Rank: | Photo: | Model: | Rating: | More Info: |
#1 |  | BEST OVERALL Life Straw personal water filter | ||
#2 |  | Katadyn Hiker Pro Water Filter | ||
#3 |  | Sawyer MINI Water Filtration System | ||
#4 |  | Etekcity Water Filter Straw | ||
#5 |  | Life Straw Water Filter Bottle Adapter |
We can live without everything except for clean drinking water. It is a need that needs to be fulfilled even when we are out of the house.
Packaged drinking water is fine until the time you are near the city, but as soon as you get under nature’s shelter, you must arrange clean drinking water before you start to become thirsty and catch a severe dehydration case.
A big bottle of home-filled water will last a few hours; after you finish the bottle, you will have the option of drinking from lakes, rivers, even little ponds, or water-saturated puddles.
During these times, you should pack a water filter for survival. Either you are hiking, camping, or visiting other countries, your clean drinking water tension will evaporate with a reliable water filter along your side.
We have curated the five best survival water filters that you can find in the market to help you with that. This article comes with an honest review of each product, pointing out its pros and cons.
We have made your buying experience easy by presenting you with the information needed for each product. Let us look at our water filter number one.
Best Survival Water Filter – Reviews & Buying guide for 2021
BEST OVERALL: Life Straw personal water filter
- Manufacturer: Vestergaard- LifeStraw
- Material: Plastic
- Weight: 2 ounces
- Item dimension: 1 x 1 x 8 inches
- Type: Personal stick water filter
- Capacity: It can filter 1000 gallons of water for one filter.
Lifestraw survival water filter system is in the first place on our best survival water filter list because of its lightweight and easy application.
This product is ideal for carrying along on your hiking, trail walks, or during emergency natural calamities situations.
If you take LifeStraw, your stress of finding clean water comes to an end. Let us look at some of this filter’s features that made this product number one on our list.
Pros
- Lifestraw personal water filter removes 99.9999% of common bacteria, including E-coli, vibrio cholera, shield, salmonella, pseudomonas aeruginosa, campylobacter.
- This survival water filter system can remove 99.9% protozoa like cryptosporidium parvum, entamoeba histolytica, giardia lamblia (beaver fever), etc.
- This straw does not require electricity, replacement parts, batteries which makes traveling very easy and convenient with this device. Plus, it weighs 2 ounces which are incredibly lightweight considering the qualities it is providing.
- It is effortless to operate because of the filter’s simple design. You can quickly put the stick in your bag or carry it with a holder attached to your bag.
- Life straw doesn’t have an expiration date, so you can store it away in your emergency kit and forget about it.
- The straw is reusable, and you can use it for filtering nearly 1000 gallons of water without purchasing any new filter.
- This product does not use any chemicals and iodine, making this product very natural and reliable.
- One particular positive point of this filter is that your single purchase has a global impact. The company claims to provide one year’s pure water supply to a school child in need with each purchase.
Cons
- Few customers have said that the product is not the easiest to draw water from. They had to apply enormous sucking pressure to pull few sips of water.
- You always have to drink the water while lying on your stomach, which is not the most comfortable position while drinking and drinking during the night. It is somewhat risky to drink this if the water body has animals like crocodiles.
Buying Advice
Life straw is an excellent product to keep in your bug-out bag and has one of the most straightforward applications and usage compared to other products.
Before using, try to soak the product in water for a few minutes and suck few times for it to work. Follow the company’s guidebook to make your stick last longer.
Runner-up: Katadyn Hiker Pro Water Filter
- Manufacturer: Katadyn North America
- Material: Synthetic
- Weight: 11.2 ounces
- Item dimension: 3 x 3 x 6 inches
- Type: Pump
- Capacity: It can filter around 300 gallons depending on the water quality.
Katadlyn Hiker Pro shines on the second position on our list as lots of people can use this one filtration system. This filtration system is the best survival water filter pump.
Hiker Pro is portable and works wonders as you will not need to do strenuous exercises when you are thirsty. You will automatically have clean, filtered water in your water sacks and bottles.
In the following lines, you will see the best survival water filter pump review from our list with our buying advice that you shouldn’t miss either.
Pros
- This filter comes with an activated carbon core that considerably improves the taste of your water. The activated carbon helps in reducing the number of chemicals in your water. The water will taste like pure spring water that has been untouched by any particles, dirt, dust, and harmful microorganisms.
- Hiker pro’s 0.2-micron fine filter easily removes bacteria and protozoa like cryptosporidium and giardia, giving you clean drinking water with each sip.
- This water filtration system comes with an option to remove and clean the filter using clean water and a sponge. This process extends the filtration system’s life, and you will not need to buy a new filter each time you go out.
- This filter from the hiker Pro series comes with a transparent body to see how the filtration process occurs.
- Katadyn Hiker Pro Transparent Water Filter is mega lightweight, compact, and compatible with all types of hydration bladders. You can fit the nozzle in any water hydration bag you wish to filter.
- This product comes with a pre-filter and an extra sturdy carry bag in which you can store the pumping system for later uses.
Cons
- As the product is decent, everyone loves it, especially if you travel in a group, but the tiny mechanisms’ construction quality is not sturdy. Few reviews suggest that some pieces come loose and other components break down as soon as you apply some pressure.
Buying Advice
We would highly recommend this product if you do not want to suck on a tube to drink water every time. Since it’s a pump, you can very quickly fill lots of water bladders or bottles that can be used by other people too.
Consider buying this product for a hassle-free clean water drawing experience from the water sources if you have a partner or a group with you.
Alternative: Sawyer MINI Water Filtration System
- Manufacturer: Sawyer Products
- Material: Plastic
- Weight: 1.6 ounces
- Item dimension: 5.91 x 1.57 x 1.57 inches
- Type: Adjustable tube filtration system
- Capacity: This product can clean 100,000 gallons of water.
Sawyer mini is the best survival water filter system available in the market, which is why it is our 1st runner-up.
Users who have used this product have never shifted or changed to another brand because of its features and water purification quality.
Let us look at the positives and negatives of this product so you can make your mind whether to include this product on your final list or not.
Pros
- As understood by the name, the Sawyer Mini is very small and fits in the palms of your hands. The small size makes it ideal for storing anywhere in your bag.
- This product weighs 2 ounces but still gives high performance with its 0.1-micron inline filter.
- Sawyer mini removes 100% of microplastics found in water along with 99.9999% of protozoa and 99.99999% of all bacteria, be it E-coli, cholera, salmonella. Your water will be spotless and taste the same with no hint of foul smells and tastes.
- This product can be attached to the drinking pouch given with this product, disposable standard water bottles, hydration packs, or you can drink directly from the water source through the straw.
- This product comes with an extra straw and a syringe for cleaning the product.
- Great for outdoors, domestic and international traveling as well. You can add this filtration system to your emergency preparedness bag.
Cons
- Some verified users have complained that the product’s cap easily rips off and falls out on the ground. They have to handle the product very carefully, which is impossible in every situation. A product built for the outdoors should be sturdy to withstand rough usage. They do not sell spare or extra caps in the event of one damaged one.
- As the system comes with different small gadgets, it is necessary to have a dedicated pouch which the manufacturer doesn’t sell.
Buying Advice
You can buy this product if you want the freedom of drinking through other bottles and different bags, along with directly drinking from a stream.
Make sure you flush the filter with clean water by the provided syringe as it will increase the life of your straw, and you can avoid the issue of straw clogging.
Alternative: Etekcity Water Filter Straw
- Manufacturer: Etekcity
- Material: Plastic, carbon, ABS, PP, Silica Gel
- Weight: 2.12 ounces
- Item dimension: 31 x 160mm
- Type: Water filter straw
- Capacity: One straw can filter around 1500 liters of polluted water.
Etekcity straw is probably the best survival water filter straw you can purchase in the market.
This set comes with few additional items along with a straw, making it extremely handy to drink water even from the dirtiest puddles.
Let us look at why this product ranks as a second runner-up in our best portable water filter survival guide.
Pros
- This product has four defense lines through which the water goes through before it reaches you. Pre-filter stops large contaminants that might be present in the water. Ion- exchange resin helps remove heavy metal ions, chlorine, and THMs. Activated carbon works efficiently to remove and eliminate odor. The final UF inline membrane is 0.01 mm hollow fiber that filters 99.9999% of waterborne rubbish.
- Etekcity water filter system meets EPA water quality standards. The German TüV SüD examination institute has tested the product.
- The lightweight feature makes it easy to store anywhere in your camping backpack. You can buy a few of these filters and use them in case of emergency by keeping them in a bug-in or bug-out backpack.
- This water filtration system comes with a sleek, foldable water pouch measuring 480 ml with a type D hook. Extra gadgets and filtration include a syringe for backwashing the device, an inlet mouthpiece, four PP cotton pads, and an extension tube of 70 cm.
Cons
- The filter system works nicely, but some customers have had a tough time drinking water through this device due to the four-dense defense system.
- This filter device is only compatible with the storing devices that they have offered; you do not have the option of pre-filling all the bottles all at once.
Buying Advice
If you include the whole set in your backpack, make sure your bag has some space.
We recommend this product to all young and healthy people who can spend their energy drawing water out through the filter straw.
Alternative: Life Straw Water Filter Bottle Adapter
- Manufacturer: Vestergaard- LifeStraw
- Material: Plastic
- Weight: 8.68 Ounces
- Item dimensions: 2.5 x 2.5 x 7.3 inches
- Type: Bottle adapter
- Capacity: 1000 gallons, carbon filter 25 gallons
LifeStraw is the best survival filter straw bottle adapter available in the market. Let us look at the pros and cons to find out why?
Pros
- This product comes with a replaceable capsule of activated carbon that very efficiently removes chlorine, chemicals and improves taste.
- A replaceable microbiological filter removes 99.999% of waterborne protozoan parasites along with 99.999999% of waterborne bacteria.
- The standard and silicone mouthpieces of this product use food-grade silicone material.
- Perfect for carrying anywhere as you can convert any water bottle into a clean water filtering water bottle within seconds.
- This product comes with standard and wide mouth caps, standard and sports mouthpieces, a leak-proof lid with loop, and a handy carry bag.
- The company provides one needy school student a year’s worth of fresh, clean water if you purchase one product from their company.
Cons
- As they have marketed their entire product on its versatility, few customers dislike this product as it does not fit camelback eddy bottles.
- The straw of this product is very long for small bottles and very small for long bottles.
Buying Advice
It is a good product if you search for an adapter filter system that works on different types of bottles.
Survival Water Filter FAQs
Can viruses be filtered out of water?
One thing to keep in mind when you think of viruses and filtration is that a virus can be removed through a purifier and not through regular filtration.
Microfilters tend to remove just bacteria and parasites, so whenever you want to filter your water to kill the virus, you need a water purifier and not a water filter.
You can carry this filter as an agent or in the form of a device. Read where you are going, study the common viruses they might have in their water stream, and then pack your bag accordingly.
Can water filters kill bacteria?
Yes, water filters can effectively kill bacteria, but you need to make sure that the type of water filter you use kills bacteria from dirty water.
If you are sure that the water will not be that harmful, you can trust a standard water filtration system. The most effective water filtration system to remove bacteria is the reverse osmosis water filtration system.
You can remove water bacteria by UV radiation or chlorination. Always consider water filters even while you are at home, avoid drinking tap water.
How do you filter water in a survival situation?
Water filtration is not the most challenging part of your survival journey, but it sure is essential. If you ignore this step, it can indeed have destructive consequences.
Some of the easiest and practical ways to filter water are:
Boiling
Boiling water is one of the most straightforward practices of water filtration. You can boil clear water and stagnant water but avoid boiling dirty and muddy water as it will make you sick.
Make sure you boil the water for more than 10 minutes. Let the water bubble for 5 minutes; this will ensure the water is safe and devoid of microorganisms.
The DIY water filtration system
Filtering water will not remove most microorganisms, but this process will remove physical dirt and debris. Cut an empty water bottle at the end and pierce a tiny hole in the center of the cap.
Close the lid but add a piece of cloth between the bottle and cap and fasten it. Now start adding a layer of rock, sand, activated charcoal, sand, moss/grass, and a piece of cloth at the end. Your water filtration device is ready.
Plants
Yes, you heard it right, plants can clean the water, but this is very risky as you need to be familiar with plants to carry out this step. A wrong plant can cause allergies or more serious health issues.
You can use plants like Rice and coconut, banana peels, cilantro, xylem, java plum seed, moringa oleifera, Oregon grape for the process. Add these plants to a container and seal the box.
These plants and food items will act as a filtration system giving you clean drinking water.
Tablet
These water tablets are readily available in the market. You measure the water you have and put one pill in the water. Swirl the water and let it sit for 15 to 20 minutes.
Using a tablet is the best survival water filter system you can get your hands on. We recommend that you carry these useful tablets with you everywhere you go, especially in your bug-out bag.
There might be chances that you don’t have the materials we have mentioned up or your water filter system broke. Using these tablets in such situations can be very helpful.
How can you tell if the water is safe to drink in the wild?
You should remember that no water is 100 percent safe to drink, primarily in the wild. You will have a hard time figuring out whether the water is safe or not because of the water’s looks.
The deadly microorganisms and pathogens are not visible to our eyes. Thus we can end up drinking water that might be harmful.
Although there are few things that you can look around before drinking water that can tell you if the water is safe to drink or not. Water that is flowing is always safe.
If you find a flowing stream of fresh water, you can drink the water without worrying. If the water you are about to drink is not moving and is stagnant in one place, you should try to avoid drinking that water.
It will most definitely be a breeding ground for insects, pathogens, and protozoan. Look for animal tracks; if animals are drinking the water, you can drink it too.
Flowing water from rivers through ravines is the safest, but groundwater is another water source that you can drink. Look for mud or signs of saturation and start digging deeper.
In most cases, the water will be dirty because of dirt and extensive sediments. You can fill the water in a cup or bottle and let it sit for a while, all the dirt will get accumulated in the end, and you will have clean water to drink.
Another option to drink water is rainwater. Rainwater is not the most dependable water source as you can only drink it during the rainy season.
You can collect the water with a tarp’s help and drink it. Use a tee shirt for extra filtration. If it is raining, you can drink the water directly but make sure that you are standing under a clear sky to avoid dirty water.
Conclusion
It was our buyer’s guide for the best survival water filter system. We hope that you like this article on water filtration systems. Make the best choice by choosing the correct device according to your needs.
We highly recommend that you carry a water purifier tablet with you for safety measures.
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