Why is my toilet gurgling?
The short answer
Gurgling is air being pulled through the water in the trap, and it means the drain isn't venting or draining freely. Usually that's a partial blockage further down the soil pipe, or a blocked soil vent. Take it seriously: a gurgling loo is often the first warning of a blockage that ends with the drains backing up into the house.
A healthy drain lets air move as water moves. When something restricts it — a partial blockage, a blocked vent at roof level, a collapsed section — the draining water pulls a vacuum instead, and it drags air through the nearest water seal, which is your toilet trap. That's the noise.
Pay attention to what sets it off. If the loo gurgles when you run the bath or when the washing machine empties, the fixtures are sharing a drain that can't cope, which points at a blockage they have in common rather than a fault in the loo. Lifting the drain cover outside will usually tell you which side of the chamber it's on.
And if you're in one of Macclesfield's terraces, check whose drain it is before you pay to clear it — a gurgling loo in a terraced street is very often the shared run backing up, and shared runs are United Utilities' to clear, free of charge.
The other reason not to ignore it: the water in that trap is what stops drain gases coming back into the bathroom. If gurgling is pulling the seal down, the smell arrives shortly afterwards, and that's the drain telling you it has been patient enough.
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