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A one-time deep clean of a commercial kitchen in the GTA typically starts around $499 for a small quick-service kitchen and rises with size, grease load and cuisine type. A busy full-service kitchen with a heavy fry and grill line runs several times that.
Recurring nightly back-of-house cleaning typically starts around $799/month for a small operation and scales with covers, hours and line complexity.
Hood and duct interior cleaning is a separate job on a separate schedule, priced per system rather than per month, and certified. It is not part of a nightly cleaning contract anywhere, and a quote that folds it in is worth a second look.
| Type of work | Typical monthly cost | What that usually covers |
|---|---|---|
| One-time deep clean small QSR kitchen | From $499 | Full degrease of line, equipment exteriors, walls, floors, drains, under and behind |
| One-time deep clean full-service kitchen | $1,200 – $3,500+ | Same scope, more equipment, heavier grease load, longer time on site |
| Recurring nightly BOH | From $799/mo | Floors, drains, prep surfaces, equipment exteriors, sinks, bins, receiving area |
| Recurring + weekly degrease | $1,400 – $3,000/mo | Nightly as above, plus a scheduled deep degrease of the cook line each week |
| Hood & baffle exterior | Included in scope | Hood exterior surfaces and baffle filters — our own crews, part of the routine |
| Hood & duct interior (NFPA 96) | Per system, quoted | Certified partner, on a frequency set by cooking volume, with a certificate issued |
Grease load drives the price more than square footage
A 600 sq ft sandwich kitchen and a 600 sq ft wok line are not the same job. Grease behaves like a coating — it accumulates on walls, ceilings, equipment and inside filters, it needs a degreaser with dwell time rather than a wipe, and it comes back on a schedule set by how you cook. When you ask for quotes, describe your cook line honestly: fryers, char-grills, woks and open flame all move the price up, and a contractor who quotes without asking has priced the wrong kitchen.
What pushes the price up, and what brings it down
Raises the quote
- Deep fryers, char-grills, woks and open-flame cooking
- Long service hours, leaving a narrow overnight window
- Extended or 24-hour operation with no closed period at all
- Older equipment with more seams, gaps and immovable units
- Quarry tile floors with heavy grout that holds grease
- A grease trap and floor drains needing regular attention
Lowers the quote
- Cold or low-heat menu with little frying
- Newer, mobile equipment that rolls out for cleaning
- Sealed, coved flooring rather than tile and grout
- A genuine overnight close, giving crews an uninterrupted window
- Kitchen staff handling nightly wipe-down, contractor doing the deep work
- Bundling the kitchen with front of house on one contract
What each part of a kitchen actually costs to clean
Kitchen quotes come as one number, but the time is very unevenly distributed. Knowing where it goes tells you which line to question when a quote looks high or suspiciously low.
| Area | What it needs | Why it costs what it does |
|---|---|---|
| Cook line & equipment exteriors | Degreaser with dwell time, then agitation, then rinse — not a spray-and-wipe | The heaviest labour in the kitchen. Dwell time cannot be rushed, so it cannot be discounted. |
| Floors, grout & drains | Nightly wash, periodic deep scrub, drain treatment | Quarry tile with deep grout holds grease and is a slip liability. Drains are the smell complaint. |
| Walls & ceilings behind the line | Scheduled degrease, not nightly | The area inspectors look at and nightly crews skip, because it is above eye level. |
| Under and behind equipment | Scheduled — requires moving units | Where grease, debris and pests actually accumulate. The most commonly quoted-out exclusion. |
| Hood exterior & baffle filters | Routine — exteriors wiped, filters degreased or run through the machine | Our own crews. Distinct from the duct interior above it, which is not ours. |
| Hood & duct interior | Certified partner, scheduled by cooking volume, certificate issued | A fire-safety job under NFPA 96 with its own certification. Never part of a nightly contract. |
| Walk-ins & dry storage | Scheduled deep clean — shelving, floors, door seals, condenser grilles | Food-contact adjacent, and the area a health inspection tends to open first. |
Why hood and duct interiors are on a separate invoice
Grease inside an exhaust system is the primary fuel in a commercial kitchen fire. Cleaning it is a fire-safety job governed by NFPA 96, performed on a frequency set by cooking volume, and it ends with a certificate — because your insurer, and possibly your fire inspector, will ask to see one.
Zusashi's own crews clean the hood exterior and the baffle filters as part of routine kitchen work. The duct interior is managed through a certified partner who performs the clean and issues the certification. That distinction matters commercially as well as technically: it is why hood interior work appears as its own quoted job rather than a line inside a monthly cleaning fee.
If a cleaning company quotes you a single monthly price that appears to include full hood and duct cleaning, ask who is certified, and ask to see the certificate from a previous job. The certificate is most of what you are buying.
Nightly wipe-down is not the same as a kitchen clean
Most kitchens already do a close-down: surfaces wiped, floors mopped, bins out. That is essential and it is not what a cleaning contract is for.
What a contract adds is the work a tired crew at 11pm will never do properly — under and behind equipment, walls above the line, ceiling tiles and vents, grout, drain treatment, walk-in shelving, condenser grilles. Every one of those is a scheduled job on a cycle, and every one is where a health inspection finds problems.
This is also why the cheapest quotes are worth reading closely. If a monthly price looks a third below the others, the usual explanation is that the scheduled deep work has been quietly moved out of scope, leaving a nightly wipe-down with a contract wrapped around it.
What to have on the quote before you sign
Frequency by task, not one word. "Deep clean" means nothing on its own. The quote should say what is nightly, what is weekly, what is monthly and what is quarterly.
Whether equipment gets moved. Under and behind is where the problems live, and it is the most common silent exclusion.
The degreaser and its dwell time. Degreasers work by sitting on the surface. A quote built on a realistic dwell time carries more labour than one built on wiping, and it is the honest one.
Hood scope, spelled out. Exterior and baffles versus duct interior, who does which, and who issues the certificate.
Who is responsible on an inspection finding. If a health inspection flags something in the contractor's scope, what happens and how fast.
A written record after each visit. What was cleaned, what products were used, who did it. It is what turns your routine into something you can show.
These ranges reflect typical GTA market pricing for commercial kitchens in 2026 and are a guide for budgeting, not a quotation. Pricing depends on kitchen size, cook line configuration, grease load, cuisine type, service hours and access. Hood and duct interior cleaning is quoted per system by a certified partner and is separate from recurring cleaning.
Frequently Asked Questions
A one-time deep clean typically starts around $499 for a small quick-service kitchen and rises with size, grease load and cuisine type — a busy full-service kitchen with fryers and grills commonly runs $1,200–$3,500 or more. Recurring nightly back-of-house cleaning typically starts around $799/month and scales with covers, hours and line complexity. Hood and duct interior cleaning is priced separately, per system.
Because grease is what you are actually removing. It coats walls, ceilings, equipment and filters, and it needs a degreaser left to dwell rather than a wipe — dwell time is labour that cannot be compressed. A 600 sq ft sandwich kitchen and a 600 sq ft wok line are the same floor area and completely different jobs. Fryers, char-grills, woks and open flame all move the price up, so describe your cook line accurately when asking for quotes.
No, and it should not be. Our own crews clean the hood exterior and the baffle filters as part of routine kitchen work. The duct interior is a fire-safety job under NFPA 96, performed through a certified partner on a frequency set by cooking volume, and it ends with a certificate your insurer may ask to see. It is quoted per system as its own job. If a company folds full hood and duct cleaning into a flat monthly fee, ask who holds the certification and ask to see a certificate from a previous job.
It depends on cooking volume rather than the calendar. A high-volume kitchen with a heavy fry and grill line generally needs a scheduled deep degrease of the cook line weekly, with under-and-behind work, walls above the line and walk-in shelving on a monthly or quarterly cycle. A low-heat kitchen can run longer between deep cleans. Nightly close-down by your own staff sits underneath all of that and does not replace it.
Full degrease of the cook line and equipment exteriors with a degreaser given proper dwell time, walls and ceilings behind and above the line, under and behind equipment where it can be moved, floors and grout, drains and drain treatment, hood exteriors and baffle filters, walk-in shelving, door seals and condenser grilles, and dry storage. The scope should be listed task by task with a frequency against each — a quote that just says "deep clean" is not a scope.
It helps in two ways. The scheduled work — under and behind equipment, walls above the line, grout, drains, walk-in shelving — is exactly where inspections find problems, and it is the work a nightly close-down never reaches. And a written record after each visit listing what was cleaned, which products were used and who did the work turns a routine you describe into a routine you can evidence. See our guide on preparing for a DineSafe inspection for what actually gets checked.
Want a kitchen quote built on your actual cook line?
We look at the line before pricing, because fryers and woks change the job more than square footage does. Scope listed task by task, with a frequency against each.
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