Fort Worth, Texas Trash Pickup Schedule & Recycling Rules

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Fort Worth trash pickup: collection days, recycling and bulk waste rules.

Fort Worth trash pickup is run by the city’s Environmental Services Department, with Waste Management providing the curbside service. The brown garbage cart, the blue recycling cart and yard trimmings all go weekly on the same day, out by 7 a.m., and bulk waste goes once a month in your area’s assigned week. Look up your day in the city’s Garbage & Recycling app. What trips people up: every extra bag left beside the cart costs $3.

• Who collects: the City of Fort Worth Environmental Services Department, Solid Waste Services (Garbage & Recycling ↗), for homes with city sanitation service on the water bill; the city’s curbside garbage and recycling service is provided by Waste Management
• Your pickup day: depends on your address; enter it in the collection calendar on the Recycling page ↗ or in the City of Fort Worth Garbage & Recycling app
• Holiday changes: only Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s Day; routes from the holiday to Friday run one day later; 2026 Holiday Collection Schedule ↗
• Missed pickup: leave the cart out and report it within 24 hours in the MyFW app ↗, by dialing 311 or at 817-392-1234
• Contact: 311 Fort Worth Contact Center, 817-392-1234 (Monday to Friday 7 a.m. to 6 p.m., Saturday 7 a.m. to 4 p.m.), 1234@fortworthtexas.gov
• Official website: City of Fort Worth: Garbage & Recycling ↗

Photo: Downtown Fort Worth skyline from the Trinity Trails. DerekAyala27, 2021-05-25. CC BY 4.0 · Source. Resized for web.

Fort Worth trash and recycling pickup schedule

Garbage, recycling and yard trimmings share one weekday, Monday to Friday. Fort Worth is a pay-as-you-throw city: you choose one of three brown garbage cart sizes and pay for that level of service.

• Carts must be at the curb by 7 a.m. You may set them out after 6 p.m. the night before, and must take them back by midnight on pickup day. Trucks run from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.
• Place each cart in front of your own address, a few inches from the curb or street edge but not in the street, handle toward the house and serial number toward the street. Carts at a neighbor’s address or across the street are not collected.
• Lids must close completely. Overstuffed carts are not picked up, and bags left beside a cart stay behind unless they are city Pay Bags.
• Keep paper yard bags at least 2 feet from the garbage and recycling carts.
• Between pickups, city ordinance requires carts to be stored out of sight of a person standing in front of the house.
• If you cannot get carts to the curb because of a physical disability, apply for Disabled Carryout Service at 817-392-1234 or with the form on the Garbage & Recycling page ↗.
• Every Fort Worth apartment complex must provide recycling for its residents. Businesses use the haulers the City Council has approved under the city’s Grant of Privilege.

What goes in the Fort Worth recycling cart

Put recyclables in the blue cart loose, empty, clean and dry. Paper and plastic to-go beverage cups are now accepted.

• Paper and cardboard: flattened cardboard, mail, newspaper, cereal boxes, pasta and rice boxes, juice cartons, paper coffee and soda cups.
• Plastic: soda and water bottles, milk jugs, detergent containers, plastic coffee and soda cups.
• Metal: aluminum soda cans, pie pans, food tins.
• Glass: food jars and glass bottles.
• No: plastic bags or bagged recyclables; garbage; anything that tangles, such as hoses, wires, chains or electronics; clothing and linens (donate them at a Drop-Off Station); food, liquid and diapers.

The city’s list is not exhaustive, and its advice for anything you are unsure about is to put it in the brown garbage cart. The collection calendar on the Recycling page ↗ also searches a list of materials. The blue cart is free: call 817-392-1234 to order one.

Yard waste and food scraps

Yard trimmings and brush are collected on your weekly pickup day, separately from garbage, and turned into mulch.

• Paper yard bags: up to 40 pounds each, top rolled closed, not stapled or taped. No limit on the number.
• Bundles: shrub and tree trimmings tied with string or twine, no longer than 4 feet and no heavier than 40 pounds, because crews lift them by hand. No limit on the number.
• Limbs: stack tree and shrub limbs up to 8 feet long and 4 inches thick at the curb. Keep each pile to 10 cubic yards or less to avoid collection charges.
• Not in brush piles: plastic bags, garbage, bulk items, stumps and root balls. Stumps and root balls up to 18 inches across go in the bulk pile instead.
• Green cart: an optional 96-gallon yard cart costs $75 once, billed on the water bill, with no monthly charge. Call 817-392-1234. The lid must close, and the cart goes out by the same rules as the others.

Brush and yard waste can also go to any Drop-Off Station, securely contained or in kraft paper bags; loose leaves and grass are refused there.

The city asks residents to compost food scraps where they can; otherwise food waste goes in the garbage cart. Through the city’s Residential Food Waste Composting Program, run with Cowboy Compost, residents pay a sign-up fee, get a starter kit and bring household food scraps to the collection sites on the program’s map ↗.

Bulk trash pickup in Fort Worth

Bulk waste is anything too large, heavy or bulky for the brown cart, collected at the curb once a month. The city is divided into four areas, each assigned the week that starts on the first, second, third or fourth Monday of the month; find yours on the map in the 2026 bulk collection schedule ↗. Piles must be out by 7 a.m. on that Monday.

A pile set out at the wrong time counts as “out-of-cycle”, and a pile with items the program does not take counts as “non-compliant”; both are charged a collection rate, listed on the Bulk Waste Collection page ↗. To skip the wait or the charge, take bulk waste to a Drop-Off Station for free. The stations also take refrigerators and air conditioners; the Freon does not need to be removed, but the food does.

Fort Worth holiday trash schedule

On the 2026 schedule, only Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s Day change collection: that day’s routes and the rest of the week move one day later, into Saturday. Every other holiday on the schedule runs normally. On the first pickup day after Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s Day, you may set two extra bags of garbage beside the cart without a charge.

Hazardous waste, electronics and drop-off sites

Household hazardous waste goes to the city’s Environmental Collection Center (ECC), which serves Fort Worth and participating cities, or in smaller amounts to a Drop-Off Station.

• Environmental Collection Center (ECC), 6400 Bridge St., Fort Worth, TX 76112, off I-30 and 820 just east of downtown. Thursday and Friday 11 a.m. to 7 p.m., Saturday 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Bring a current water bill or valid driver’s license; some participating cities also require a voucher. It takes automotive fluids and fuels, batteries, cleaners and chemicals, cooking oil, lawn, garden and pool chemicals, light bulbs, and paint and painting supplies. Accepted amounts: 10 gallons each of automotive fluids, cleaning chemicals and cooking oil, 20 gallons of lawn, garden and pool chemicals, 20 light bulbs and 30 gallons of paint. It refuses ammunition and explosives, appliances and electronics, building materials, bulk trash and yard waste, butane and propane cylinders, medicines and medical waste, tires, and asbestos, PCBs and radioactive items. Keep products in their original containers, not trash bags, and stay in your vehicle while staff unload. Its Help-Yourself Shelf gives away like-new chemicals, cleaners and paint, and mobile collection events visit Fort Worth and participating cities during the year.

The city runs four Drop-Off Stations with the same hours: Tuesday to Friday 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., Saturday 8 a.m. to noon, closed Sunday and Monday. They also close for Martin Luther King Jr. Day, Memorial Day, Juneteenth, Independence Day, Labor Day, Thanksgiving, the Friday after Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s Day.

• Brennan Drop-off Station, 2400 Brennan Ave.
• Southeast Drop-off Station, 5150 Martin Luther King Fwy.
• Old Hemphill Road Drop-off Station, 6260 Old Hemphill Rd.
• Hillshire Drop-off Station (North Service Center), 301 Hillshire Dr.
• Who may use them, free: residents with an active city solid waste account, who bring a copy or photo of a water bill from the last six months showing the sanitation charge plus a matching driver’s license. Apartment residents may bring recyclables and household hazardous waste with a driver’s license. No commercial, out-of-city or landlord waste, and you cannot send someone else with your bill.
• Taken: bagged household garbage, blue-cart recyclables, scrap metal, bulk waste, brush and yard waste, passenger car tires (four per household every six months, rims separated), small home repair and remodeling waste (one visit a month, up to 5 cubic yards), appliances, small lawn equipment drained of fuel and oil, fire extinguishers, household chemicals (up to 20 gallons per household every three months) and free secure paper shredding. Styrofoam is taken for disposal only while the recycling equipment is out of service.
• Electronics: computers, monitors, TVs, gaming systems, phones, cameras and other gadgets, two every six months, recycled through the city’s partnership with GEM Southwest.
• Refused: loads not secured or covered; loose trash, leaves and grass; concrete, rock, dirt and ceramic tile; explosives and ammunition; roofing; asbestos; oxygen, CO2, butane, helium and propane tanks; radioactive items such as smoke detectors; titled vehicles.
• Vehicles: single-axle trailers up to 8 feet long and 6 feet wide are allowed, loaded no higher than 3 feet (about 5 cubic yards). No box trucks. A load over the limits is turned away whole. Children under 12 and pets stay in the vehicle.

Residents may also take solid waste to the city’s Southeast Landfill, 6288 Salt Road, Fort Worth, TX 76140, where fees apply; loose debris such as small pieces of sheetrock, leaves or soil must go to a landfill. Landscapers and contractors must use a permitted mulching or compost site or the landfill.

Fees and billing

• Solid waste charges appear on the Fort Worth water bill as a sanitation fee, priced by the size of your garbage cart. The city’s FY2026 budget carried its first solid waste rate increase since 2006.
• You may change your garbage cart size once a year at no charge. Extra carts add a fee to the water bill.
• The blue recycling cart is free and stays with the address; leave it when you move to avoid charges on your final bill.
• The optional green yard cart is a one-time $75.
• Pay Bags for extra garbage come in sets of five for $15 plus tax, mailed to you and billed on the water bill (817-392-1234).

Missed pickup, damaged carts and new carts

Trucks run until 7 p.m., so do not report a miss before 7 p.m. on your pickup day. Leave the cart or pile at the curb and report garbage, recycling and yard misses within 24 hours; after that, the contractor will not come back.

Report through the MyFW app, by dialing 311 from a cell phone, at 817-392-1234 or by email to 311@fortworthtexas.gov. You can also text “hello” to 817-835-6939 (817-835-MYFW). To order a brown, blue or green cart, call 817-392-1234.

Set-out rules and fines

• Since January 1, 2024, City Code Sec. 12.5-841.1 adds $6 for each overloaded cart whose lid will not close and $3 for each loose bag or item set beside a cart. A lid blown open by the wind is not charged, and kraft paper yard bags do not count as loose bags.
• Collection trucks carry cameras and image-recognition software; the data they capture is used to verify disputed charges. Appeal a charge at 817-392-1234.
• Report an illegal dumping site at 817-392-1234 or in the MyFW app, and call 911 if you see dumping in progress.

Materials with their own rules

• Household hazardous waste: the ECC, or up to 20 gallons every three months at a Drop-Off Station.
• Paint: up to 30 gallons of paint and painting supplies at the ECC.
• Lithium-ion batteries: the ECC takes batteries.
• Tires: four passenger car tires per household every six months at a Drop-Off Station; the ECC refuses tires.
• Aerosol cans and propane tanks: the Drop-Off Stations and the ECC both refuse propane and butane cylinders.
• Mattresses
• Pizza boxes
• Christmas trees

More in Texas

• Texas trash and recycling rules
• Austin
• Boerne trash pickup
• Dallas
• El Paso trash pickup
• Houston
• San Antonio
• Holiday changes by city
• Bulk pickup rules by city
• Missed pickup contacts by city
• Drop-off locations by city