different washing.

How we tell what you have in your car

Most often it is ordinary leather with a protective layer – your car's spec sheet calls it pigmented, and around ninety percent of modern cars have it. We recognise it by the even, almost stamped-looking surface with no natural grain.

The glossy top layer your hand touches is the only thing we really touch when cleaning. It behaves more like the paint on the bodywork than like the leather underneath – which is why a nourishing cream has nothing to give it, and why the surface is so even: that layer evens out the leather's natural grain.

The cross-section shows how thin the glossy top layer is compared with the leather beneath it – it is the layer we treat when cleaning, and the one we choose the product by.

Soft leather that soaks a stain up

In higher trims the leather is often dyed without a proper protective layer; your car's options list calls it aniline. We recognise it by its softer, warmer touch and by uneven tones, creases and scars – exactly what ordinary leather with a protective layer lacks.

Water and grease soak into it almost instantly instead of staying on the surface. A ring from a bottle or a drop of hand cream can stay for good, so we use a different product and deal with the stain faster – the sooner you bring it in, the smaller the chance a mark remains.

The same goes for colour: the sun reaches it directly and on this leather it fades within 5 to 10 years. The middle grade, labelled semi-aniline, looks just as soft but has a thin protective layer. From a photo we will tell you which group your seats belong to.

What happens to leather after years

In a closed cabin in the sun the temperature climbs to 70 to 90 °C, and heat and sunlight make the top layer brittle – the same process as on the paint, only on a seat you feel it before you see it.

After 8 to 10 years, ordinary leather with a protective layer starts to crack in fine lines, first where it is rubbed repeatedly – the driver's side bolster. It is the polished strip from the opening, a few years further on.

Once the top layer cracks, it is that layer we repair: you cannot reach the material underneath without removing it, so a cracked spot is treated by repairing the surface, not by working into it. On a cracked bolster we therefore offer a repair rather than a cream – and we say straight away whether it is still worth it on your car.

When it is not leather at all

Some cars have a seat material that looks and smells like leather but is a layer of plastic pressed onto a textile backing. We recognise it at first glance, and it changes the whole process: a cream meant to nourish leather has nothing to nourish here and just sits on the surface.

There, detailed interior cleaning will help you more than a process built for leather.

What happens next

Tell us what car you have, or send a photo of the seat – we will recognise the upholstery from it and tell you how to look after it. Add the age of the car and the spot that troubles you, and you get an answer with the process and the price.

Ask about interior cleaning