How to Break Adhesive Tape Perfectly Every Time
Like many families, we have a roll of masking tape in the kitchen trash drawer, and we often use it for all sorts of crafts, stickers, and other nonsense. But the edge is often torn so that the next time it is difficult to peel it off. I thought my husband was smart when he came up with the idea to cut the ribbon and carefully fold over the edge to make a flap. But it turns out there is a better way.
As Austin Kay points out in this TikTok , you can fold the tape into a triangle just before tearing it off. Hold the triangle with your thumb and you now have a clean edge on the tape and a tab on the roller. As a bonus, each piece of tape has a tab at one end that you can use to easily peel it off the floor (or wherever you put it) when you’re done.
I first stumbled across this hack on Reddit , where commentators started a lively debate about whether this is really the way it is in the film industry. So I’m not going to claim authenticity, but I will say that this method has many advantages.
One of the downsides is that if you don’t need a tab then you have a lot of tabs to rip off pieces of tape. If this bothers you, you can always save the tab for the very last part before putting the tape back in the drawer.
I have tried this technique on various rolls of tape in my home. The first time I tried this with masking tape, I found it hard to twist the tape to get that nice little triangle. But after a minute or two of practice, I got a triangular inlay each time that was functional (though not as neat as Austin’s).
Works with duct tape too. It’s easier to make a nice, neat triangle with duct tape than masking tape, and it rips really well after that. (Rather than pulling on it all at once, I found it best to pull at an angle so that the side of the tape next to your body breaks first.) It even worked amazingly well on gorilla tape, which is thicker and stickier than a regular duct. tape and is harder to break. I usually just go and grab my scissors, but I was able to get the perfect edge by tearing it this way. All the rolls of tape in my house now have little triangular protrusions. Welcome the next person to use them.