I’m a big advocate of knowing what goes into your body. I like to read the labels of everything that I eat and drink and then decide if I’m gonna go for it or not. Yet water can be a tricky one to read the label on… especially when it comes from your tap. This is why I use a Berkey Water Filter.

Rather than chance it, we got a Berkey Water Filter system 9 years ago and I’m always getting questions about it. So I thought today would be a great time to break it down for you (and share a new recipe too!).

How to choose the best berkey water filter

What’s in the water you drink?

Most of you reading this are fortunate enough to have the cleanest water on the planet, yet it doesn’t mean there isn’t room for improvement—especially when it’s our health on the line. I don’t write this to freak you out but rather to educate you on why I believe purified water is important.

Did you know that the average municipal water source contains:

  • Liquified chlorine
  • Fluorosilicic acid
  • Aluminium sulphate
  • Calcium hydroxide
  • Sodium silicofluoride

I don’t know what any of those are, yet I do know the chemical breakdown of water is just Hydrogen and Oxygen. So what’s going on?! Also, depending on where you live and if you have well or city water, you could also be ingesting the following:

  • Chlorine
  • Fluorine compounds
  • Trihalomethanes (THMs)
  • Salts of: arsenic, radium, aluminum, copper, lead, mercury, cadmium, barium
  • Hormones
  • Nitrates
  • Pesticides

The town I live in has chlorine and fluoride added to the water. I can literally smell the chlorine when we run the water from the faucet. It’s crazy! While the Environmental Protection Agency regulates municipal tap water and many stay within the guidelines, it doesn’t mean you are just drinking H20.

4 cups of water on counter after testing Berkey Water Filter

Importance of a water purifier

I grew up in California and lived there until i was 28. We packed up the kids and moved to the sunshine state of Florida and have settled into a small quiet town called Brooksville. I didn’t realize how different tap water could be until I moved to our new home. Something didn’t taste right or smell right, so I started investigating like Veronica Mars.

I quickly learned that the “funny taste” was the chloride + fluoride treatment in the local water supply. Fluoride is a treatment that has been banned in many European countries. Say what?!

At my last dentist appointment, I was given a fluoride treatment. I don’t have a problem with the dentist treating my teeth with fluoride, in fact, I’m a big advocate for healthy teeth and gums.

Early on, I did try avoiding fluoride in my coconut oil toothpaste and we all ended up with cavities at our next visit, so I decided it just wasn’t gonna work for us.

However, I’m pretty sure I was NOT made to ingest fluoride with my recommended 8 glasses of water per day. I decided that we would use a water filter to eliminate as many chemicals as we could from our water.

My daughter using our Berkey water filter system in the kitchen

5 Reasons why I use a Berkey Water Filter

I started using Berkey water filters a few years ago. I had tried a Brita but was replacing them so often it was getting so expensive and annoying. We also had a fridge filter and that was also expensive to replace. I felt like there had to be another way to get clean water at a reasonable price. And there was!

1) I needed a water filter that was economical. The Royal Berkey costs around $300, so you may be wondering why I went with this option. The answer is all in the filters. While other filters like my old Brita needed to have a replacement every 3-6 months, the two Black Berkey filters will purify 6,000 gallons before needing replacement. I don’t know many people who drink more than a gallon per day, which means it will be well over a decade or two before you need to replace the filters.

2) You will 100% notice a difference in the taste. Not only is it clean, but it tastes good! Many other filters out there don’t offer much of a taste difference, but Berkey filters seem like they completely remove the bitter aftertaste of added chemicals.

3) It’s the easiest filter to use. Simply pour water into the top chamber and viola, the water filters down to the bottom chamber and you have clean drinking water. What is even better, is that it uses zero electricity!

Filter setup inside Berkey water purifier system with charcoal

4)  More than 99% of the harmful contaminants are gone. It feels good drinking water that is so clean without using harsh processes to get there.

5) The fluoride that your water once contained is gone! Since it really isn’t necessary for your health and well-being to be in your drinking water, you’ll feel better knowing that your Berkey Water filter elimates 95% of the fluoride in your city’s water (as long as your filtration system includes the pf2 fluoride filter attachments).

Berkey water dispenser setup for kitchen

My Berkey Water Filter sits on my kitchen counter and is a lovely stainless steel that blends into my kitchen. I love the fact that I only have to change the filter every few years and my family has clean water to consume. Knowing that I don’t have to add that to my to-do list is a relief!

Compare berkey water filter models side by side

Where you can buy a Berkey Water Filter

Are you ready to start drinking better tasting and better for you water?

I bought my Berkey online through Amazon and think it’s the way to go. Click here to get the exact model that I bought for my family (we’ve had it for 7 years now and just have to replace the filter each year or two).

What makes Berkey better than the rest is the fact that they meet water purification standards by eliminating 99.9999999% (a.k.a. A LOT) of pathogenic bacteria. I decided a long time ago that if I’m going to make healthy changes for my family, I was no longer going to wish I bought the best, but that I would, in fact, get the best.

How is your local drinking water?

I’d love to know where you live, how the water is in your area and if you use anything to filter it. Comment below and let me know… I’m super curious.

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Comments

  1. I purchased my Berkey unit shortly before the Covid madness and haven’t looked back. It’s one of the best purchases I have ever made for my family.

  2. I moved to Florida a year and a half ago and only drink bottled water, which isn’t great either. This article was very helpful!!!

  3. Hi Jen,
    Thanks for this post! I’m in NYC and thinking extra about my water supply in the context of trying to conceive. How and how often do you clean your Berkey? I see on their site it doesn’t have to be often at all, but I worry about water just sitting in there and it getting kind of scuzzy. Thank you!!

    1. Hi Emma! I have a Berkey also, aren’t they awesome?! The Berkey folks recommend cleaning your Berkey stainless steel chambers monthly, and the Black Berkey Purification elements every six months or as filtration speed slows. This really should be enough as they recommend not letting your filters sit unused for more than three days, so there is a fairly regular stream of water going through them and into the lower chamber and then, of course, out of the lower chamber as you use the water. (We refill ours roughly once a day, sometimes more during the hot months.) Plus, the chambers are made of stainless steel, which also helps with them staying cleaner longer.

  4. Hi Sherry,

    You won the geographical lottery!! Cheers to delicious + clean water!

  5. I live in Vancouver Washington and our water is terrible here. It tastes like metal & dust. We are currently using a filter that goes in our fridge. It definitely tastes better than tap water but I worry that we are still drinking all kinds of chemicals. So frustrating that water consumption has to be so complicated.

    Going to save up for a Berkey.

  6. Gosh, you are one of the lucky ones Sherry. You should bottle it and sell it to the rest of us!

  7. I am on my own private well water. We had it drilled when we built here. There was no city water supply. We had it dug super deep and bypassed most of the nasties. I have a lot of mineral deposit that likes to ruin appliances so we have a heavy duty water softener system. Then we have a UV light filter that all water passes through (my mom had cancer and we had a preemie and we had to be extra careful with their immune systems). Then I have an RO filter at the sink. My water should rival good bottled water at this point. Or maybe better. This is the one thing we did right. Hopefully.

    1. Hi Jodi,

      It sounds like we have the same water! I live on well water and have way to many filters. But you can never be too safe and ensure your water is as clean as possible!

    1. Btw, our public water supply is TERRIBLE! Full of minerals, “floaties”, smells and tastes of sulfur. They even had to send out a letter recently that they had failed some of the water testing. Scary!

    2. HI Bobbie,

      Thanks for letting me know. I just updated the link + you should be able to enter now. It’s so scary not knowing what’s in your water. That’s why I love that Berkey Filters really help lower that concern + worry.

    3. Hi Brooke,

      Thanks for letting me know. I just updated the link and you should be good to go!