How to Get Rid of Bed Bugs and Keep Them From Coming Back

If you keep waking up with a row of bites on your arm, there are small black dots on the mattress seam, and the bites came back a week after you sprayed, you most likely have bed bugs. Spraying at random won’t end them, because their eggs are glued deep inside cracks where the spray never reaches. The numbers and steps in this guide come from the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the University of Kentucky and the UK’s National Health Service (NHS), together with the way our team inspects and treats homes.

What bed bugs look like: adults, nymphs and eggs

Bed bugs are small, flat, wingless insects with a reddish-brown color, and adults are 5 to 7 mm long, about the size of an apple seed. They feed only on blood and come out at night while people sleep. The rest of the day they hide in narrow cracks close to the bed.

After a meal, a bed bug’s body swells and turns redder. Nymphs, the young bed bugs, look like adults but smaller and paler, and they pass through 5 stages before they are fully grown. The eggs are pearly white and about the size of a pinhead. This table is based on EPA data:

Stage	Size	Color and shape
Egg	About 1 mm	Pearly white; a black dot (the eye) shows once it is more than 5 days old
Nymph	From 1.5 mm in the first stage to 4.5 mm in the fifth	Clear or yellowish white; a young nymph that hasn’t fed yet can be almost invisible to the naked eye
Adult	5 to 7 mm	Brown and flat before feeding, reddish brown and swollen after

Not the mealybugs on your plants

In Egypt, the everyday Arabic word for bed bugs is also used for mealybugs, the small white insects that attack house plants and trees. So if a neighbor, a gardener or an online video talks about treating “bugs”, check which insect they mean. Mealybugs have nothing to do with beds or bites, and they are treated in a completely different way. Everything in this guide is about bed bugs, the insects that feed on human blood.

Signs of bed bugs at home: confirm before you spray

The clearest sign of bed bugs is a cluster of small black dots on the mattress seam. After that come blood spots on the sheet, the pale skins bed bugs leave behind as they grow, and white eggs in cracks. If you find 2 of these signs, bed bugs are very likely.

• Black dots the size of a pen tip: these are dried bed bug droppings, and you’ll find them clustered on seams, along the edges of the sheet and in cracks in the bed. Dots gathered in one place mean the bugs are hiding close by.
• Small rust-colored blood spots: on the sheet, the pillowcase or the mattress. They appear when a bug that has just fed gets crushed as you turn over in your sleep.
• Pale, see-through skins: a bed bug sheds its skin 5 times before it becomes an adult, so these skins collect in cracks and seams.
• Tiny white eggs: glued into seams and gaps, and hard to see without a flashlight.
• The bugs themselves: easier to spot at night, or when you lift the mattress and shine a light along the seam underneath.

Bites alone aren’t proof. The University of Kentucky cites studies in infested apartments where about 30% of people showed no reaction at all, even after being bitten again and again. The CDC says a bite mark can take a day or more to appear, and in some people up to 14 days. That’s how two people can sleep in the same bed, one covered in bites and the other with none.

As for smell, the CDC mentions a musty, sweetish odor in heavy infestations, but the University of Kentucky says people rarely notice it, so you can’t rely on it.

Where and how to check

Bed bugs like to stay close to where people sleep. The CDC says they can crawl more than 30 meters in one night but usually stay within about 2.5 meters of the bed. Turn on your phone’s flashlight and check in this order:

1. The mattress seams, on top and underneath, especially the corners and the spot where the label is sewn in.
2. The bed slats and joints, and the wood behind the headboard.
3. The living-room sofa, or any couch where someone sleeps or sits for long hours.
4. The nightstands and nearby drawers, especially wooden ones with gaps and holes.
5. Behind picture frames, under peeling wallpaper, and around the electrical outlets next to the bed.
6. The edges of the rug and the baseboards beside the bed.

Take close-up photos of anything you find. A clear photo of the dots or of a bug makes a real difference when you ask a specialist, because fleas, small cockroaches and other insects are easy to mistake for bed bugs.

Where do bed bugs come from? Why they appear suddenly

Bed bugs are carried into a home by people and their belongings, and they have nothing to do with how clean the home is. The CDC says they travel in luggage seams, folded clothes, bedding and furniture, and that they have been found in five-star hotels. Frequent travelers and people who sleep in shared spaces are most at risk.

The most common route is a suitcase. It comes back from a hotel or a furnished holiday apartment with bed bugs tucked into its seams and pockets, gets opened on the bed, and the bugs crawl out and hide nearby. Used furniture comes next: a sofa, a mattress or a wooden bed from someone else’s home. The University of Kentucky lists it among the most common ways bed bugs spread.

Shared housing, such as student housing, furnished rooms and workers’ accommodation, carries more risk because people move in and out all the time. In apartment buildings, a bug that can crawl more than 30 meters in a night can make its way from one apartment to the next. And sometimes all it takes is a guest who stayed over one night with a bag that came from an infested place.

So why do they seem to appear out of nowhere? An infestation starts with one or two bugs, the bites can show up days later, and many people don’t react at all. Weeks go by while the numbers grow quietly, and by the time you notice, the infestation is already well established.

How fast do bed bugs multiply? The bed bug life cycle

A female bed bug lays one, two or more eggs a day, hundreds over her lifetime, and the eggs hatch in about a week at normal room temperature. These figures come from the University of Kentucky, and they explain why a small infestation grows so fast.

A newly hatched nymph needs a blood meal before it can move on to each of its 5 stages. At 21 to 27°C, with food available, it can become an adult in about a month, which means more than one generation a year. Adult bed bugs live about 10 months on average when conditions suit them.

Here is a rough picture of an untreated infestation, based on those figures. Real timing varies with the temperature and with how easily the bugs can feed:

Time	What happens in the room
Week 1	A female carrying eggs lays them in the mattress seam and the cracks of the bed
After about a week	The first eggs hatch, and the nymphs start feeding and biting
After about a month	The first nymphs become adults and start laying eggs themselves
After 2 months	A second generation hatches, and the bugs reach the sofa and the room next door

Why shutting the room doesn’t work

Bed bugs can go without food for a long time. The University of Kentucky says nymphs and adults can survive 1 to 4 months without feeding in an ordinary home, and a year or more if the temperature stays at 13°C or below. If you shut the bedroom and sleep in the living room, the bugs won’t die. They’ll wait, and sometimes they follow you to your new spot.

Why do bed bugs come back after spraying?

Bed bugs usually come back after spraying because the eggs in the cracks were never treated. They hatch about a week later and the bites start again. People then assume new bugs came in from outside, but it’s a new generation hatching from the same infestation.

There are other reasons too:

• Bed bugs are becoming more and more resistant to insecticides, much as some bacteria resist antibiotics, according to the University of Kentucky. Using more of the same spray doesn’t solve that.
• Bug bombs (foggers) and spraying into the air don’t reach the cracks where bugs and eggs hide, say the EPA and the University of Florida. Random spraying can also push bed bugs further away.
• One missed spot, such as the sofa, a nightstand, a baseboard or the back of a picture frame, is enough for the infestation to return.
• A suitcase back from a trip after the treatment can bring in a brand new infestation.

So the EPA says treatment may have to be repeated if you see bed bugs after the first round of cleaning, and the University of Kentucky says follow-up visits are usually needed in professional treatment. The follow-up is what catches the generation that was still in the egg on the day of spraying.

How to get rid of bed bugs at home, step by step

To get rid of bed bugs yourself, combine several steps in the same week: heat for clothes and bedding, vacuuming and steam for the seams, a sealed mattress cover, traps under the bed legs and a weekly check. No single step works alone. Together they cut the numbers fast and show whether the problem is bigger than you can handle.

Step 1: Leave things where they are

Don’t move the mattress or the sofa to another room, and don’t start sleeping in another room in the hope that the bugs will starve. Moving furniture moves the bugs with it, and sleeping somewhere new just makes them follow you. Keep the infestation where it is until it has been treated.

Step 2: Treat bed bugs in clothes and bedding

• Put the sheets, pillowcases and the clothes near the bed into sealed plastic bags inside the bedroom itself, and open the bags only when you’re standing at the washing machine.
• Wash at 60°C, and if you have a dryer, run it on hot for at least 30 minutes. That is the NHS advice, and the University of Kentucky says 10 to 20 minutes in a dryer on medium to high heat kills bed bugs at every stage.
• Keep the clean clothes in sealed bags until the treatment is over, and don’t put them back in the wardrobe next to the bed.
• Things you can’t wash, such as bags, shoes and soft toys, go into a sealed bag in the freezer. The EPA says 3 days if the freezer is at exactly -18°C, and the NHS suggests 2 to 3 weeks. Home freezers don’t always get that cold, so if you’re not sure, wait 2 weeks.
• In summer, the EPA mentions sealed black bags left in a closed car parked in the sun. The University of Kentucky says to leave them in the sun for at least a day, with a thermometer inside the bag to confirm the temperature has reached 49°C or more. Don’t go by how hot the day feels.

Step 3: Treat bed bugs in mattresses and sofas

Start with the vacuum. Move the nozzle slowly along the seams and folds, as if you were scraping them. The University of Kentucky says bed bugs can survive inside a vacuum cleaner, so seal the bag well and drop it straight into a trash bin outside the house, as the EPA advises. If you pull a nylon stocking over the nozzle, the bugs collect in it and you can throw them away easily.

Then use steam, if you have a steamer. Steam kills the bugs and eggs it touches, and the EPA says it has to be at least 54°C. A nozzle that spreads the steam without a strong blast of air works best, so the air doesn’t scatter bugs to other places. Move slowly along the seams. Steam leaves nothing behind once it dries and doesn’t go deep into fabric, so all it does is lower the numbers.

Once the mattress is clean, zip it into a sealed mattress encasement. The bugs inside are trapped until they die, and any on the outside are easy to see on the smooth surface. Keep it zipped, because bed bugs can survive months without food. The University of Kentucky points out that an encasement won’t stop bugs elsewhere in the room from climbing onto the bed and biting, so it only works alongside the other steps.

Don’t rush to throw the mattress out. The University of Florida advises thinking about treating furniture before you get rid of it. If you do decide to throw out a mattress or a sofa, wrap it in plastic before you carry it out of the room, so bugs don’t drop off on the stairs and end up in your neighbors’ apartments.

Step 4: Isolate the bed and set traps under the legs

Pull the bed a few centimeters away from the wall, and keep the sheets and blankets from touching the floor. Clear out the bags and boxes stored under the bed. That way the only route up to the bed is through its legs.

Put a simple trap under each leg. The EPA describes one you can make at home: two plastic containers, one inside the other, with a strip of rough paper tape on the outside of the larger one so the bugs can climb it, and talcum powder in both. A bug coming from the floor falls into the gap between the two containers and can’t climb back out. Check and clean the traps every week and refresh the powder. If you find bed bugs in them, the infestation is still there, even if the bites have eased.

Step 5: Cut the clutter and seal the cracks

Every box and every pile of clothes next to the bed is one more hiding place. The EPA says clutter affects how well treatment works, and it recommends sealing small cracks with silicone caulk. Start with the infested room: open baseboards, cracks in the wooden wardrobe, gaps in the nightstand. Also remove soft toys and long curtains that touch the bed, as the University of Florida advises.

Step 6: Check every week for a year

The EPA says to check every 7 days and to keep checking for at least a year after you finish. Look at the seams and at the traps under the legs. If you find bed bugs after the first round of cleaning, you need to repeat the treatment, or the infestation needs a professional.

Bed bug spray and home remedies: what actually works?

Most popular home remedies, such as vinegar, salt, bleach and strong scents, have no scientific evidence that they clear a bed bug infestation, and some, like kerosene and rubbing alcohol, are dangerous. Ordinary bug spray kills only the bugs it touches. Either way, the eggs and the bugs hiding in cracks survive, so the infestation comes back.

This table brings together what we found in scientific sources about the remedies people ask about most:

Method	What the scientific sources say	Bottom line
Vinegar	None of the sources we checked (EPA, University of Kentucky, University of Florida) treats it as a treatment, and there is no evidence it affects the eggs in cracks	Not a treatment
Salt	The same: no published evidence from a scientific body that it ends an infestation	Not a treatment
Bleach	The University of Kentucky says it doesn’t work and can be hazardous, and the University of Florida puts it on its list of things not to do	Not a treatment, and it can do harm
Baking soda	No published evidence from a scientific body that it kills bed bugs or their eggs	Not a treatment
Essential oils and scents	Rutgers University researchers tested 18 essential oils, with no effect you could rely on; the weakest, spearmint, killed only 5%	May keep bugs away from one spot for a while, and that’s all
Incense	No evidence that it kills bed bugs; smoke doesn’t get into cracks, as the EPA says of bug bombs, and it means an open flame near the bed	Not a treatment
Mothballs in the wardrobe	In the Rutgers test, after 7 days in a bag of infested clothes, the eggs and nymphs survived and only 44% to 60% of the adult males died	Not a treatment
Rubbing alcohol (spirit)	In the Rutgers tests, about half of the bugs sprayed directly were still alive 4 days later, and the EPA warns that it catches fire easily	Dangerous, and not a treatment
Kerosene, diesel and gasoline	The EPA and the University of Florida warn that they are flammable and harm your health; the University of Florida says never to mix any insecticide with them	Dangerous, don’t use them
Bug bombs and spraying into the air	The EPA says they don’t reach the cracks, and using them the wrong way can cause a fire or an explosion	Not a treatment on their own
Aerosol bug spray	Kills the bug it touches, the eggs stay, and bed bugs now resist many common products (University of Kentucky)	Only for the bug in front of you

Does bug spray kill bed bugs?

An aerosol bug spray kills the bed bugs it touches, but it won’t end an infestation. The eggs are glued inside seams and cracks where the spray doesn’t reach, some bed bugs resist common products, and random spraying can drive the bugs onto the sofa or into the next room. Use it if you see a bug in front of you, but don’t count on it as a treatment.

If you use any insecticide, the EPA says it should be registered and labeled for bed bugs, and you should follow the label instructions to the letter. The University of Florida warns against spraying products that aren’t meant for beds on mattresses and bedding, against mixing several products together, and against using garden or outdoor products indoors.

Why home remedies seem to work

Any spray kills a few bugs in front of you, and the bites ease off for a few days. Then the eggs hatch, the bites come back, and people move on to the next remedy. In a 2013 Rutgers test, an essential oil product killed 92% of bed bugs in the lab after 2 weeks, while the bugs had no chance to feed. But when the researchers sprayed the bugs and then let them feed, the bugs survived. At home, bed bugs feed every night, so the second test is the one closer to real life.

Can you get rid of bed bugs permanently?

Yes, a bed bug infestation can be cleared completely, but no treatment can stop new bed bugs from coming into your home with a suitcase or a used sofa. The result depends on two things: finding and treating every hiding spot, and treating the eggs that hatched after the first treatment during the follow-up visit.

That’s why we never promise anyone that bed bugs “will never come back”. What we do is treat the hiding spots we find during the inspection, schedule the follow-up visit for after the eggs hatch, and show you how to catch bed bugs early if they get in again.

How do you know the infestation is really over? No new bites for weeks, empty traps under the bed legs, and no fresh black dots on the seams. Because bed bugs can survive months without food, the EPA says to keep checking for a full year. If a year passes with no sign at all, you can consider that infestation over, and any bed bug you see after that most likely came from a new source.

When do you need a bed bug exterminator?

Call a pest control company if the bites continue 2 weeks after washing and vacuuming, if you find signs in more than one room, or if the bugs are in a sofa or a bed that’s hard to take apart. Every week of delay means more eggs and more places to treat.

The NHS says getting rid of bed bugs yourself is very difficult, because they are hard to find and some resist insecticides, and the CDC advises calling a company with bed bug experience if you have an infestation.

Signs that the problem is bigger than home remedies:

• You found signs in 2 or more rooms, or on the living-room sofa.
• You’ve sprayed 2 or 3 times, and the bites come back about a week after each round.
• There is a baby, a pregnant woman, or someone with allergies or asthma in the home, so the product and the way it’s applied have to be chosen for that household.
• The bugs are in a wooden bed or a wardrobe full of cracks that are hard to reach.
• The place is shared housing, a hotel or student housing, where people keep changing.
• The bites are affecting your sleep or your children’s sleep.

How professional bed bug treatment works

Professional treatment starts with an inspection, not with spraying. The technician first finds the hiding spots, then treats only those cracks and seams, and sets a follow-up date for after the eggs hatch, so the young bugs that come out later get treated too.

The University of Kentucky describes the same approach: the insecticide goes into seams, folds and cracks, usually not onto surfaces people sleep or sit on, follow-ups are usually needed, and a thorough inspection can take up to a few hours.

This is how we work:

1. Questions before the visit: how many rooms have bites, how long it has been going on, what the signs look like, and whether there are children, a pregnancy or pets in the home. A photo shows the size of the job from the start.
2. Simple room preparation: washing the sheets and the clothes near the bed, emptying the nearby drawers, and pulling the bed away from the wall.
3. Inspecting the mattress, the bed and the sofas: the mattress seams on top and underneath, the bed frame and its joints, sofas and fabric chairs, and behind picture frames and nearby outlets.
4. Targeted treatment of the hiding spots: only in the cracks and seams found during the inspection, with a product suited to the case, and never sprayed into the air of the room. Before leaving, the technician tells you when you can go back into the room and how to air it.
5. A follow-up visit after the eggs hatch: the hidden eggs hatch in about a week, so we come back to treat the nymphs before they grow up and lay eggs. We set the date during the first visit, based on how heavy the infestation is.

How to prepare the room before the technician arrives

• Wash the sheets, pillowcases and the clothes near the bed at the highest temperature they can take, and keep them in sealed bags.
• Empty the drawers next to the bed, and clear out anything stored under it.
• Pull the bed a little away from the wall so the technician can reach every corner.
• Don’t move any furniture out of the room, and don’t throw anything away before the technician has seen it.
• Take cats and dogs out during the treatment, and cover any fish tank nearby and switch off its pump.

Questions to ask any company before you book

You have every right to ask any company these questions. The answers show whether they’ll deal with your infestation or just spray and leave:

• Will you inspect first, or spray straight away?
• Where exactly will you spray: into the cracks and seams, or into the air?
• What product will you use, and can I see its label details? When can we go back into the room, and how long should we air it?
• Is there a follow-up visit after the eggs hatch, and when?
• If the bites continue after the follow-up, what will you do?

Bed bug bites: symptoms and when to see a doctor

Bed bug bites usually show up as small, slightly swollen red spots that itch, in a line or a cluster on the face, neck and arms, and they clear up on their own in about a week. The NHS adds that on brown or black skin, the bites can look brown, red or purple, and they are harder to notice.

More about the bites:

• You usually won’t feel the bite, because bed bugs inject one substance that numbs the skin and another that stops the blood from clotting (CDC). A single meal takes 3 to 10 minutes (University of Kentucky).
• The marks can appear a day or more later, and in some people up to 14 days later (CDC). So you may not connect the bites with a trip you came back from 2 weeks ago.
• Bed bugs are not known to spread disease to people, but they cause itching and lost sleep (CDC). A lot of scratching can break the skin and open the way to an infection.
• A bite is not a diagnosis. It can look like bites from other insects or like a skin allergy, and a doctor is the one who can tell them apart.

Bed bug bite treatment at home

The NHS advises:

• Put a clean cloth soaked in cold water on the bites to ease the itching and swelling.
• Keep the area clean and try not to scratch, so it doesn’t get infected.
• Ask a pharmacist about a cream or medicine for the itching if it’s bad and keeping you awake. The NHS notes that children under 10 and pregnant women should check with a doctor before using these creams.

When to see a doctor

See a doctor if the bites are still very painful, swollen or itchy after trying what the pharmacist recommended, or if the pain or swelling is getting worse and spreading around the bite. The NHS says this could be an infection that needs treatment from a doctor.

Bed bugs in hotels, travel and shared housing

Bed bugs turn up wherever people sleep and turnover is high, like hotels, student housing and shared accommodation, and a clean place is no proof it’s free of them. The CDC says they have been found in five-star hotels and resorts, and the University of Kentucky lists hotels and apartment buildings among the places most at risk for that reason.

Before you unpack in a hotel or a furnished apartment

The University of Kentucky’s advice for travelers:

• Check the bed before you open your suitcase, especially around the pillows and along the mattress seams.
• If you can, look behind the headboard, although it’s sometimes heavy.
• Put your suitcase on the luggage rack or on a hard surface away from the bed, never on the bed or the sofa.
• Keep the things you don’t need closed up in the suitcase or in plastic bags.

When you get home

Open your suitcase outside the bedroom, on the balcony or next to the washing machine. If you get bites after a trip, wash all the clothes you took with you straight away. The University of Kentucky says the suitcase itself can be treated with heat, for example by leaving it in a closed car in the summer sun, or thrown away.

If you run a hotel or student housing

Here the plan is different from an apartment. The University of Kentucky recommends regular professional inspections for apartment buildings, every 3 or 6 months. In a hotel, the infested room isn’t the only problem: the rooms on either side need checking too. Housekeeping staff who change the sheets are in the best position to spot black dots on the seams, so training them to recognize the signs helps catch an infestation before a guest complains. You’ll find how we work with businesses on our bed bug treatment page.

How to keep bed bugs from coming back after treatment

The most important thing is to spot any new bed bug early, before it lays eggs and starts a new generation. In practice that means checking on a regular schedule and taking a close look at anything that comes into your home from outside, especially used furniture and luggage.

• Inspect any used furniture before it comes into your home, as the NHS advises. Check a secondhand sofa or mattress on the landing or in the entrance, before it reaches the bedroom.
• Keep clutter near the bed to a minimum (NHS), because every pile is a hiding place and makes checking harder.
• Leave the traps under the bed legs. They are the simplest way to find out that bed bugs are back before the bites start.
• Keep the mattress encasement zipped, and look it over each time you change the sheets.
• Vacuum regularly. The NHS says regular cleaning and vacuuming help you spot bed bugs early.
• Open your suitcase outside the bedroom, and wash the clothes from every trip as soon as you get back.
• If you live in an apartment building and your home was treated, ask the neighbors who share your walls to check too, because an infestation next door can bring the bugs back to you.

Bed bug season in Egypt, in numbers

Google searches for bed bugs in Egypt peak in early summer. In June 2026 there were 27,490 searches for 7 Arabic bed bug keywords, compared with only 8,770 in January 2026, more than 3 times as many. We put these figures together from Google Ads data for Egypt covering one year, from September 2025 to August 2026.

14,970Sep

18,380Oct

18,660Nov

12,750Dec

8,770Jan

14,100Feb

19,620Mar

21,410Apr

17,450May

27,490Jun

22,970Jul

16,910Aug

Monthly searches for bed bug terms in Egypt

Month	Searches
Sep 2025	14,970
Oct 2025	18,380
Nov 2025	18,660
Dec 2025	12,750
Jan 2026	8,770
Feb 2026	14,100
Mar 2026	19,620
Apr 2026	21,410
May 2026	17,450
Jun 2026	27,490
Jul 2026	22,970
Aug 2026	16,910

Source: Google Ads data for Egypt via DataForSEO, the total of 7 Arabic search terms for bed bugs (what they are, how to treat them, how to get rid of them and pest control).

The Arabic term for “bed bugs” on its own shows the pattern even more clearly: 2,400 searches in January and 12,100 in July, 5 times as many. And the rise doesn’t start in summer. It starts before. Total searches reached 19,620 in March and 21,410 in April, and there is a second rise in the fall: 18,380 in October 2025 and 18,660 in November.

These numbers measure people searching, in other words when people notice the problem and start to worry. They don’t count the bugs themselves. So search data can’t tell us that bed bugs increase in summer. What we do know, from a separate scientific source, is that bed bugs complete their life cycle faster in warm weather: the University of Kentucky says they can reach adulthood in about a month at 21 to 27°C.

If you see any sign in March or April, deal with it then. Treatment needs a follow-up about a week after spraying, so starting early lets you finish before the hot months. If you wait until June, you start in the same month most people are searching, and usually after the infestation has grown. And since July and August are the season for beach holidays and travel, open suitcases outside the bedroom and wash the clothes as soon as you get back.