British Berkefeld® Gravity Water Filter with four 7" Super Sterasyl™ Ceramic Water Filter Elements

I could not live without one of these. So much better than a britta filter and does a good job of filtering enough water for one-two people and a dog in a day. I drink a lot of water and teas and use clean water for cooking and it is never a problem to filter a gallon in not too long if it gets low or runs out. The unit is sturdy and fits well on a small counter area in a small kitchen. I accidentally ordered a larger one of a different style from a different company and figured out that this unit is perfect for the single or two-person home with not much counter space - and it's not so big that if I were to go camping or traveling, it would be a real pain to tow it along. The silver finish always looks nice and stylish, besides. Visitors seem really intrigued and impressed by it and want to buy one. I admired a friend's for years before I decided to get one. Most importantly, it really does a great job or producing some of the best tasting water I've had out of a home filter set-up. The tap water I pour in there has such a strong chlorine smell but has none of it when it comes out. I also live in a townhouse that was built in the 70's, so I made sure to get filters that filter out lead.

I live in an area that has to deal with the occasional hurricane and am also getting into prepping a bit. So I bought this Big Berkey and use it a lot. We were going to a local grocery store and re-filling 5 gallon water cooler bottles at 29 cents a gallon, which isn't bad. The big hassle was having to go through the process to re-fill them. So I saw this on Amazon, read the reviews and decided that it would be worth a try. It was very securely shipped and did not take long to put together, thanks to some of the previous reviews here. Being a beginning prepper, I learned that the most important thing to have is water so I bought twenty 5 gallon mylar water bags. We filled up all the bags with tap water and now when the water cooler 5 gallon jug is empty we get out one of the 5 gallon bags and run it through the Berkey, and presto so we great tasting water. With five 5 gallon jugs we always have 125 gallons of drinkable water available in the house at all times. The Berkey is easy to use and no one can tell the difference between the Berkey water or any bottled water we have ever bought. At 550 gallons per filter I figure we can get 2200 gallons from the Berkey at a minimum because I am filtering tap water to start with. 2200 gallons is $638 dollars not counting the wear and tear on my car and body, the gas to get to the store and just plain hassle of having to go when you run out. I absolutely love my Berkey and the great tasting water it provides my family.

Great tasting water. And I love the non-leaching stainless steel body, and the design for that matter. I had recently used Santevia, and was concerned of its plastic construction. Considering the number of hours it takes for the water to flow through, I'm sure plastic was leeching into the water. They say no bpa, but from what I heard, all plastics leech. And this includes the filter with plastic housing that ends up immersed in filtered water for hours as well. This Berkey seemed to me perfectly designed, with the filter sitting on top chamber, and the option of four filters, speeding up the filtering process, and love the filter of ceramic encasing activated carbon. And the fact tha black as well as the fluoride/arsenic filter option being available, when there's change in my water source, I can consider that. I am so glad to finally have found the convenient water filtration system. And I think the cost of this system is worth it, considering the filters do last a lot longer than most others. For the past several years, I've been paying 50+ dollars for Aquasana water filter every 5 months: over-riced and pathetically meager waste. Finally I have a peace of mind.

After many hours of on-line searching, my wife advised me that this promised to be the best water filter available to consumers. So, we purchased it and immediately started using it. Although our city's water has been tested as being either the worst or among the worst public water supplies in the nation, the British Berkefeld more than lived up to our expectations. Our water tastes great, just like it used to taste when I was a kid and our city had one of the purest water supplies in the nation. It filters out just about everything that is wrong with our water, except for the fluoride that the city insists on putting in there. The four ceramic water filters are easy to remove for cleaning and are easy to clean and re-insert. The containers are well-constructed and don't take up too much counter space. The one inconvenience is that it does not come with a stand, which it needs in order to elevate the unit high enough to put a water glass under the faucet. Therefore, we turned a stainless steel dutch oven upside down and placed the unit on top of it---problem solved, and, our improvised stand looks as through it is part of the original unit. We enthusiastically recommend this product!

I've change kitchen, bathroom plumbing and asked a friend who is a plumber to verify what I already knew about the spigot, I'll be on my 3rd now and i know how NOT to tighten too tight, washers are in correctly. there are a LOT of reviews on how this is very poor quality and many have leaked. I received 1st one already cracked, 2nd work for month and I would be very careful turning on/off since it is clearly cheap design/plastic. But leaking again-looked and it's cracked again. Company clearly wants to put blame on customers, but it's not. There should be an option to get a solid, stainless steal food grade spigot! looking for now - the level one looks good but see reviews that is leaking too! Last note, don't over fill both containers, it will leak out of the seam b/w the two even though I expected the water tension to stop adding to water level, it doesn't and will drip out - onto the floor if you aren't careful Again, filter work great, but design is pretty poor.

I am helping a friend buy a system and realized that I never bothered to return and post a review. I had first seen this system first hand when I lived in Delhi, India in the late 90's. Everyone used this to filter their water and drank the city tap water without worries. Mom had spent hundreds of dollars and gone through all sorts of failed systems by the time I got involved with this purchase. The distillers were the biggest headache--heating elements, and electrical connections right next to boiling water. In retrospect, we should have seen that one coming! Bottom line, this is the best. We love it. It is NOT a Berkey. I did heed the advice and we bought a stainless steel spigot right off the bat. I actually bought 2, but the other is still in its box. Great system, the filters are fabulous ( easily cleaned with a Scotch Bright pad. ) We didn't use the lid handle because it did not fit under my shelf. However, I actually think that the small amount of air it lets into the top container is a good thing, because it cuts down the moisture which collects along the inside of lid and container sides. Love it!

I purchased this system 7 months ago on the advice of neighbors who have used the British Berkefeld water filter system for well over a decade. In recent years, there has been a lot of fracking for natural gas in this area; for those of us on well water, there has been some worry that the water in the aquifers has been tainted by chemicals used in the fracking process. I purchased the Big Berkey with the four white ceramic filters because that's what my neighbors use. They advised me to clean the filters periodically with a Scotch Brite pad and told me the filters would last for years. That was the same impression I came away with from the bit of research I did online. Shipping was fast, the system was easy to set up (more so because my neighbors did it for me), and the water tastes very good. Caveat: I never had the water tested at a lab before or after I started using the Berkey filters so I can only judge it on taste and not on its actual effectiveness. The unforeseen costs of purchasing and maintaining this system might be more palatable with scientific--as opposed to anecdotal--proof that chemicals and generally undesirable cooties were being filtered out. For the moment, that will remain one of life's mysteries. By the end of six months, however, I began to notice that all the water wasn't filtering from the upper chamber, leaving about four inches of water. I had cleaned the filters with the Scotch Brite pads a few times--whenever the filters started to look less white--but I cleaned them again. It didn't help, so I got online to look for help on the FAQ page at berkeywater.com while I waited for the customer service people to arrive at 9 am. I read some confusing advice on the FAQ page about cleaning the ceramic filters with vinegar. I also read that the filters are only good for six months, or a certain numbers of gallons per filter. Whaaaaat? My neighbors have been using theirs for years and I am the only person using this system. NOT what I had been led to believe prior to my purchase. The customer service person concurred, telling me repeatedly that the filters only last for six months. (FYI, there's conflicting information about that online.) Beyond the price of the system itself, a consumer will be spending about $200 per annum on filters for this system. The black filters are more expensive but they are supposed to last longer. After reading questions o the FAQ page from other customers about the black filters and how to prime them properly and other complications they've experienced including longer filtering time and a fun test for how well your filter is working that involves a vial of red food color and a lot of time, I honestly don't want to deal with that. I have had another issue from the beginning with a vacuum in the lower chamber that prevents the filtered water from flowing through the spigot. This requires lifting up the upper chamber periodically to release the vacuum. The upper chamber is heavy when it's full and I have it on an elevated stand to allow for a container to be placed under the spigot, so it's an awkward procedure: Imagine lifting a slippery 20-pound baby out of its carseat from behind while it's sleeping. Though the vacuum is stronger as the water level in the lower chamber decreases, it is always an issue. The customer service person at berkeywater.com told me I could exchange it for a new one because there's a one-year warranty on the system. He advised me to go through customer service at Pro Therapy, (PT) the vendor from whom I purchased the system on Amazon, to initiate an exchange. PT tried to help, but it had to be cleared through New Millennium Concepts (NMC), whom I believe are the North American distributors. During a three-way call that lasted close to an hour, the sales rep for NMC made me regret ever purchasing the system. Probably half of that time was on hold while the sales rep ran out to the sales floor to yell at whomever had told me that I could exchange the system while the very nice customer service rep at PT and I listened to NMC's hold music, which was too loud to have a conversation. The rest of the time was spent listening to a long, rambling monologue by the NMC sales rep about the effects of altitude and something about viruses and the long history of British Berkefeld and other things which were not relevant to my situation. As the minutes and then what seemed like hours passed, my remaining years on the planet dwindling, it grew increasingly obvious that there's a good reason that she's in sales and not customer service as she explored at length the many ways in which my disintegrating relationship with my water filter system could be my fault. If I remember correctly, the NMC sales reps said the original ceramic filters made or distributed by British Berkefeld actually do last for years. The new filters, manufactured by someone for the American version of British Berkefeld are much more cheaply-made and now have to be replaced every six months. Nothing more gratifying for the bottom line than a repeat customer!! I don't know how much of this is purposeful disinformation to lure new customers who will have to buy more filters--ergo, some fraudulent bait-and-switch scam--and how much is general inefficiency or just a poor product. The NMC sales rep demanded to know where I had read about cleaning the filters with vinegar on her company's website (which the very nice PT customer rep looked up for her) so that she could yell at whomever was responsible for that bad advice. And there are multiple websites for this product and its distributors--britishberkfeld.com, getberkey.com, berkeywater.com--in addition to other vendors who sell the system. Good luck getting to the right website! I'm sorry I purchased this system. The NMC sales rep suggested I fix my issue with the vacuum by sticking a piece of cardboard between the two chambers. 1) Ugly and 2) Super-awkward unless you have a second person to help with this gymnastic maneuver. I would also have to pay for return shipping if I exchanged the system. For me, there's really no satisfactory solution to this situation. It's difficult to rationalize this cost for a single user.

This is amazing filters just as described. You'll need to run water through it 3 times and rinse before it tastes good.

tres bon filtre a eau , a avoir chez soi ,en inox,cartouche céramique,suite a un probleme d'arriver d'eau potable se systeme ma permis d'avoir de l'eau potable

I think it's a good system. The water tests harder than the average Brita filter but the capacity and ease is great.

Superb piece of kit. Finally get to drink Yorkshire tasting water in the south. A must have for any serious wild campers 👍👍👍

it leaked and its a bit tricky to stop it leaking i wouldnt advise this