Is separating laundry colours dated practice?

The vast majority of clothing dyes are colorfast now. That didn't use to be the case, so clothes had to be separated before washing.

Nope. I do darks, lights, whites, towels (along with cleaning cloths on an hot cycle) and bedding washes.

My DC's father used to wash everything together and the clothes always came back grey...

Whites, lights, darks, delicates, towels and bedding. Etc. I machine wash my sneakers too. Separately.

I do a white and a colours wash unless, I have colours that I know could run in a lighter coloured top/pants.

Why buy white items if you are going to wash them with coloureds, just buy pink, grey or manky beige instead.

I find laundry threads fascinating. I’m in the US so I’ve come to learn there are a lot of differences. (Although I’ll never claim that I’m typical 😜)

That being said I chuck everything in together regardless of color including dry clean only blouses. All on a cold wash. All gets tossed in the dryer except for blouses which are flung over a line to dry in the basement. My DH will do a load of whites from time to time with bleach and I’ll freshen up the whites.

The exception is a new red t-shirt I will wait until my DH does a load since 90% of his clothes are navy blue.

And woolens get tossed in together at a nice tepid temperature. Agitated for 1 min. Then left to soak (usually until I’ve both forgotten and remembered them), then they’re spun with no rinse, filled with tepid water again and spun with no rinse. Laid flat to dry after blocking.

I do, whites/lights, darks, other halfs work stuff, light bedding/towels, and dark bedding and towels. I've usually got enough of something to put on 2 full loads a day.

Whites, darks, reds, blues/greens.

Bedding is all white so always have enough.

I do whites and lights together, colours and darks together, bedding (again separated by whites/lights and dark) and woollens. Some whites turn grey faster than others; I think it depends on the fabric.

I just separate into whites/very light coloureds and literally everything else.

That said, I'm kept awake at night by this: if I wash a red shirt and a white shirt together, the colour will run from the red to the white, right? Why, then, when I wash a white shirt with red sleeves, does the colour not run from that??

I think washing at lower temperature helps tbh. I wash everything except bedding and towels on a 40° wash that takes 24 minutes, our clothes are not filthy as we both retired, everything comes out fine .

I do lights, darks, hot wash for bedding and let whites build up as we haven't got many. nothing terrible will happen there and then usually but lights and whites go dingy over time if you don't. I prefer to do that than use extra products

Whites
Lights
Brights
Darks (sometimes a navy pile and a black pile)
Bedding
Towels
Cleaning cloths
Delicates

Doing laundry is a job I love!

Whites
Lights
Reds
Navy and denim
Black

Keffie me too.

Towels can't have fabric softener so they go in their own wash. Bedding i occasionally do at 60.

I can spot the kids at my kids school whose parents don't separate. Their white shirts are dingier.

Often they are the same people who use persil non bio (full of whitening agents because non bio powders are poorer at removing stains) on coloured clothing - their jumpers are terrifically faded.

You don't notice it when all the clothes in your home are like it but if you laid some of your whites on top of mine, you'd see it pretty fast.

Of course not everything runs loads. But yellows & pinks in particular quickly get dingy & dull when washed with darks.

I do whites together and usually put oxy powder in with them. Colours go together. Our whites never get to the grey stage some do.

White on their own. The rest all goes in together.

I am with you! Towels, bedding, white wash with school shirts and any white underwear, black wash which is mainly school uniform, coloureds. My machine is always on!!!

Always wash whites separately.
A colleague & I once turned up in the same white jumper from Next.
A few months later, it happened again.

A third party made a comment about "didn't know they made it in grey".
Wounding, but accurate.

Same! Bras, shirts and white socks (and any other white stuff) on the weekend. 😂

I do wash whites separately, but besides that I don't separate by color. I separate by temperature - many of our clothes say to wash in cold water (trousers, nicer tops, bras, sports clothes) and others in warm water (t-shirts, underwear, socks).

Same here. Whites religiously on their own to keep them white, everything else chucked in together willy nilly.

I separate washing. Always have, always will. I don't just separate it, because it's colour.

It's also texture that needs to be taken into account and washing length of time.

1/ Bedding and towels separate washes
2/ Underwear and pj"s another wash
3/ Dishcloths and tea towels another wash.
4/ Outwear clothing another wash
5/ Jumpers and the type another wash
6/ Whites separate