LOTS of water softener recommendations are available by searching old posts.

Indeed Stax, water softeners don't hold their liquor well.

@User, standard water softeners are a commodity process - there's no secret sauce or special magic. The definition of soft water is less than 1 grain of hardness per gallon. Some hardware is more reliable than other hardware, but no water softener is going to make your water "more soft" than < 1 gpg.

Softeners that use Fleck and Clack valves are some of the most common and reliable. Many softeners are using a re-branded Fleck 5600 sxt control valve. You can order a very reliable one featuring a Fleck 5600 SXT control valve for about $600 on Amazon.

That said, DIY install and setup isn't for everyone - you may need to work with a local dealer / installer.

The point is we are talking $600 or so for good hardware + install, steup, etc.

What you don't need is $3,000-5,000 for a certain water softener that doesn't use electricity.

Unless you are a 24 hour laundromat or an apartment house, you don't need twin resin tanks.

You also want to stay far away from anything that's "salt free" that uses magnets, electro-magnets, coils, etc. or claims to be a "conditioner".

Water softeners have to be sized correctly, they are based on a certain number of grains capacity. The math can be a little tricky - but it starts with a water test to find out exactly how hard the water is - in grains per gallon - and how many people in the household.

To answer your other question - it's common to leave the cold water in the kitchen unsoftened OR to have a separate drinking water faucet. Some people don't like the taste of softened water. It probably shouldn't be used on plants. Also, outside hose / irrigation are not softened.

Jake makes good points. We have iron, hard water and a little sulfur smell. We have an iron system and a soft water system. They came with the house. Untreated, the water tastes very mineraly. Treated it's fine and we have no problems. We have untreated water at the outside hose bibbs, but I wish I had a soft water hose bibb to wash the car, as the car has to be toweled dry to keep the spots to a minimum.

Thank you guys for this information. It is very helpful. I need to make sure that it can be drunk from multiple taps because I dont want to be going to the kitchen to get water for the birds and dogs. I will make sure to stress this as I look for it. I’ll use the great info you suggested while looking. Thank you!

Alaska water system is great. We’ve had ours for 25 years. Great service!

Thank you @Jake The Wonderdog I really don’t want to have only one faucet for drinking. The birds are in another part of the house and bringing dishes of fresh water over would be too cumbersome. I also think that would involve running a new water line to the kitchen. A lot of people I know use kinetico. I think I will call them on Monday. Their website says the water has less salt than a glass of milk (30 mg vs. 120 mg). I did get a quote once, but it was very expensive. I think I may just have to pay it as I have just about had it with the water spots on my new shower, etc. I will also check out Alaska water system @flamingo75 Thank you.

That's fine - but again, the issue between soft water and hard water is the amount of sodium in soft water. The amount of sodium added is a direct function of the amount of hardness in the water. The brand of softener isn't going to change that. It's true that soft water (using any brand of softener) contains less sodium than common foods such as milk, bread, etc. and typically isn't an issue for humans. I don't know about birds, fish, small animals.

Kinetico is very expensive and provides little actual tangible benefit over a $600 softener. They don't use electricity... which saves about 50 cents a year. They backwash with softened water - which doesn't actually matter. They have twin tanks which doesn't really matter unless you are a 24 hour laundromat.

Thank you. @Jake The Wonderdog I just spoke with another company. I saw a previous post where clak or fleck valves were recommended so I searched for one who carried them. They carry both, but recommend clak (clack?), but said both are good. The price was much cheaper than kinetico was a few years ago when I had a quote from them. They also talked about getting a water flitration system. I don’t know is this is necessary?

There isn't a huge profit margin in water softeners anymore (unless you are Kenetico). Water filtration is another thing, however.

Do you need one... probably not. Especially since you aren't keen on using a particular faucet for drinking water.

Typical water filters are:

Carbon - which removes chlorine, taste, odor, and some chemicals.

Reverse Osmosis - which removes most everything... but is also typically used specifically on a low-volume drinking water faucet. R/O water filters require more maintenance, and waste a lot of water. If you have lead in your water or nitrates, for example, you would need an R/O filter on your drinking water.

I don't think you mentioned if you were on municipal water or well water.

Again, if you just are tired of hard water deposits on everything, don't worry about a water filter.

Later, you can add an under-the-sink filter if you decide you want to have filtered drinking water.

Thank you @Jake The Wonderdog I am on municipal water. It tastes fine to me. When she mentioned filtration, I told her it wasnt so important to me. I drink bottled water and honestly, I don’t believe our city water has ever killed or sickened anyone due to long term contaminant exposure. The only issue is that all the water in the house would be softened water. I don’t know how this would be for cooking. I don’t really cook but it would be nice to know. I don’t want my yard dug up and another line dug to the kitchen sink. I just installed a new kitchen counter last week. I really don’t want to have them install another hole near the faucet either. Do you have a separate line into your kitchen?

@Jake The Wonderdog is giving great advice.

Due to well water, I have a water softener. Regret not putting in a filtered, but UNsoftened sink faucet for drinking water.

If the house is newer, it was probably plumbed with a "softener loop" - even if a softener wasn't installed. The plumbing is usually designed so that the cold water in the kitchen doesn't go through the loop - ditto the outside faucets.

If it's an older house or never plumbed for a softener, then it can get a little trickier. If you have a basement or crawl space, then it's not so bad - but will require some plumbing. A house that's on a slab, and not originally plumbed for a water softener can be the most challenging.

I cut all the plumbing out of my 1943 house and re-plumbed 80% of it (I will redo the plumbing in the bathrooms when I remodel them). I installed a $600 Fleck based water softener from Amazon and a carbon water filter for my kitchen drinking water - all in my basement. That was 6 years ago and it's still working great. Since it has a full basement and I was redoing the plumbing anyway, a separate line to the kitchen cold water wasn't a big deal. It might be a bigger issue for you.

Municipal water is regularly tested, and has to meet certain standards. Flint Michigan aside, I usually have more trust in municipal water than in well water that isn't tested. A carbon filter will remove the chlorine from your municipal water - and make it taste and smell much better. If you are in the habit of drinking bottled water then it may not matter to you.

All of the technical aspects of this discussion are above my pay grade but I will say we’ve had softeners installed in 2 homes post build both being in ”hard” water areas. In our current softener we use Potassium Chloride instead of salt, specifically because my husband didn’t like how the salt softened water tasted. The potassium softened water can be used on plants safely. We were told the amount of potassium ingested by drinking is = to about a banana per liter of water drunk. Our stainless sink, showers, toilets etc all look much better water spot & build up wise. Since it was post build, it is connected to whole house including hose spigots but not to irrigation system. It does have a bypass close to turn it off temporarily. We chose not to do a kitchen faucet bypass.

Although nothing is perfect, a whole house multistage RO system can do wonders for a large home. A water analysis is a must to help installers decide which additional filters to install. Pros: Ultraclean water, 99%+ spot free and 0-1 tds at most; nothing stains and the .1-1% residue if any, sodium, silica etc. does not stick to anything. Cons; At least doubles your water bill, could be tripple or more depending on impurities present, expensive. We have a six stage 3000gpd unit, basically puts out 2+gpm.

@Pinebaron I wont’t disagree with you because I have no knowledge about multistage RO systems. I will say that our water usage is 14% below norm for an average efficient household - this based on annual usage report from our water supplier. point being, our water softener hasn’t increased our household water usage.

Following

KW: Water usage increase is only when one uses an RO aystem which usually has at least a 1-1 water waste ratio, often a lot more; its just the way an RO ayatem works, details of which i wont go into here. Often a small RO system can be installed under the kitchen aink for drnking water purposes only if you dont mind consuming mineral free water; many don’t due to health myths but thats an entirely different debate, and i dont want to get into that at all. Although impractical, if one chooses, RO waste water can be put to use for watering lawns or other putposes where water purity is not required.

@Pinebaron thanks for detail. Sounds like I wouldn’t be a user of an RO system unless it was somehow making consumable water out of otherwise undrinkable water & putting the waste to good use.. We cannot afford to waste our water resources!

KW: A whole house RO aystem is not for everyone.

@Pinebaron

Regarding whole-house carbon filters, I've often said, "My toilets don't need carbon filtered water". That goes triple for whole house RO.

Most people don't need RO drinking water unless there's a specific, known contaminant such as lead, nitrates, etc. Whole house RO is over-the-top except in very few situations.

Repeat: A whole house RO aystem is not for everyone.

this topic is too complicated :( I have talked with many companies some of which were way expensive some of them I couldnt find any reviews. I live in NJ and we have hard water. I dont like the look of the water stains on my shower doors, takes so much time to clean. Also my dishwasher shows build up. But from Jake The Wonderdog i understand if I ever have the softeneing system I need to seperate the kitchen faucet and just put a good osmosis system there for coffee and cooking etc. Would softening water really increase the life of the appliances? Can you recommend some companies I got really confused. So far I got quotes from Eco water, Aquathin etc.

@Cagla Pekel Kanier

It's not that complicated.

If you have hard water - you install a water softener. A good quality one can be purchased for $700-800 for the softener itself. Why is that complicated?

Hi Jake the Wonderdog - i called plumbers who seemed have no idea how to install them or willing to install them.
I called companies like ecowater through costco - way expensive. And nobody mentions kitchen water or outside water to be seperated as softened water would have more sodium which would be unhealthy for my pets or plants. There are so many companies and i cannot understand if they hve the better technology better systems etc. When i first started reading reviews forums etc i was after a water softener + filtration for the whole house for the sake of my appliances and our shower water to be safer for our family and the idea of cleaning less as i won’t have the water spots as much as i used to. All these companies also promote RO which takes everything from water unless you put back the needed minerals with some other filter or what ever it is called but not all of them has it- All of these- after reading so many reviews etc seems so shady to me and i got so confused and not sure what to do now.

I live where the water is very, very hard. We installed a water softener (uses salt bags) and have never really looked back. 17 years later, no buildup ruining the dishwasher and the faucets. Knock wood: haven't sprung a pipe leak in 17 years. I think people who live around us are asking for trouble by not having a similar unit.

I would love to have an RO unit under the kitchen sink, and I think it's a great idea. But there is a LOT of misinformation and sales-driven double-talk about what actually "softens" water. I would trust Jake. I've been reading his expertise on the forum for years.

@Cagla Pekel Kanier

I understand the issues you are raising. Believe me, there's a ton of snake oil being sold in residential water treatment.

Because a simple water softener isn't THAT profitable, companies would rather sell you something else. The focus isn't on solving a problem, it's on selling high margin hardware.

Approximately when was your house built? Most newer homes were built with a softener loop - so they are plumbed for a water softener already.

Look for a LOCAL water treatment company - don't focus on the brand of water softener. Tell them you just want a water softener. Don't get sucked into RO, carbon filtering, etc. You can add that later if you want. Just get the softener and that will solve 99% of your issues. Your local water treatment company is probably going to offer an "house brand" water softener that you've never heard of before - that's ok. They are made from standard parts (tank, resin, control valve, salt tank). I could build my own "Wonder Dog" brand softener - and that's what most local companies do.

Jake the wonderdog- My house is built in 1970’s so not new construction unfortunately. Hopefully they can seperate the soft water from outside and the kitchen. We would definitely buy yourwater softener :) thank you for your suggestion i’ll try to find a local one.

Can I gve softened water to my parrots and dogs?

Dog, yes - parrots, unknown.