The best shower filters of 2025

Many countries, including the United States, have guidelines to ensure that harmful chemicals in water, and overall water quality, are tested and regulated.

In the United States, the EPA has legally applicable standards for all the different types of pollutants in your drinking water, and also secondary concerns which can cause skin irritation or affect your hair. Your local water supplier must produce a new Consumer Confidence Report every year, and the The EPA has a public database designed to allow you to easily search for the most recent tap water report for your area. You can read the report and see if there are worrisome pollutant levels in your water, but you can also rest safe in the knowledge that if any water pollutants are above their legal limit, your community will certainly be notified. .

If you are particularly concerned about lead, an easy way to mitigate the risk is to simply turn off the tap water a few minutes before using it. The most dangerous amount of lead accumulates when the water has been sitting in your home’s pipes overnight, so if you remove the water from the lines, you will be in better shape.

Lead and chlorine in drinking water

Even if your water smells and tastes good, that doesn’t mean your tap water is free of harmful chemicals. Water pollutants fall into different categories, but the main ones in shower water are toxic metals, chlorine (used as a disinfectant) and the products that chlorine creates with any other chemicals in the water. water Any of these can put a major crimp in your showering experience.

The main toxic metals that often hide in water are arsenic, lead, cadmium and mercury, all of which make the World Health Organization Top 10 List of “primary health chemistry”.

Lead is often considered the biggest pollutant, even if your water supply is pure, the water slowly corrodes the lead in home plumbing systems, and the toxic metal seeps into the water. Children are at particularly high risk for harsh chemicals and have been reported to absorb up to 50% of their lead through drinking water. Even at relatively low levels, WHO reports, lead exposure can cause irreversible neurological problems. This is why water quality should always be a consideration.

Another main problem is connected to the chlorine that is used as a disinfectant in our drinking water. The biggest health concern is actually the byproducts created when chlorine reacts with the natural organic matter in the water, creating harmful chemicals called. THMs. You’ve probably heard of chloroform, which is just a common THM, and high levels of THMs act as carcinogens.

A study found that people absorbed more THMs from a 10-minute hot shower than from drinking a liter of water, so if you’re concerned about this, a shower filtration system that actively removes chlorine can be helpful.