Salt at a doorway is probably the most widely shared protective practice in the world. It turns up in Jewish, Japanese, Scottish, Hoodoo, Mediterranean and Scandinavian practice independently, which is about as close to a universal as folk magic gets.
What almost nobody covers is the practical half. Here it is.
Which salt
Any salt. Table salt works. This is the most common worry and it is the least important variable — the cheap cylinder from a supermarket has been used for this for a century.
Coarse sea salt is preferred by most practitioners because you can see the line, it does not vanish into a rug, and it sweeps up cleanly. Rock salt lasts longest outdoors. Pink and black salts carry no additional protective property; they are more expensive and that is all.
What matters far more than the type is that you know what you are doing while you lay it. Salt poured absent-mindedly is seasoning.
How much
Less than you think. A visible line a few grains wide across the threshold is enough. The line is a statement of boundary, not a physical barrier, and a thick heap of salt is not more of a boundary — it is just more to sweep up and more for a dog to find.
Indoors, a small dish in a corner is often better than a line on the floor. Same function, no mess, no pet risk.
How often to replace it
This is the most-asked and least-answered question in the whole practice.
The working answer: replace it when it has visibly changed, or monthly, whichever comes first. Salt absorbs moisture from the air, and a line that has gone clumped, grey, yellowed or damp has taken on what it was there to take. That is the signal.
In a busy or unsettled house, weekly. In a calm one, monthly is plenty. A line that still looks exactly as you laid it after a month is telling you something useful too.
Salt bowls in corners go longer — six weeks or so — but the same rule applies. When it darkens or damps, it is done.
Does a break in the line matter
Not as much as people fear. Walking through it, a pet scattering it, a draught blowing it about — these are not failures. The boundary was set by intent when you laid it, and a scuff does not revoke that.
What does matter is the line disappearing entirely and being forgotten for two months. A protection you stopped maintaining is a protection you no longer have.
If you are unsure how often yours needs replacing for the state your home is actually in, that is a quick answer in our live chat. The honest interval depends on the house, not on a rule.
If you want an unbroken line that survives daily traffic, put it on the outside of the threshold rather than where you walk, or under a doormat, or use a small dish either side of the door instead.
What to do with the old salt
Three rules, consistent across traditions.
Do not reuse it. It has absorbed. Putting it back is putting the problem back.
Do not put it down the sink. It returns into the house's plumbing, and it is not good for the pipes either.
Get it out of the building. Sweep into a bag, and out. For ordinary maintenance an outdoor bin is fine. For salt laid during active trouble, traditional practice is to dispose of it away from your property entirely — a bin on the way to work, a crossroads if you keep to that.
Sweep outward, toward and through the door, not inward into the room. Direction is doing real work here.
If you rent, have pets, or have carpet
The advice everyone gives assumes a house with hard floors and a garden. Most people have none of that.
Carpet: do not lay loose salt. It grinds in, it holds damp, and it will not vacuum out completely. Use a shallow dish at either side of the door.
Pets: dishes, raised, out of reach. Salt in quantity genuinely harms dogs and cats.
Rented, communal entrance: lay it on the inside of your own door, not in the shared hall. It works exactly as well and you avoid a conversation with a neighbour.
Outdoors: think before you ring the property in salt. It sterilises soil and kills grass, and the effect accumulates over years. Use it at the door, not around the garden.
What salt does not do
Salt holds a line. It does not remove what is already inside, it does not undo a tie to a person, and it does not clear a house that has had a bad year in it.
If you have laid salt and the house still feels heavy, that is not a failure of the salt. It is the wrong tool for that job, and the right order is to clear first and seal afterwards.
Ask us which you need
Our live chat is at the bottom of this page and this is a quick one to settle. Tell us what the house has been like, how long it has been going on, and what you have already tried.
We will tell you whether salt at the door is the whole answer — often it is, and it costs you nothing — or whether you are trying to seal a room that needs clearing first. Getting that order right is most of the work.
Or browse our protection work.