What Attracts Spiders Into a Home?

Prey Is the Whole Answer

Spiders go where there is food. A house with a lot of spiders has a lot of flies, midges, moths and other small insects, and the spiders are the visible end of that. No other explanation comes close.

Which is why the useful question is never "how do I repel spiders" but "why are there so many insects here". Deal with the second and the first solves itself over a few weeks.

What Does Not Attract Them: The Myths

A dirty house does not. Spiders do not eat crumbs or rubbish; a spotless house with a bright porch light and a cluttered garage will have more spiders than a messy one without. Clutter matters, but as shelter, not as food.

Nor does leaving a window open make much difference — most house spiders are already indoors or come in at ground level. And conkers, essential oils and ultrasonic plug-ins have no reliable effect at all. If we thought they worked we would tell you to buy them instead of us.

What Does: Lighting

The biggest single factor, and the one most people can change. A white security or porch light left on overnight pulls flying insects to the wall from a considerable distance, and the spiders set up exactly where the food arrives — which is why the worst webs are usually around the front door.

Move the light away from the doorway, switch to a warmer-toned bulb, or put it on a movement sensor rather than dusk-to-dawn. It is free and it does more than most treatments.

What Does: Shelter and Structure

Somewhere undisturbed with something to anchor a web to. Boxes stacked against garage walls, the corners of a conservatory roof, cellars, sheds, under the bed, ivy on an external wall, log piles and bins next to the door, and dense planting against the building.

A cluttered garage with a light by the door is close to purpose-built spider habitat, which is why garages generate more of our spider calls than any room in the house.

The Season That Is None of the Above

For two or three weeks around the turn of the season, big house spiders start appearing indoors. Those are adult males looking for a mate. They were not attracted by anything, they are not living in your house, and they stop on their own.

If that is what you are seeing, no treatment is worth buying and we will say so. The £180 first room and £60 per additional room is for a genuine persistent problem, not for September.