How to get rid of bad smell in plastic bottles

I accidentally learned how to fix the problem.
I read somewhere that you could wrap your clean but still smelling plastic containers in damp newspapers and put them in the freezer over the night. That should make the bad smell go away.
Well, I misunderstood the instructions a little bit and put some of the wet paper inside the bottles as well before putting them in the freezer.
This happened to be a really good thing because when I took my bottles out the next day they didnt smell bad anymore. There was just a distant smell of newspaper which disappeared within an hour and left the bottles absolutely and totally "smell free".
So, I thought that sharing this with you could save some bottles from going to the trash can and save some tears as well.

Another thing which works, is to use NaHCO(3) or more commonly, Baking Soda.

Another thing that works is Oxi clean, just be sure that you use hot water in the beginning. Within a couple of hours your bottles should smell good.

I can't believe I missed this thread earlier, otherwise I'd have been on this right away.

Ready yourself a pot of water. Put 1/4th a cup of baking soda and your bottle in them, and bring the water to a boil. Let your bottle sit in the boiling water for about 5-10 minutes. After you retrieve your bottle (I usually use the back of a wooden spoon for this) and dispose of the boiling water, put a tablespoon of baking soda in the bottle, then fill it with water and let it sit for 15-20 minutes. And then your bottle should be smell like it did when you just bought it.

This is my usually preferred method, to the letter. Definitely good to know more techniques.

How bad was the smell? I've only used hot water and soap on mine before to clean them out.

I've got a regular water bottle that gets a bad smell. I have a scrub brush that helps but it seems to set into the plastic

Mattew said:

How bad was the smell? I've only used hot water and soap on mine before to clean them out.

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Usually that's good enough most of the time. In cases where you accidentally let bottles sit around without rinsing them is when they start to get a bad smell stuck to them.