People around the world, do you drink tap water without boiling?

US here. Yes, can confirm I can, and do drink water from the tap without boiling. The city provides, maintains, and regularly checks the safety of the water. Notices are put out if something damages the pipes and a "water boiling" policy is put out promptly over local radio and/or newspaper.

Lol, I was you 10 years ago. For context I'm Malaysian and we only drink water that is first filtered and then boiled. When eating outside we generally avoid iced drinks unless it's a reputable shop.

Then I moved to Australia and reacted with utter horror to see my then-bf drink straight from the tap. I was like wtf you're going to get parasites! Spit it out!

Now I drink water like Aussies and my kid refills her bottle from the tap too. My parents, when they visit, still boil water to drink but they've at least stopped thinking we're trying to murder their grandchild.

Berlin, Germany: we drink water straight from the tap. It's free and delicious. If you don't feel like drinking tap, just drink a "Berliner Rohrperle". It's the same thing with a fancier name, because our tap water is awesome.

Nowadays we even have public drinking fountains dotted around the city.

In the US, the only time you'd have to boil water before drinking in most places is if there's something wrong with the water system and they put out a "boil water" advisory, and that's pretty rare. It's definitely not something you have to on a daily basis. Some people will use water filters but it's not usually a necessity.

If you can't drink your tap water without boiling, your government has totally failed you.

One thing to consider: While tab water in most of the developed world is potable,any water safety guarantees usually end where the house water pipes begin. Depending on the state of the piping, tap water might not be safe, even if the water supplyer says it's safe.

You can get a water test (especially bacteria is important) for relatively cheap. Last time I did such a test it was ~€60. It's not wrong to do one.

Also, the definition of potable water is that the water is potable after the tap has been running for 10(!) minutes.

Bacteria contaminated pipes are pretty common and if the water has been sitting in these biofilm-covered pipes over night or even longer, the water can become pretty harmful. Especially after you get home from a vacation, letting the water run for a decent amount of time might be a good thing.

Also: the worst thing that can happen to your water pipe system are blind pipes, so pipes that are connected only on one end. That could be e.g. left-over plumbing after remodeling or pipes that lead to unused taps. If at all possible, these ahould be removed or flushed at best daily.

México. NO. Do not drink the tap water. Boiling does not help. It has a bunch of heavy metals and other contaminants in it. It sucks because mechanical filtering is incapable of removing them effectively. Reverse osmosis does but it is a challenging and expensive process to properly keep in your house. We always buy bottled water. Trucks deliver twice a week.

Netherlands: our tap water is better than bottled spring water

Finland

Yes. Our tap water is among the cleanest on earth

When i lived in hongkong i never boiled the water, i just drank it from the tap

At home I exclusively drink tap water. I only boil it for tea sometimes :) I‘m from Germany.

yep, i'll drink straight from the tap. i live in california, united states. it is even common to have drinking fountains in public spaces: special button activated taps that spurt cool tap water into the air for you to drink from.

I live in a major Italian city, I'm well over fifty, and I've always drunk unfiltered water straight from the tap without boiling. Some Italians apparently don't like the taste of tap water but it's still safe to drink it unfiltered and unboiled in nearly all the country.

Canada - Many people here put water in the fridge or a britta jug to get rid of the chlorine taste

I live in Seattle WA in usa. We have some of the cleanest water. This is because of the great fire of 1889. An entire district and most of the waterfront went up in flames. The reason is that the fire department had no water pressure because of all the demand from the attempt to put out the fire.

After that they got the cedar river shed. A huge amount of land that is owned by Seattle and kept pristine.

So yes you can drink the tap water in Seattle.

But I only drink la croix, lol

NL here. Tap water here is a very well managed substance, and as a result, it's not only hella safe, but hella tasty as well.

Belgium: yes! We drink tap water. Straight from the tap. Hardness varies from city to city. At my home I have a filter to make the water softer. That helps the taste but also keeps all faucets etc running.

Spainiard here. You can drink tap water everywhere (that's connected to the drinking water network, obviously), but there are better tasting waters than others. Madrid's water is bad, Barcelona's is atrocious (I don't know anyone living there that doesn't buy bottled water, it even gives weird flavours when cooking), but other places are nicer. My town's water is awesome, I just fill up bottles from the tap and put them in the fridge for easy cold water and laugh at the camacus.

I live in Sweden. Yeah, the tap water is clean and can be drank straight from the tap without boiling, filtering, or treatment in the whole country.

Switzerland here,

Yes we absolutely drink tap water here, not only it is well regulated but it may also beat many bottled water in terms of taste..

In France tap water is drinkable and good almost anywhere, the exceptions being in some cities during drought or due to unusual pollution. I actually dislike most mineral bottled water because I find it tastes like something.

I used to live in Thailand, while the authorities say the water is good you'll likely get sick if you drink water straight from the tap. I used to buy my water from a filtering machine near my condo.

I live in South Florida. The tap water in my area is safe. I drink it without boiling or filtering.

We filter our tap water here in Korea. Most people do, but as I understand, it's safe to drink it just straight from the tap. It's just better through a machine that gets rid of any lingering chlorine and heats it or chills it for you.

Australian here, never met anyone who boils tap water before drinking it. Some people have filtered water taps installed but our tap water is usually pretty great, I drink probably 2-3 litres of it a day

Germany here. My family and I drink tap-water all the time. No problems. Sometimes the Water could be contaminated with certain bacteria, but thats rare and the local government will warn you.

I live in the great lakes region of Canada and our tap water is totally safe

Croatia here,

tap water is completely drinkable and safe without any boiling. Exception are some more remote islands, so if you are going on some island, chekc if the tap water is drinkable.

Fun fact: Croatia actually uses drinkable water for toilets as well, altough i would not drink from a toilet :)

UK. Yip. Water "hardness" varies across the country which means people usually prefer the taste of the water in the region they grow up in. Other than all the leaky underground pipes and lack of investment in a privatised service, UK water is actaully very good.

In the United States, it is a little bit different.

There are "standards" that water quality has to live up to. Do these standards actually meet the criteria for safe drinkable tap water? Not always. This is evident in places like Flint, Michigan and other poorer urban areas.

Some of the tap water can be so bad that people wouldn't dare to drink it even after boiling.

In some areas, the tap water quality is wonderful.

Here is a relatively decent source about the topic as it pertains to the USA. https://wisevoter.com/state-rankings/best-tap-water-in-the-us/#:~:text=The%20ten%20states%20with%20the,%2C%20South%20Dakota%2C%20and%20Nevada.

The long story short here, is certain places like Hawaii have extremely clean tap. Other places, like Texas, are notorious for having numerous water quality violations.

It falls down to each individual State and City for maintaining the standards that were set. In my opinion, it it just an easy way for them to waive liability at the end of the day.

X.

Here in the Netherlands (and I’m pretty sure most Western European countries) its perfectly safe to drink tap water without boiling

aa

Bermuda here, straight from the tap!

It actually gets collected from rain water on each individual home's roof. The roofs are lime-washed to kill the really nasty stuff as it runs down in to a holding tank under the house. Some times you get dead critters in there, but nothing larger than a small lizard or bug. They tend to sink to the bottom of the tank, below the outlets.

Most Bermudians swear by a "cup of bleach" thrown down there every couple of years. It's in to a tank that's 10,000gal+ at a minimum (mine's over 40,000), so it's basically homeopathy at that point - but the lime-wash works!

The only place you'll want to avoid it in Bermuda is in the City of Hamilton (mains, not great quality), a house with a dirty roof, or in one near the sole power station on the island. This is an on-going fight to get them to adhere to the emissions safety standards they claim to.

White roofs and smoke stack in the picture!

Manila, Philippines: My drinking water comes from a delivery service that drops off a few blue containers of drinking water every few days. I've never swallowed tap water but I do use tap water when rinsing after toothbrushing. The sticker on the blue containers has the company name on it, contact details (obviously), and something about "18-stages latest US technology".

Argentinian here, depends on the region of the country, in most places it's safe to drink tap water although it usually has too much chlorine or in small rural cities like mine sometimes there's a bacteria leak on the water so we prefer to buy bottled water

Italy here: tap water is drinkable BY LAW, at least inside houses and public places.

Important:

Despite the overall quality of the water in the region, the water pipes can ruin it. If you got lead pipes you should avoid drinking the water or using it for cooking. Boiling won't change it.

In Germany, landlords are legally required to tell you if there are lead pipes in your house, don't know about other countries. Typically, the risk of having lead pipes is higher if the house is older.

TL;DR: lead pipes are very bad

In Germany tap water is considered "one of the most strictly controlled food products"

Tap water in Brazil is supposed to be drinkable, but I use a filter anyways because I don't trust the companies.

The further I searched, the more it seems to me that in developed countries (like US, Canada and the above examples), tap water is safe to drink directly. Is that true? Do you drink tap water without boiling?

Yes. It's a bit of a scandal when that's not true. (Canada here)

And to my surprise, I checked the Water Supplies Department website and notice it asserts that tap water in Hong Kong is potable, like many well-developed countries and regions.

Boiling it has to be "force of habit", then. I wonder how long it's been potable. I'm guessing mainland China is mostly boil-first.

I live in Melbourne Australia and we drink water straight out of the tap. Even restaurants give you tap water

Australian here, yes. Our tap water is pretty good

In this US, yes, we generally trust our tap water (although there have been notable incidents of water infrastructure failures, such as major lead contamination in Flint, MI), to the extent that if you get a drink in a restaurant here, 99% of the time it's going to be mixed or made using tap water, with ice made from tap water.

Some folks will use a filter (Brita brand filter pitchers used to be popular at one time, with TV ads and everything) but that's more for filtering out chemicals/toxins/minerals than anything else.

In rural places, every now and then the local government or water company (yes, a lot of places here have privatized water infrastructure which is not super great) will put out a 'Boil Water Notice' but this is generally considered outside of the norm, and you usually expect to see that kind of stuff resolve within a couple of days unless it's a result of a major disaster (we were under a Boil Water notice for 2 weeks after hurricane Katrina in my area, the longest stretch I ever remember). Boil Water notices are usually a result of either a breach of the infrascture (a pipe collapsing and the water supply getting dirty), or a water supply failing its regular quality/safety tests. Our water (can't speak for everywhere in the US, and don't really know the specifics of how they do it) is chemically treated and filtered before it goes into the tap, and the supply mechanisms are usually regularly tested to make sure they're within safe standards.

All of that being said, I know people who refuse to drink tap water, mostly because it tends to have a distinct taste from treatment and from having minerals in it, but also because they've heard horror stories like in Flint. Two things: those folks normally drink bottled water, which is usually just bottled-up tap water from some other place; and I usually see those folks gladly drinking fountain drinks/tea/etc at a restaurant, which is made with un-boiled tap water and served on tap-ice.

TL;DR - the tap water in the US is generally considered safe to drink, in most places, with notable exceptions, and for now (our mostly-privatized infrastructure is getting worse and worse, and very public failures have started to appear in not only water infrastructure, but everywhere)

Spain here, tap water is safe for drinking everywhere, though you might have some issues in small old towns. But generally you will not contract any illnesses nor have any health issues, 100% guarranteed

Yep, in the Netherlands we drink tap water all the time. No reason to boil it, except for tea of coffee of course.

I’ve been to Iceland a few years ago. The tap water often had a strong smell of sulfur, especially in the capital, Reykjavik.

Maybe it’s still safe to drink, but the taste was not great. Even showering was not awesome.

I visited australia and we had to drink from the tap.

Netherlands, yes we drink straight from the tap. We're in the top 5 of safest drinking water in the world. Buying bottles of water is a marketing trick for fools out here.

Eastern US here. Definitely can drink without boiling. I do filter it, though. I'm more concerned about metals and particulates than pathogens.

You can drink the tap water in most places in Iceland without boiling it (especially in Reykjavik), but if you're further into the countryside then I would check first!

Australian here. Yes, I regularly drink water from the tap without boiling it.

The only exception is if Sydney Water issue a "Boil water" alert. That usually only happens after really major flooding though.

I live in the USA, and we don't have to boil tap water in my city, but after having lived for a spell in a place where tap water is boiled first, I boil mine because I like the way it tastes--it's sweeter. Maybe boiling it helps get rid of the chlorine taste that city water has? I don't know. But I do prefer it.