Distilled water or rainwater for the aquarium?

You can distilled water or rainwater for the Aquarium use and use? This question keeps coming to us from aquarists. Especially when it comes to the water values to influence accordingly. In our guide to aquarium water, we focus on how important it is PH, CH or GH of tap water received. But now we want to go into two special waters. The rainwater and the distilled water. Both are mentioned again and again in connection with an aquarium. Both have their justification to be examined more closely.

Distilled water for the aquarium

Let's look at distilled water first. This has a special feature to normal tap water. Distilled water is soft and contains no hardness. Anyone who takes the trouble to measure distilled water precisely with a water test will find that it is water with a total hardness of GH of 0 and a carbonate hardness of 0 KH. The PH value also has a neutral value of around 7,0. The water could basically with the one Osmosis system / reverse osmosis system be compared, whereby the zero of GH and KH will not be reached there.

Bestseller no. 1

Tetra AquaSafe (quality water conditioner for fish-friendly and natural aquarium water, neutralizes fish-damaging substances in tap water), 500 ml bottle

12,16 EUR

ServicesBestseller no. 2

JBL water conditioner for freshwater aquariums, 500 ml, Biotopol 23003

Stress protection and strengthening of the immune system by vitamin B

10,99 EUR

Bestseller no. 3

Aquarium-Direkt water conditioner for the aquarium (perfect for full or partial water changes and for new setup - water treatment - tap water), size: 5 L

Ideal for full and partial water changes

;

For new installations of aquariums

19,79 EUR

Everything about osmosis can be found here.

So why use distilled water?

Reasons could be the influence of the water values ​​in the aquarium or nano aquarium. Anyone who gets particularly hard water from the tap here could add distilled water in order to influence and lower their values ​​accordingly.

• affect water parameters
• lower carbs
• lower GH
• lower PH

Distilled water: But does it all make sense and is it safe to pour the water into your aquarium?

There is no easy answer to this question. Special distilled water is commercially available. If you want to fall back on this, you should definitely not take just any one from the discounter. Here you usually get other substances in your aquarium. For example, it can happen that distilled water has been enriched with perfumes. Especially if it is used for ironing.

There is also another argument against using distilled water. Especially the price. Distilled water is simply too expensive for a weekly water change. Especially if you are in the range of 200 liter aquariums and larger. In a nano aquarium this might be fine, but everything else makes no sense in our opinion. The containers are usually only 5 liters in size.

So what would be the alternative to distilled water?

There is only one thing to say here. Buy one osmosis system. No matter how big it is, it brings a lot of advantages and is also easy to handle. This purchase quickly paid for itself. And you don't have to lug around heavy canisters.

Bestseller no. 1

Tetra AquaSafe (quality water conditioner for fish-friendly and natural aquarium water, neutralizes fish-damaging substances in tap water), 500 ml bottle

12,16 EUR

ServicesBestseller no. 2

JBL water conditioner for freshwater aquariums, 500 ml, Biotopol 23003

Stress protection and strengthening of the immune system by vitamin B

10,99 EUR

Bestseller no. 3

Aquarium-Direkt water conditioner for the aquarium (perfect for full or partial water changes and for new setup - water treatment - tap water), size: 5 L

Ideal for full and partial water changes

;

For new installations of aquariums

19,79 EUR

Rainwater for the aquarium

Now we come to another possibility to possibly relieve the domestic water bill. You could also do that here Water change do with collected rainwater. On the one hand this water would be free of charge and on the other hand there is plenty of it in our latitudes. But there are a few things to note here.

But first we come to the water values ​​of the rainwater. Basically, this is also quite mild. Although you can't get a value of 0 for GH and KH, values ​​of 2-5 can be achieved. The PH value can also level off at around 7, although this also depends very much on the area and the environmental pollution. Keyword acid rain.

However, there are still some substances in rainwater that are rather undesirable. In particular, the following should be mentioned:

So that you can do your water change with rainwater, there are a few things to consider:

In addition to the free rainwater, enrichment with certain microorganisms such as water fleas and the like could also be quite interesting. Many fish are happy about it. You could say live food for free.

Our recommendation:

If you want to influence your water values ​​today, you should use an osmosis system. We would not use distilled water. In addition to the price, the risk of messing up the water values ​​through other harmful pollutants is too high.

We are also very skeptical about rainwater. There are also some risks here and it is also not easy to collect and store the water accordingly. Above all, reaching the right moment is not easy. The first rain must first filter the pollutants from the air and also absorb them. Only then will it become cleaner and you could now catch it.

Spend some money and buy a reverse osmosis system.

Bestseller no. 1

VECARO distilled water 30 liters 6 canisters of 5 liters each

6 x 5 liters of Klax distilled water.; Prevents limescale residue - protects your steam iron.

24,99 EUR

Bestseller no. 2

Protecton Demineralized Water 1 liter

universal product; premium class; Car cleaning & care

1,99 EUR