Clear water is on everybody’s mind lately. News of municipal supplies and wells polluted by commercial chemicals reported from time to time.
It is hard to control the high quality of the well or city tap water, but you can use a filter to safeguard yourself and your family from possibly harmful impurities and make your water taste better.
With various filtration products on the market today, how do you choose the best water filter? Not every person has the time to do research. In this article we are going to help you choose the best water filters and filtration systems with different functions.
From cost-effective alternatives like water filter pitchers to the best whole house water filter for a well, we have actually considered the specifications and also narrowed down the option to 7 leading challengers for you. Now let’s dive directly into the guide.
How Do You Know If The Water is Safe to Drink?
If your home water supply is city tap water, there must be a report of the water quality in your state/town available on the official website of the U.S. EPA.
If you are using well water, or water of which the quality you are certainly, there are a number of means to examine if you can safely use it.
The most direct way is to inspect the water with your very own senses. For Instance, if you see clouds or particulate matter in the water, it’s possibly dangerous to drink or even shower with it. Likewise, an unusual taste or odor might indicate a high level of contaminants such as chloramine, iron, or sulfur, or other toxic chemicals.
Another way is to check with a home water quality test kit, which you can access online or at local grocery stores. According to the color it shows when exposed to the contaminants in water. You can get useful information whether your water is contaminated or how badly it is contaminated by some certain substances.
However, these methods are not quite reliable as they do not identify a very wide variety of substances. Only a few contaminants can be detected and the exact levels of contaminants are not obvious.
The best way is to reach out to a local state-certified lab and send your water sample to them for a test. Here you can get a list of labs recommended by the EPA for every state or locations in the US. You can also have your water test at a lab approved by the EPA to meet the fourth Unregulated Contaminant Monitoring Rule (UCMR) proficiency testing criteria.
Best Water Filter Review
Once you know the current condition of your home water supply, it’s time to choose the water filter that works best for you according to how clean you want it to be.
Filter may differ in method of filtration and capability, size and structure, lifespan and price, easiness of installation.Sometime it will be difficult to pick out the exact one you’re looking for, and some recommendations and reviews will make it a lot easier.
ZeroWater Pitcher – Most Affordable Water Filter
A water filter pitcher is what makes those who live in an apartment or RV can drink filtered water.
The 6-cup ZeroWater Pitcher only takes $20 and fits almost all fridges. It could remove chromium, lead, heavy metals, as well as sediment that might have in your water. The water-quality meter comes along with it allows you to test the cleanliness of the filtered water.
Water taste and odor can be greatly improved, the only drawback is that the filters don’t last very long.
Big Berkey Water Filter 2.5 Gallon System – Best Countertop Filter
Big Berkey has a big name in filtration technology with the best countertop water filter in the industry. It could significantly get rid of harmful chemicals including pesticides, herbicides and organic solvents, reduce heavy metals like lead but meaning while retaining the beneficial minerals.
It can make up to seven gallons of fresh purified water per hour. Although it is able to produce enough pure drinking water for up to six people, the filter may not be enough if you also need the water for cooking. If for a big family, or you need more water in the kitchen, we suggest you consider an undersink RO system for better convenience.
Brita SAFF-100 – Best Faucet Water Filter
Brita’s faucet mount filter could reduce up to 60 contaminants and remove 99 percent of lead, chlorine, benzene, and other particles commonly found in tap water. According to customers feedback, Brita’s faucet filters “are effective for the well water that comes into my house, which has high sulfur content and very high iron content.”
This filter has a service life for up to four months or 100 gallons— shorter life compared to under-sink systems. However, the filter has a life indicator which is visible on your faucet instead of underneath your sink, reminding you when it’s time to replace the filter.
Waterdrop G3 Tankless Reverse Osmosis– Best Under-Sink Filter for Drinking Water
The Waterdrop G3 reverse osmosis system is a powerful under sink reverse osmosis water filtration system that has efficient filtration, a sleek compact layout, provides fresh pure reverse osmosis water for you and your family with 7-stage filtration.
There are three major characteristic that make the Waterdrop undersink RO system different from the competing RO systems:
While the majority of undersink reverse osmosis water filter systems rely on a storage tank to hold filtered water, the Waterdrop purifies the water when you need it and without a water storage tank, which prohibits the growth of bacterias in the tank to a certain degree.
With an inner pump, this system can produce up to 400 GPD (gallons per day) of purified water contrasted to only 75 GPD from traditional RO systems with a tank. It will also operate at a 1:1 ratio of filtered water to drainage.
When in use, an LED ring on the faucet shines with various colors to show you the status of the filtration system. At the same time, the front LCD panel on the filtration system shows both the filter status as well as the present TDS (total dissolved solids) level of the filtered water in real time. Other RO systems without TDS panels would certainly require a third party TDS meter to check your water condition.
Given that the Waterdrop G3 occupies less space, generates even more filtered water, and gives much better reviews than any other system in the market, it should be near the top of your list!
Home Master Whole House 3-Stage Water Filter– Best Whole House System for Well Water
If you’re using well water, you need to have something ahead of a water softener, shower filter, or drinking water filter. It needs to remove the big sediments, algae, and part of the heavy metals and minerals, and bring the water to a fundamental level of cleanness before using a point of use water filter.
For that purpose, we recommend this excellent water filter system from the NSF listed brand Home Master.
The Home Master HMF3SDGFEC is designed specifically to treat well water. It includes 3 cartridges, standing for 3 stages of filtration.
In the first stage, a multi gradient density filter removes up to 95 percent of iron, manganese, sediment, chemicals as well as other contaminants in the water larger than 1 micron.
Afterward, the special filter reduces iron of larger than 3 ppm. This is to make sure there will be as little of the annoying metal as possible to irritate your skin or make damages on the in-house plumbing system and also water devices.
At last, the granular activated coconut shell carbon filter gives the water a final polish, removing chemicals and also any unpleasant flavor or odor in it.
Best of all, this is done without significant reduction of the water pressure in your house, thanks to the big capacity of the cartridges (100,000 gallon). The filter can last a full year for a family of four, and no maintenance is required until it requires replacement.
Keep in mind that while this system is very effective in filtering water, it does not deal with all the parasites as well as chemicals found in the water. It is sufficient in making the water clear and also safe enough for showering if the well is not alarmingly polluted.
For drinking water, however, you will require to install an additional RO undersink filter or a strong countertop filtration system.
Fleck 5600SXT 48,000 Grain Water Softener– Best Softener for Hard Water
Water filters eliminate impurities; softeners reduce hardness as well as scale. That’s an essential difference between a water filter and softener. If you need to stop the buildup of calcium and also magnesium in your pipes; a water softener is a better option.
This system uses a meter based regeneration process. This means that the water you use is measured and the system only regenerates when it needs to. If water needs increase the system regenerates more often to keep up.
Made with top-notch components, the Fleck treats enough hard water for a household of six and is backed by a 5-year warranty on most parts, 10 years on the storage tanks.
The AquaHomeGroup shower filter doesn’t soften water to the degree a whole softening system does. However, it is still an excellent approach to provide filtered water for fragile and falling hair and sensitive skin caused by communal water.
This little showerhead filter offers 15 stages of water treatment. The cartridge includes sediment filters, the extremely efficient KDF 55, calcium sulfite, activated carbon and also super permeable ceramic balls. It reduces chlorine, heavy metals including lead, mercury, nickel, chromium, different dissolved solids, microorganisms, and pesticides. This filtering product likewise inhibits the growth of fungi, making the water safe for showering.
It in addition goes an action further by providing vitamin C, minerals, and other materials that boost negative ions and oxygen levels in the shower water. By this way, it can turn plain shower water into nourishing water for your hair as well as skin.
To be honest, it won’t Photoshop you or turn you 10 years youthful overnight. However, most users reported the water it produces reduces skin itchiness and also much less hair fall right after the first time of use. In any case, it’s worth giving it a try.
Sawyer Squeeze– Best Water Filters for Backpacking
This little filter can get rid of more than 99.99% of all microorganisms, protozoa, as well as cysts such as E. coli, Giardia, Vibrio cholera, and also Salmonella from any natural water resource, along with other hazardous pollutants larger than 0.1 micron.
With a size of 9.5 x 4 x 3.5 inches, this 3.2 oz filter would not take a lot more space in your backpack than an electric toothbrush. And it can filter up to 540 gallons of clean water each day, as the design allows water to quickly get filtered.
Anyway, it is a nice gear on your road to help you get access to safe water as long as there are water resources, to help you produce as much clean, secure water as you need.
Efficient filtration and easy to use, the Intex is among the best-performance filters for household above-ground swimming pools.
This 10-inch filter has a powerful electric motor that helps generate filtered water of 2,100 gallons per hour. It additionally comes with a 24-hour timer so your swimming pool can handle itself without much manual involvement.
The filter maintains your swimming pool water clean and without dirt, algae, as well as large debris with a chamber of fine sand. It only needs to be replaced for every 5 years, making it one of the most affordable pool filters out there.
The device can handle backwashing, rinsing, recirculation, and also drainage on its own, an easy turn of the control valve.
It can supply enough fresh, tidy water for a pool of up to 19,600 gallons.
Conclusion
We hope this guidance is helpful to you in finding the right water filter system. It’s not possible to include everything in one article, but feel free to leave us a comment or contact us, we would love to hear from you and would be glad to answer all kinds of questions!