Coffee makers are either cleaned with water or with specific cleaning supplies provided when you buy the coffee maker.
Apple cider vinegar will leave a fruity taste in the machine and might damage metal parts of the machine.
Use whatever the manual coffee maker recommends instead.
How to Clean a Coffee Maker with Apple Cider Vinegar?
My experience with it has been, is to just fill the coffee maker up with straight distilled vinegar (you can buy ‘Cleaning’ Vinegar by the gallon) and run it through.
When the vinegar is heated, it attacks lime with a vengeance. It thoroughly cleans the inside of my machine.
Then, I just run tap water through it four or five times! My machine runs as well as new! Fill your coffee maker with two parts water and one part apple cider vinegar.
If your coffee maker allows you to pause brewing, do so for a few minutes to let the apple cider vinegar really clean and de-scale the maker. Once the machine has run, rinse your coffee maker out with clean water.
Tips to Clean a Coffee Maker with Apple Cider Vinegar
Don’t use apple cider vinegar, but rather white distilled vinegar. Apple cider vinegar can leave a residue.
Dilute the vinegar with an equal amount of water (if you live in an area with hard water, use distilled water) and run it through the machine’s brew cycle.
Then run two cycles of plain or distilled water through the machine. Use white vinegar with at least 7% acidity. Fill the pot with vinegar and turn it on.
When it is half full, turn the machine off for 25–30 min. Turn back on to finish the vinegar. Discard vinegar and put 2 pots of water and run it through the machine. Works awesome as do it every month h due to the calcium levels.
A half-cup of white vinegar with enough water to fill the water compartment. Turn the coffee maker on. Then run 2 compartments of water through the coffee maker with it on to rinse out the vinegar. Leave coffee maker open to air out.
You will need to use a higher ratio of vinegar to water in your cleaning solution, and likely run the process more times.
Apple cider vinegar also has a distinct flavor so you will also want to rinse the coffee machine thoroughly once you have completed your descaling.
On a personal note, I’ve tried several of the actual cleaners.
Don’t waste your money. If you got access to a Walmart, go and get yourself a gallon of cleaning vinegar. It works great. You can use this stuff to soak the lime out of showerheads and stuff, too.