Aquasana Water Softerner and Filter – Buying Guide 2022

If you live in an area with a hard, mineralized water supply, it’s a good idea to invest in a top-quality water treatment system. These products clean and condition your water so that it tastes fresh and doesn’t cause scale buildup in your household fixtures. 

The Aquasana team creates pro-standard designs that filter and purify your home’s supply, providing clear, refreshing drinking water and lending a glossy shine to your hair after you shower. 

Top Choices on the Market

Best Aquasana Water Softener and Filter Reviews

This Aquasana EQ 1000 model is the best whole house water treatment system on our list for various reasons. We LOVE that this package includes a salt-free water conditioner. If you’re looking for an answer to the Aquasana vs. Pelican water systems debate, here it is. Quite simply, the Aquasana EQ-1000-AST-UV is the best softener and filter combo on the market.

This conditioner unit uses Scale Control Media (SCM) technology to neutralize hardness-causing minerals in your water supply. It does this by crystallizing these compounds into harmless particles. 

This salt-free technology also means that you won’t have to run any backwashing or additional cleaning cycles to clear out excess sodium deposits, like you would with most salt-based options. 

We also appreciate the activated carbon media in this Aquasana 10-year/1,000,000 gallon whole house water filter, which uses carbonized coconut shell media to absorb VOCs and other harmful chemical compounds. The system’s patented Kinetic Degradation Fluxion (KDF) filter uses a potent copper-zinc alloy to remove hydrogen sulfide, chlorine, and iron through the chemical process of redox. 

One of this product’s best features is its UV filter, which serves as the last of 5 separate stages in the EQ-1000’s water treatment sequence and sterilizing up to 99.99% of disease-causing microbes. The UV waves also remove water cysts like cryptosporidium, which can withstand supply chlorination and causes vomiting and diarrhea. 

We LOVE that this unit is so environmentally-friendly. The conditioner’s salt-free technology ensures that there’s no runoff of sodium waste into the surrounding environment. Too much salt in the shared water supply can damage crops and species diversity.

Aquasana EQ-600 Whole House Water Filter System: Best for the Money

This Aquasana EQ-600 model is the best product on our list when it comes to value for money. This affordable package includes a 600,000 gallon Rhino tank, a pre-filter and post-filter for removing sediment particles, and all the suitable fittings for installation. 

The Rhino tank contains KDF and carbon filters, which remove various chemical compounds and harmful heavy metals from your water supply. The upflow technology forces the water to flow from the bottom of the tank to the top. This process ensures that your water is thoroughly filtered. The hard, mineralized supply passes through ALL the coconut shell media layers before moving on into your plumbing system. 

Many Aquasana whole house water filter reviews neglect to mention this product, perhaps because the package doesn’t include a water softener, UV filter, or even a handy pro-grade installation kit. However, we think that the EQ-600 is a highly effective whole house filter system. It has an impressive capacity, removes dirty silt and sediment deposits from your supply, and provides tasty, fresh tap water that you’ll want to keep on drinking.

This model also removes industrial solvents, inorganic farming chemicals, and soluble heavy metals like lead from your water supply. The package comes with a generous 6-year warranty and requires very little maintenance. All you need to do is replace the filters a few times a year.

3. Aquasana 500,000 Gallon Well Water Rhino: Best Aquasana Whole House Filter for Well Water

When it comes to treating hard well water, this Aquasana model is the best option on our list. That’s because this product is specifically designed to catch the trace elements, minerals, and microscopic pathogens that you tend to find in private or public well water. 

Well water often contains heavy metals like iron, lead, and radon. These chemicals have particularly high densities and can be poisonous. The Aquasana Well Water Rhino uses a KDF filter to remove some of these heavier elements through oxidation-reduction reactions. 

You’ll also often find various inorganic chemical compounds in well water. If a local farmer uses herbicides and pesticides on their crops, these solutions may run into the well supply and contaminate your water. This Aquasana model uses carbonized coconut shell media to remove these inorganic substances, along with various chloramines and hydrogen sulfide compounds. 

Incidentally, if you want a product that removes over 90% of the chlorine in your shower water, go for the Aquasana Premium Shower Filter. According to several Aquasana shower filter reviews, this model is the best product for getting shinier, healthier hair. 

You may also find bacteria and parasites like E.coli and cryptosporidiosis in a private well water supply. These microbes can pose a significant risk to your health, causing involuntary weight loss, chronic nausea, and gastrointestinal issues.  

The integrated UV filter at the end of this Aquasana product shines germicidal UV rays through your supply. These waves damage the disease-causing microbes in the water, leaving them unable to develop further or reproduce to create more pathogens.

4. Aquasana AQ 5300 3-Stage Under Counter: Best Under Sink Aquasana Water Filter System

The Aquasana AQ 5300 model is a 3-stage filter system that removes over 75 different contaminants from your supply, leaving you with fresh, clean water. We love the patented Claryum system, which uses a combination of activated carbon, catalytic carbon, mechanical filtration, and ion-exchange technology to clean your tap water thoroughly.

The activated carbon media absorbs and traps pesticides and soluble MTBE, while the catalytic carbon filter has a higher capacity for reducing levels of chlorine and chloramine in the supply. This catalytic carbon media also helps to remove both hydrogen sulfide and harmful trihalomethanes (THMs) from your drinking water.

The ion-exchange technology works to remove the heavy, hardness-causing metals like lead and mercury from your water supply, while the 20-micron pre-filter catches larger pieces of silt and rust before they can pass through into your drain pipes.

We prefer the AQ 5300 model to the Aquasana AQ 5200 for a couple of reasons. Firstly, the AQ 5200 is a 2-stage system and doesn’t include this micron pre-filter that helps to prevent sediment buildup in your plumbing system.

Secondly, the AQ 5300 has a greater capacity than the AQ 5200, with a filter life capacity of 600 gallons compared to the 2-stage model’s 500 gallons. This means you’ll be able to enjoy clean, fresh water for a more extended period before having to replace the filters. 

5. Aquasana AQ 4000 Countertop Water Filter: Best Countertop Aquasana Water Filter System

Many Aquasana water filter reviews agree with us when we say that the  Aquasana AQ 4000 is the best countertop model on this list, with a 2-stage filtration system that catches and reduces 77 contaminants in your water supply. 

If you receive your household supply from an untreated groundwater source, then your tap water may include various chlorine-resistant cysts like crypto and giardia. These highly infectious microbes can cause stomach issues, diarrhea, vomiting, and a fever.  

The AQ 4000 has sub-micron mechanical filtration technology that traps larger particles like these cysts and removes smaller microbes like disease-causing bacteria.

We LOVE how easy it is to install this countertop model. You just attach the faucet diverter valve and hose to your tap, and you’re good to go. This compact, lightweight model takes up very little space on your kitchen counter. You can slide it behind your tap, and you’ll barely notice it’s there. 

Once set up, this model is easy to maintain. You only need to change the filter a couple of times a year, and you won’t need to clean out any pipes or run any backwashing cycles. It’s also easy to find an Aquasana filter replacement for a reasonable price online. 

We wish that this model had a pre-filter to catch silt and scale pieces. Still, the high-performance, integrated Claryum technology means that the AQ 4000 removes up to 15 times as many contaminants as similar countertop filtration systems.

6. Aquasana Salt-Free Water Conditioner: Best Aquasana for Preventing Limescale Buildup

The Aquasana salt-free water conditioner uses Scale Control Media (SCM) technology to prevent scale buildup in your pipes and household appliances. 

This buildup occurs when untreated, mineralized water combines with soap to form a viscous material that sticks to the inside of your faucets and fixtures and hardens over time. This process clogs up your pipes and can damage your showerhead, washing machine, and kitchen taps. 

This conditioner’s built-in SCM reduces this buildup by crystallizing the ions of the hardness-causing minerals in the supply. This technology changes the structure of magnesium, carbonate, and calcium molecules, preventing them from sticking to your drain pipes and faucets. This salt-free process also means that you won’t have to worry about cleaning out the sodium scale deposits that salt-based softeners tend to leave in your plumbing system. 

Another benefit of the salt-free conditioner is that it won’t demineralize your water. You’ll still be able to receive the various nutritional benefits of calcium and magnesium, even if these molecules don’t stick to your pipes anymore. 

If you’re looking for a whole house filtration system, this model isn’t for you. The Aquasana Salt-Free Water Conditioner alters the chemical structure of hardness-causing minerals but doesn’t filter out sub-micron particles or inorganic chemical compounds. You might also need to hire a plumber to help with the Aquasana installation process.

7. Aquasana OptimH2O Reverse Osmosis + Claryum: Best Aquasana for Removing Fluoride & Lead

This Aquasana filter is the best product on this list for removing fluoride, lead, and chlorine from your drinking water supply. 

The market-leading reverse osmosis technology catches and removes sub-micron fluoride and arsenic particles. This filtration system harnesses your household supply’s existing water pressure to force water through a semipermeable membrane and filter out tiny particles that other filters would miss. 

This water then passes through into the carbonized media filter, which removes chlorine, chloramine, VOCs, and soluble MTBE. The ion-exchange function then reduces the number of hard, heavy mineral molecules in your supply.

Finally, the innovative remineralizer adds calcium, potassium, and magnesium back into your supply. That’s because the reverse osmosis membrane removes these metals from the water. By adding these molecules back into your supply, the system ensures that you’ll retain the muscular and cardiovascular benefits of these metals when you drink tap water. 

This remineralizer also adjusts your water’s pH balance, increasing the alkaline content to keep you hydrated and boost your energy levels. 

The Claryum filters last half a year and are easy to replace by just holding the central unit and twisting. Also, the package comes with a generous 2-year warranty, so you can test out the quality of your treated water before fully committing to the product. If you have any problems, you can get instant help online from the Aquasana customer service portal on the company website.

Final Verdict