What Causes Swirl Marks on Car Paint?
Updated October 9, 2026 4 min readBy Dominick, owner of Slums Mobile Detailing
Those circular scratches you see in sunlight are almost always caused by washing, not driving.
What causes swirl marks?
Swirl marks are fine scratches in the clear coat caused by dirt being dragged across the paint — usually by automatic car wash brushes, dirty sponges, one-bucket washing or dry towels. Dark colors show them the most.
How to remove and prevent them
- Remove: machine polishing (paint correction)
- Prevent: two-bucket hand wash, clean microfiber, no brush washes
- Protect: ceramic coating adds a slicker, harder surface