How to Get Rid of Spiders (And Which Ones to Actually Worry About)

Here's something most people don't want to hear: the spiders in your house are doing you a favor. That wolf spider camped out behind your toilet? It's been eating silverfish, roaches, and earwigs for weeks. The little cobweb spider in the corner of your garage catches dozens of mosquitoes a month.

Out of roughly 3,000 spider species in the United States, exactly two are medically significant to humans. Two. The brown recluse and the black widow. Every other spider you'll find in your house is either harmless or so weakly venomous that a bite feels like a mosquito sting at worst.

That said, nobody wants to reach into a closet and grab a handful of spiders. So let's talk about how to manage them without losing sleep.

Brown Recluse: The One People Panic About

Brown recluses live in a fairly narrow band of the US -- roughly from Nebraska down to Texas and east to Georgia. If you live in Oregon, Minnesota, or New England, you almost certainly don't have them, no matter what your neighbor says. They're about the size of a quarter, tan to dark brown, with a violin-shaped marking on the area behind their head.

They're called recluses for a reason. They want nothing to do with you. They hide in cardboard boxes that haven't been moved in months, behind picture frames, inside shoes in the back of the closet, and under stacks of old newspapers. Bites almost always happen when someone puts on a shoe or piece of clothing the spider was hiding in. The spider doesn't chase you down.

A recluse bite can cause tissue necrosis -- basically a small area of skin dies around the bite. It's unpleasant and can leave a scar, but it's rarely life-threatening for adults. About 90% of brown recluse bites heal on their own with basic wound care. The horror stories you've seen online are the extreme 10%.

If you're in recluse territory and find them in your home, glue boards are the best monitoring tool. Place them flat against walls in closets, the garage, and storage areas. Check them every two to four weeks. If you're catching more than a handful per month, call a pro. A pest control company will do a crack-and-crevice treatment with a residual insecticide in all the hiding spots you can't easily reach.

Black Widows: Scary Looking, Mostly Avoidable

Black widows are shiny jet-black with that famous red hourglass on the underside of their abdomen. You'll find them in dark, sheltered spots: the back corner of the garage, inside meter boxes, under deck furniture that hasn't been moved in a while, and in woodpiles.

Their webs are messy and strong -- not the pretty orb webs you see in gardens. If you stick your hand into a tangled, low web in a dark corner, take a look first. Widow bites hurt immediately and can cause muscle cramps, sweating, and nausea. In the US, there hasn't been a confirmed black widow death in over a decade thanks to modern emergency medicine. But the bite still sends about 2,500 people to poison control centers each year.

Wear gloves when moving firewood, reaching into dark storage areas, or cleaning the garage. That single habit prevents most widow bites.

Getting Rid of Spiders = Getting Rid of Their Food

This is the part most spider guides skip. You don't have a spider problem. You have a bug problem, and spiders showed up because there's food. Reduce the insects in your house and spiders will leave on their own -- there's nothing keeping them there if there's nothing to eat. If you've got roaches or other prey insects, fix that problem and the spider population drops on its own.

Start outside. Spiders follow insects toward light, and insects follow your porch lights. Switch exterior bulbs to yellow or warm-toned LEDs. A $4 bulb swap cuts down the flying insects around your doors by a shocking amount.

Seal gaps around doors, windows, and where utility lines enter the house. Spiders don't need much space -- most can squeeze through a gap the width of a credit card. A $7 tube of silicone caulk handles most entry points. For a complete entry-point checklist, our pest-proofing guide covers every common gap and what to seal it with.

For the perimeter of your house, a residual spray keeps spiders from setting up shop along your foundation and around doorframes. The two products pros use most are Demon WP (a wettable powder you mix with water, about $15 for enough to treat a house twice) and Suspend SC (a liquid concentrate, roughly $30). Spray a 2-foot band around your foundation, around windows, and around doorframes every 60 to 90 days. Both are available online without a license.

Monitoring with Glue Boards

Pest control professionals rely on glue boards more than any other tool for spider monitoring. They're low-tech and they work. Catchmaster 72MB boards run about $12 for a pack of 12. Fold them into tents and place them flat against the wall in corners, behind furniture, in the garage, and near exterior doors.

Check them once a month. They'll tell you exactly what's moving through your house and where. If you start catching a lot of one type of insect, treat that problem and the spiders will thin out on their own. If you're catching brown recluses or widows, that's when it's time to pick up the phone.

When to Call an Exterminator

For the average house spider -- the ones building webs in your ceiling corners or hanging out in the basement -- you don't need a professional. A broom and perimeter spray handle it.

Call a pro if you're finding brown recluses or black widows regularly, if glue boards show a growing population, or if you've got a severe spider presence that perimeter spraying hasn't touched after 60 days. A spider-focused treatment runs $100 to $250 for most homes and is usually bundled with general pest control service. Many companies offer quarterly plans in the $40 to $60 per visit range that cover spiders along with ants, roaches, and other common pests.

One surprising fact worth knowing: the common house spider (Parasteatoda tepidariorum) can survive for months without food and will build webs indefinitely even in houses with almost no insects, which is why you'll find cobwebs in rooms nobody uses. They're not thriving -- they're just persistent.