A novel HF cleaning method of silicon wafers is provided whereby the wafers are cleaned with a lowered level of particle contamination on the surface thereof. In the method silicon wafers are immersed in a HF bath, followed by immersion in a deionized water bath. The silicon wafers are lowered into and lifted out of each bath along a direction which is substantially vertical with respect to a surface of each bath at a rate of from 1 mm/sec to 50 mm/sec. During immersion, a vertical oscillation of the surface of each bath is maintained in the range of less than 4 mm.