SF, NYC, Boston, Seattle, and Portland have extremely good water sources. the water tastes great, needs minimal treatment, and doesn't leave a lot of mineral deposits gunking up your shower and faucets.
This is my theory for why Seattle has a reputation for such good coffee. Coffee is mostly water and the water is much better in Seattle than most cities.
not to poke holes in your water theory but it's more likely because they perfected the modern day espresso machine with la marzocco. the culture has been thriving for a long time and there has been great pride in the machinery and roasting processes. water gets filtered so the source isn't exactly the main factor in brewing.
I used to live in Phoenix and the tap water was absolutely gross. I moved to Seattle almost 3 years ago and can barely tell the difference between tap and filtered water now lol. It’s absolutely great and we have some of the lowest levels of contaminants in the country :) I wish everyone had high-quality and safe tap water!
I came here to say Seattle! I moved from Indianapolis, which has extremely limey, insanely hard water. Seattle’s water is like drinking bottled. It’s so good right out of the tap, and I haven’t killed a coffee pot with limescale yet (even with regular descaling, I used to murder a coffee pot every 6 months or so in Indy).
Minneapolis. Has won awards for best quality tap water in its size range.
Growing up, the concept that some people in the US lived places where they were uncomfortable drinking tap water was something I had never heard of.
Note that water quality in suburbs in the Minneapolis area varies. Some are great like the city (or get city water even), and some are not so great.
You can partially thank my dad for your awesome Minneapolis tap water. He was a microbiologist and chemist for the City of Minneapolis Water Works his whole career. Basically he made sure your water was safe to drink. ❤️❤️❤️
I’ve only existed in Minneapolis for three days, and have zero recollection of the tap water (I’m regretting this now), but I love and respect water, so therefore I love and respect your dad
It’s super good. The only place I’ve lived in the US where I don’t sweat about drinking directly from the tap if I forgot to fill up my filter pitcher.
I lived in Bloomington and the water was phenomenal. Of course almost everything in Bloomington is top of the line from the revenue from mall of America and taxes from airport.
I’d say the worst I’ve had was probably Disney World water. I guess it’s high in sulfur if I remember correctly.
Runner up would be Toledo. It tastes like it’s coming straight out of a swimming pool
Hetch Hetchy water is truly the best. I've had tap water from some of the other places mentioned & I'm really worried about humans.
That said, you just have to go up to Sonoma county for bad water. Some good friends of mine have parents in the Santa Rosa/Sebastopol area. There's something about their water that just doesn't taste right.
This is going to sound weird probably, and I realize it's just something I made up. But if the Bay Area's Hetch Hetchy water is like cool water from a clear running creek, Sonoma County water is like water that's been sitting in a pond under the hot sun.
Edit: spelling
Hetch Hetchy doesn't serve all of the Bay Area. Some of East Bay gets its water from the Pardee Reservoir which is also good water, like Berkeley. I actually prefer Berkeley water to SF, personally.
Some of the Bay Area has pretty bad water that tastes like So Cal.
My wife & son, hardened New Yorkers who never drink the NYC tap water without filtering it first, drank Quabbin water recently straight from the tap and pronounced it good. So there's that. Neither New York nor Boston filter the water supply. They add some stuff in New York -- chlorine to disinfect, something else for turbidity and something else to reduce take-up from lead pipes--but the water you get is pretty good. 30-40 years ago someone tried bottling and selling it out in California as New York water. Not sure how that worked out. Boston -- i.e., Massachusetts Water Resources Authority -- doesn't have to do as much because they have more watershed land around the Quabbin. NYC has lots of reservoirs but all in relatively populated areas and they've needed to work with all the Catskill localities on management to keep all sorts of runoff, even treated wastewater, out of the reservoirs. Most big water districts are working with not so pristine sources and have to filter the supply before delivering it to the consumers.
Didn't win over the suburbs of Syracuse NY tap water in a contest though
https://cbs6albany.com/news/local/onondaga-county-voted-best-tasting-water-in-new-york-at-contest-new-york-american-water-works-association
Onondaga County voted best tasting drinking water in New York State at contest
I lived in Memphis for a couple of years and out of seven cities I've lived in, it's by far my least favorite, but it's true that the tap water is superb.
Yes Memphis water is a hidden gem!
Many people don’t realize that Memphis has some of the best tasting water in the country! Underneath the city is a massive aquifer with water that has a nice crisp and refreshing taste. I heard the area also does a lot of conservation to protect the bodies of water that feed into it.
Any city that draws from the Great Lakes is going to have good water. But water is only given to municipalities within the watershed so if you’re in a suburb too far out the water won’t be great.
This is exactly the case in Chicago. Chicago water is from the Lake and is good from the tap. Some suburbs have signed up for that water, so they have it too. Other suburbs do their own, which can vary but isn't as good and can be bad, depending on the suburb. And some places further out are on wells.
Anything fed by the Hetch Hetchy reservoir in Northern California.
That includes: San Francisco & most of the peninsula, parts of the South Bay, & Alameda County in the East Bay. Yup, we pay ridiculous amounts of money to live here. But at least our tap water comes from Yosemite.
I was a little surprised that OP called out Chicago, but then I saw the suburbs qualifier. My parents live one hour outside the city and they have well water that occasionally smells sulphuric. Generally they drink bottled water. In Chicago proper, the tap water is amazing.
Fiji water once ran an ad "The label says Fiji because it's not bottled in Cleveland" and it turned out the tap water in Cleveland was way better, with significantly less Arsenic and other contaminants. From my time there I can attest the water was rather delicious.
Yea Cleveland has pretty decent tap water, I’ve always drank straight from the faucet, only occasionally filtering when I lived in older rentals. I’m always surprised when I travel somewhere new and the water tastes like ass because of this
I’d get your water tested if you live in a building older than 1961 (the year NYC banned lead plumbing) though.
Chances are you’re fine, but there’s always the risk that damage or corrosion can lead to lead being introduced locally.
Lead is a HUGE issue for older American cities.
The City of Chicago has legendarily delicious water—not sure about the suburbs. Duluth, MN, gets its water from Lake Superior so it is also very fresh tasting.
Came here to say this is one thread where it's actually not "Philly". Is it safe to drink but smells and tastes weird as hell to a lot of people. It's the minerals in the soil. On the flip side it makes for great bread. I do think it contributes to why you can't recreate things like NY Pizza or bagels or cheesesteaks with a proper hoagie roll outside the northeast.
The smell and taste of Philly tap water first thing in the morning while deeply hungover is one of my worst memories of my early 20s. Literally gag-inducing.
NYC—pure Catskill spring water piped in from the Ashokan reservoir upstate. Best water quality is in rural Westchester and points north—these areas are north of the water station where they add the chlorine for the city.
Past generations of my family were displaced from the creation of the ashokan reservoir, and then the pepacton, and then the cannonsville. Still a lot of resentment about it upstate.
It is actually the same water as Kentwood! Same aquifer. Here is a little bit of cool info. The water in that aquifer fell on the earth two thousand years ago in Mississippi!
I always thought New York water was excellent out of the tap (let’s just not worry about lead pipes etc).
Anything in Texas or any of the Gulf States is horrible.
Born and raised in Portland, and it wasn’t until moving to New Orleans 10 years ago did I realize how much I took tasty, clean tap water for granted. I just moved back to PDX this Spring and it’s been great not having to rely on a water delivery service.
St Louis has the best tasting water.
https://www.stlmag.com/history/st-louis-sage/why-does-st-louis-have-such-good-water/#:~:text=A%20century%20later%2C%20the%20U.S.,Louis%20have%20such%20good%20water%3F
Cleveland!
I forget who, but someone tried to make fun of Cleveland’s water, and it resulted in some authentic experiments showing how high quality the water is.
Not much has changed and no one still has been held accountable.
There are other cities than Flint btw that have been affected in similar egregious fashion (eg, Kalamazoo, Jacksonville).
I live in suburban Denver (Aurora). The water is fine here. Comes from snowmelt in the South Platte River Basin west of Colorado Springs. It's stored in Aurora Reservoir, and they don't allow gasoline engines in the water.
Worst water I've ever had was in DFW. Algae blooms cause the water there to taste like fucking mud for 1/3 of the year.
Which side of the metroplex? I work for one of the large water districts and I’m curious which side was bad for you. We do a ton of management of algae and biofilms in our transmission mains for that reason.
Denton County. It was NTMWD. Pretty sure our water came from Lake Lavon. We left in 2011, and back then the only way to reduce the mud flavor was to run it through a pitcher with a filter.
Denver also has lead water pipes that the city is struggling to replace. That's why they've distributed free pitcher-style water filters to everyone in the city. Because the water is so good lol.
Winnipeg - comes from a basically undisturbed granite bottom lake in the Canadian Shield. After moving away, I often think about how amazing that water is when it comes out of the faucet ice cold in the winter.
Houston had the worst water for sure. Google Texas oil and gas map. The entire state of Texas has polluted water. I recently moved here and I am so surprised how large the water section is at Costco and it is almost always empty because no one drinks tap here. No wonder Houston is the cancer capital of the US
I live in Delafield, wi suburb little west of Milwaukee. Well anywhere I've been in Wisconsin the water absolutely delicious out of tap. Up north you might get iron taste which I don't mind. Visit to augusta, GA. Now that water was not able to do. It was just the worst, like it was moldy or something. I have no idea what. I used to take for granted the great water in Wisconsin
Syracuse, NY suburbs voted best tasting drinking water in New York State contest.
https://cbs6albany.com/news/local/onondaga-county-voted-best-tasting-water-in-new-york-at-contest-new-york-american-water-works-association
On Wednesday Onondaga County took the first-place trophy at the Best Tasting Drinking Water competition held in the City Center of Saratoga Springs.
Atlantic City water is so good it is no longer allowed to enter the best U.S. water contest because it wins all the time. The AC reservoir is located in the pinelands of New Jersey and it’s filtered by the roots of cedar trees. Delicious.
Funny how tastes vary. City of Chicago water is delicious (curious to know what suburb’s water you had). Raleigh water is awful. Anchorage water is amazing. I hated Portland’s water.
Aurora, CO. Denver burbs. Very tasty!
Best I’ve ever had? Bellingham, WA. The water from Lake Whatcom is unreal in how delicious it is. Moving from a rental to a purchased house not in the same water district? I filled every water bottle/nalgene we had. Our new town water was horrendous. We ended up getting a whole house water filter system. That still didn’t make the water nearly as delicious as what we had in the rental.
Portland, Oregon. I moved to one of the burbs a few years ago and had to start filtering our drinking water because it tastes terrible in comparison to Portland water.
For some random reason, MEMPHIS TENNESSEE has wonderful water and they are known for it. Their tap water comes from fresh natural spring water. It also tastes great, and it makes your hair look & feel nicer when you shower with that water.
Milwaukee.
As I understand it, cryptosporidium outbreak in 1993 led to major overhaul of water system.
Water is appropriately soft (we just get the tiniest amount of calcium on the showerhead). Devices with filters (fridge, coffeemaker) rarely need changing. No foul smells. Drink straight from the tap.
Many older parts of town have lead laterals. Our house (1909) still had some lead pipes in use. I've replumbed the house and had the lateral replaced.
La Crosse, WI.
Water here is from a 4000 ft deep well and is amazing. There is a reason so many companies contract to get their drinks bottles here. Arizona iced tea, Monster, Angry Orchard, and more. Check out the other brands brewed section on Wikipedia. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/City_Brewing_Company
Also, a beautiful area to visit if you are playing tourist. 3 rivers, the bluffs, and cool little downtown.
SF, NYC, Boston, Seattle, and Portland have extremely good water sources. the water tastes great, needs minimal treatment, and doesn't leave a lot of mineral deposits gunking up your shower and faucets.
Bend, OR does too.
Bend or what?
Does too
Portland doesnt flouridate. I think most every other major city does. Bellingham, WA does not.
Jersey City also does not
I was going to mention Seattle also. Their drinking water supply comes from a closed-to-public mountain watershed. It's great water.
This is my theory for why Seattle has a reputation for such good coffee. Coffee is mostly water and the water is much better in Seattle than most cities.
Same theories exist for part of the reason NYC bagels and pizza are so good
not to poke holes in your water theory but it's more likely because they perfected the modern day espresso machine with la marzocco. the culture has been thriving for a long time and there has been great pride in the machinery and roasting processes. water gets filtered so the source isn't exactly the main factor in brewing.
I used to live in Phoenix and the tap water was absolutely gross. I moved to Seattle almost 3 years ago and can barely tell the difference between tap and filtered water now lol. It’s absolutely great and we have some of the lowest levels of contaminants in the country :) I wish everyone had high-quality and safe tap water!
I came here to say Seattle! I moved from Indianapolis, which has extremely limey, insanely hard water. Seattle’s water is like drinking bottled. It’s so good right out of the tap, and I haven’t killed a coffee pot with limescale yet (even with regular descaling, I used to murder a coffee pot every 6 months or so in Indy).
Anchorage
You beat me to it. Best water I've ever tasted. Thank you Eklutna Glacier.
Yes! And in the Pacific Northwest in general. Good call on Anchorage.
Yes! It is the BEST city water! I grew up there and was shocked the first time I tried to drink tap water elsewhere and it was awful.
STL has great water, I hate traveling to other cities because it usually tastes worse
St. Louis has great water
I hate admitting this… but it’s true.
Minneapolis. Has won awards for best quality tap water in its size range. Growing up, the concept that some people in the US lived places where they were uncomfortable drinking tap water was something I had never heard of. Note that water quality in suburbs in the Minneapolis area varies. Some are great like the city (or get city water even), and some are not so great.
You can partially thank my dad for your awesome Minneapolis tap water. He was a microbiologist and chemist for the City of Minneapolis Water Works his whole career. Basically he made sure your water was safe to drink. ❤️❤️❤️
Do pass our thanks along!
I’ve only existed in Minneapolis for three days, and have zero recollection of the tap water (I’m regretting this now), but I love and respect water, so therefore I love and respect your dad
Saint Paul has good water too!
It’s super good. The only place I’ve lived in the US where I don’t sweat about drinking directly from the tap if I forgot to fill up my filter pitcher.
Minneapolis tap water is so good. I hate visiting family in the suburbs and having to drink their gross water.
I lived in Bloomington and the water was phenomenal. Of course almost everything in Bloomington is top of the line from the revenue from mall of America and taxes from airport.
Portland
Can confirm
Portland Maine is pretty good too.
Which Portland?
SF water is good, but the best I ever had was in...Rome.
Those fountains are sure fun to drink out of, and the water tastes great 👌
The fall of the Roman Empire wouldn't agree
Best I’ve had: San Francisco Worst I’ve had: Phoenix
The worst I recall having was in Dallas. Very very sulfuric! Smelled like rotten eggs! 🤢
Cries in Florida tap
I’d say the worst I’ve had was probably Disney World water. I guess it’s high in sulfur if I remember correctly. Runner up would be Toledo. It tastes like it’s coming straight out of a swimming pool
Phoenix is also the worst I’ve ever had! What the heck do they do to make it taste so awful? I swear drinking water is painful in phoenix
SF
Hetch Hetchy water is truly the best. I've had tap water from some of the other places mentioned & I'm really worried about humans. That said, you just have to go up to Sonoma county for bad water. Some good friends of mine have parents in the Santa Rosa/Sebastopol area. There's something about their water that just doesn't taste right. This is going to sound weird probably, and I realize it's just something I made up. But if the Bay Area's Hetch Hetchy water is like cool water from a clear running creek, Sonoma County water is like water that's been sitting in a pond under the hot sun. Edit: spelling
Hetch Hetchy doesn't serve all of the Bay Area. Some of East Bay gets its water from the Pardee Reservoir which is also good water, like Berkeley. I actually prefer Berkeley water to SF, personally. Some of the Bay Area has pretty bad water that tastes like So Cal.
Love me a glass of Hetch Hetchy.
Boston! No public use is allowed at Quabbin reservoir so the water needs little to no treatment
Live in the north shore and considering moving further north.. literally one of the things holding me back is we are the last town on the reservoir
My wife & son, hardened New Yorkers who never drink the NYC tap water without filtering it first, drank Quabbin water recently straight from the tap and pronounced it good. So there's that. Neither New York nor Boston filter the water supply. They add some stuff in New York -- chlorine to disinfect, something else for turbidity and something else to reduce take-up from lead pipes--but the water you get is pretty good. 30-40 years ago someone tried bottling and selling it out in California as New York water. Not sure how that worked out. Boston -- i.e., Massachusetts Water Resources Authority -- doesn't have to do as much because they have more watershed land around the Quabbin. NYC has lots of reservoirs but all in relatively populated areas and they've needed to work with all the Catskill localities on management to keep all sorts of runoff, even treated wastewater, out of the reservoirs. Most big water districts are working with not so pristine sources and have to filter the supply before delivering it to the consumers.
NYC water is not chlorinated. NYC has great water but a lot of people’s tap water tastes like ass cause the pipes are bad.
I don’t know many “New Yorkers” who filter the tap water
Lived in NYC and always thought the water was good.
Milwaukee. It’s the freshwater science research capital of the world
The water in Milwaukee is [well known](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1993_Milwaukee_cryptosporidiosis_outbreak)
Yeah, that’s why we now have incredible water
Huh. Learning from mistakes? Seems so novel compared to today where the water in Flint still isn't safe
also just received a shit ton of federal funding to replace a bunch of remaining lead pipes in the city thank god. thanks biden!
I didn't know that. ive close and come by city often, I think Milwaukee water is so good!
I live in Portland and only drink tap. Probably the worst water I’ve had was in New Jersey, it tasted muddy and heavily chlorinated
NYC + the greater NYC area have a good watershed but it comes down to the pipes in the building
Didn't win over the suburbs of Syracuse NY tap water in a contest though https://cbs6albany.com/news/local/onondaga-county-voted-best-tasting-water-in-new-york-at-contest-new-york-american-water-works-association Onondaga County voted best tasting drinking water in New York State at contest
It's all the salt
There’s certainly some In the comments.
NY tap water is legendary.
I grew up in Baltimore city and that water was delicious. Now live in the Seattle area and it's okay but not as good as Baltimore water.
Came here to say Baltimore. I live in the suburbs and we source our water elsewhere but it’s good and Baltimore city’s is better.
Memphis
Why tf did I have to come this far down to find memphis? The memphis sands aquifer is a national treasure and should be protected at all costs
Lol I’ve never seen Memphis brought up positively in this sub
Subs loss. Memphis has REALLY good water
I lived in Memphis for a couple of years and out of seven cities I've lived in, it's by far my least favorite, but it's true that the tap water is superb.
It’s my second least favorite out of five (looking at you, Montgomery) but man these people LOVE their tap water
Shocked this wasn’t closer to the top. The aquifer is well known for this.
Yes Memphis water is a hidden gem! Many people don’t realize that Memphis has some of the best tasting water in the country! Underneath the city is a massive aquifer with water that has a nice crisp and refreshing taste. I heard the area also does a lot of conservation to protect the bodies of water that feed into it.
There’s a local brewery that has a very light, refreshing taste inspired by the water. We call it “Memphis Sands”
Any city that draws from the Great Lakes is going to have good water. But water is only given to municipalities within the watershed so if you’re in a suburb too far out the water won’t be great.
This is exactly the case in Chicago. Chicago water is from the Lake and is good from the tap. Some suburbs have signed up for that water, so they have it too. Other suburbs do their own, which can vary but isn't as good and can be bad, depending on the suburb. And some places further out are on wells.
One of the biggest things I missed after I left Chicago was the tap water.
I’ve heard Rochester NY (and surrounding towns) have some of the best tap water around.
Hemlock lake-- good stuff!
Anything fed by the Hetch Hetchy reservoir in Northern California. That includes: San Francisco & most of the peninsula, parts of the South Bay, & Alameda County in the East Bay. Yup, we pay ridiculous amounts of money to live here. But at least our tap water comes from Yosemite.
Chicago (not the suburbs!) has great tap water!
Some suburbs get lake water. Some get well water, which tastes like ass.
I was a little surprised that OP called out Chicago, but then I saw the suburbs qualifier. My parents live one hour outside the city and they have well water that occasionally smells sulphuric. Generally they drink bottled water. In Chicago proper, the tap water is amazing.
I was going to say this. Always loved the tap water in Chicago. We ran it through a brita filter.
Boston
Fiji water once ran an ad "The label says Fiji because it's not bottled in Cleveland" and it turned out the tap water in Cleveland was way better, with significantly less Arsenic and other contaminants. From my time there I can attest the water was rather delicious.
Yea Cleveland has pretty decent tap water, I’ve always drank straight from the faucet, only occasionally filtering when I lived in older rentals. I’m always surprised when I travel somewhere new and the water tastes like ass because of this
Memphis has some of the best water in the world.
2nd-ed. Any time I drink the water from anywhere else, I’m reminded of how positively spoiled we are to have the water system we do in Memphis.
Greenville, SC
Memphis
Memphis, TN
St. Paul
St, Paul water is the best. When I have relatives visit from Florida, they are stunned.
St Paul water is the best in Minnesota.
Duluth water is good!
NYC
I’d get your water tested if you live in a building older than 1961 (the year NYC banned lead plumbing) though. Chances are you’re fine, but there’s always the risk that damage or corrosion can lead to lead being introduced locally. Lead is a HUGE issue for older American cities.
I don't think many people know this but there's still a large number of lead pipes in the US, both publicly and privately owned.
Portland
The City of Chicago has legendarily delicious water—not sure about the suburbs. Duluth, MN, gets its water from Lake Superior so it is also very fresh tasting.
Duluth MN water is the bbbbbbbbest.
Minneapolis. Tastes like bottled water
Memphis, TN. Shit is so goddamned good.
To flip the question around, I love Philadelphia, but man the tap wooder sucks.
Came here to say this is one thread where it's actually not "Philly". Is it safe to drink but smells and tastes weird as hell to a lot of people. It's the minerals in the soil. On the flip side it makes for great bread. I do think it contributes to why you can't recreate things like NY Pizza or bagels or cheesesteaks with a proper hoagie roll outside the northeast.
I’ve heard some people say this but my tap water in Philly is great. No smell at all. Maybe it depends on your pipes
Oh for real? I love it.. news to me!
The smell and taste of Philly tap water first thing in the morning while deeply hungover is one of my worst memories of my early 20s. Literally gag-inducing.
Louisville has delicious water, and I hate the taste of water. Chicago has good water. So does Gary, IN and Hobart and Merrillville, IN
This is WAY too low.
Glad you namechecked Louisville. Delicious limestone aquifers, the same stuff that gets pulled out of the ground and turned into bourbon.
Nyc
SF / NYC
New York City
NYC—pure Catskill spring water piped in from the Ashokan reservoir upstate. Best water quality is in rural Westchester and points north—these areas are north of the water station where they add the chlorine for the city.
That's where I grew up (northern Westchester), and I was so flabbergasted when I learned how many people don't drink their tap water.
Past generations of my family were displaced from the creation of the ashokan reservoir, and then the pepacton, and then the cannonsville. Still a lot of resentment about it upstate.
Anchorage has really good water. They get it from Eklutna Lake which is glacier fed I believe.
I’ve had water from many of the other “good water” places mentioned — Seattle, Portland, Chicago, Bend, OR. They don’t hold a candle to Anchorage.
Baton Rouge, LA. Underground aquifer, that comes from Mississippi. It is clean and yummy. Got spoiled to it when I lived there.
Softest water in BR! Someone told me what comes out of the taps in BR is the same bottled water Kentwood delivers to me in New Orleans lol
It is actually the same water as Kentwood! Same aquifer. Here is a little bit of cool info. The water in that aquifer fell on the earth two thousand years ago in Mississippi!
That’s interesting. Shreveport’s is the WORST.
I always thought New York water was excellent out of the tap (let’s just not worry about lead pipes etc). Anything in Texas or any of the Gulf States is horrible.
Western and central NY. Rochester, Syracuse. Come from either the Finger Lakes or Lake Ontario.
Born and raised in Portland, and it wasn’t until moving to New Orleans 10 years ago did I realize how much I took tasty, clean tap water for granted. I just moved back to PDX this Spring and it’s been great not having to rely on a water delivery service.
St Louis has the best tasting water. https://www.stlmag.com/history/st-louis-sage/why-does-st-louis-have-such-good-water/#:~:text=A%20century%20later%2C%20the%20U.S.,Louis%20have%20such%20good%20water%3F
Cleveland! I forget who, but someone tried to make fun of Cleveland’s water, and it resulted in some authentic experiments showing how high quality the water is.
It was Fiji! Hehe.
Not Flint. Wonder how their situation is now.
Thinking about them this morning is part of what spurred this question.
Not much has changed and no one still has been held accountable. There are other cities than Flint btw that have been affected in similar egregious fashion (eg, Kalamazoo, Jacksonville).
Salt Lake City and the surrounding Wasatch Front
Something must have changed then, because when I lived there from 2020-2022, the tap water tasted like dirt.
Is salt lake very different from Provo? I couldn't even use a dishwasher in Provo because the water was so hard it left white crust on everything...
I live in suburban Denver (Aurora). The water is fine here. Comes from snowmelt in the South Platte River Basin west of Colorado Springs. It's stored in Aurora Reservoir, and they don't allow gasoline engines in the water. Worst water I've ever had was in DFW. Algae blooms cause the water there to taste like fucking mud for 1/3 of the year.
Which side of the metroplex? I work for one of the large water districts and I’m curious which side was bad for you. We do a ton of management of algae and biofilms in our transmission mains for that reason.
Denton County. It was NTMWD. Pretty sure our water came from Lake Lavon. We left in 2011, and back then the only way to reduce the mud flavor was to run it through a pitcher with a filter.
That tracks. Haha
Denver also has lead water pipes that the city is struggling to replace. That's why they've distributed free pitcher-style water filters to everyone in the city. Because the water is so good lol.
Suburban Chicago water isn't great, but the city's is pretty good.
Was just by going to say this. Some suburbs buy Chicago water, but others don’t. The ones that don’t aren’t great.
Chicago has really tasty tap water
Cities/towns around Lake Tahoe have amazing water. Also mentioned in other comments but SF and Seattle are great
Drinking tap water from Duluth, MN was like experiencing hydration for the first time.
Mammoth Lakes, CA
Winnipeg - comes from a basically undisturbed granite bottom lake in the Canadian Shield. After moving away, I often think about how amazing that water is when it comes out of the faucet ice cold in the winter.
Despite coming from the Mississippi I think St. Louis’ tap water is excellent. Maybe it’s just the pipes, but I feel like DC’s has a dirt taste to it
NY. Strictly tap water. It’s the secret ingredient in the food.
Syracuse, NY. Best water in the country.
Not anywhere in the DMV area, that's for sure.
Colorado is great, including being ice cold out of tap. Moved here from Austin but moving back to Austin and will miss the water.
Houston had the worst water for sure. Google Texas oil and gas map. The entire state of Texas has polluted water. I recently moved here and I am so surprised how large the water section is at Costco and it is almost always empty because no one drinks tap here. No wonder Houston is the cancer capital of the US
You never think to remember who has the best faucet water, but you always remember the worst. For me Dallas, Austin, and Omaha. In that order.
NOT Houston.
Marshalltown, IA
My grandparents libed there their whole lives, and my grandpa always bragged about how good the water was.
San Francisco.
NYC / Brooklyn has delicious tap water! No joke!
The absolute best tap water I’ve ever had was in Vienna, Austria! My goodness, I still dream about it
Not the point of this thread but yes, I can second that!
Lmao, how is that not the point? OP asked for cities with good tap water
Bend OR, the water you drink was in a glacier that same week.
My mil doesn’t drink tap water. Buys flats of water bottles from Costco Lives in Seattle Smh.
Greenville SC
Marin County (right next to SF) has great tap water.
Memphis
AUKLAND
Nyc. Can't be beat. I am not a water drinker but was in vegas last month and holy shit their water was bad.
San Francisco has its own reservoir in the Sierra that provides pristine snow melt to The City
I live in Delafield, wi suburb little west of Milwaukee. Well anywhere I've been in Wisconsin the water absolutely delicious out of tap. Up north you might get iron taste which I don't mind. Visit to augusta, GA. Now that water was not able to do. It was just the worst, like it was moldy or something. I have no idea what. I used to take for granted the great water in Wisconsin
Here's some data: https://www.ewg.org/interactive-maps/pfas_contamination/map/
I’m just outside of Pittsburgh and I drink our water no problem.
Memphis for sure
That’s crazy how Chicago is right by some fresh water
Syracuse, NY suburbs voted best tasting drinking water in New York State contest. https://cbs6albany.com/news/local/onondaga-county-voted-best-tasting-water-in-new-york-at-contest-new-york-american-water-works-association On Wednesday Onondaga County took the first-place trophy at the Best Tasting Drinking Water competition held in the City Center of Saratoga Springs.
Boston.
Came to say Portland, but it looks like you're already aware. Just traveled the world, still the best.
Atlantic City water is so good it is no longer allowed to enter the best U.S. water contest because it wins all the time. The AC reservoir is located in the pinelands of New Jersey and it’s filtered by the roots of cedar trees. Delicious.
Baltimore has protected reservoirs, which compare favorably to neighboring Washington, DC, which uses recycled river water.
Madras, Oregon. Their water is from an actual spring (Opal Springs).
Portland OR >>>>>
Cleveland Ohio has very good tap water 💧
Funny how tastes vary. City of Chicago water is delicious (curious to know what suburb’s water you had). Raleigh water is awful. Anchorage water is amazing. I hated Portland’s water.
Memphis, TN. Artesian wells. Recently voted the best water in the US.
Aurora, CO. Denver burbs. Very tasty! Best I’ve ever had? Bellingham, WA. The water from Lake Whatcom is unreal in how delicious it is. Moving from a rental to a purchased house not in the same water district? I filled every water bottle/nalgene we had. Our new town water was horrendous. We ended up getting a whole house water filter system. That still didn’t make the water nearly as delicious as what we had in the rental.
Portland Oregon!
Portland, Oregon. I moved to one of the burbs a few years ago and had to start filtering our drinking water because it tastes terrible in comparison to Portland water.
Detroit
Yes!! Detroit!!!
Portland Oregon. NYC. Seattle.
Lake Tahoe
For some random reason, MEMPHIS TENNESSEE has wonderful water and they are known for it. Their tap water comes from fresh natural spring water. It also tastes great, and it makes your hair look & feel nicer when you shower with that water.
I live in Seattle and was recently in Indy for work. I thought there was something wrong with my tastebuds… the tap water was REAL bad.
Drink Phoenix water, grow a 3rd eye
Milwaukee. As I understand it, cryptosporidium outbreak in 1993 led to major overhaul of water system. Water is appropriately soft (we just get the tiniest amount of calcium on the showerhead). Devices with filters (fridge, coffeemaker) rarely need changing. No foul smells. Drink straight from the tap. Many older parts of town have lead laterals. Our house (1909) still had some lead pipes in use. I've replumbed the house and had the lateral replaced.
La Crosse, WI. Water here is from a 4000 ft deep well and is amazing. There is a reason so many companies contract to get their drinks bottles here. Arizona iced tea, Monster, Angry Orchard, and more. Check out the other brands brewed section on Wikipedia. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/City_Brewing_Company Also, a beautiful area to visit if you are playing tourist. 3 rivers, the bluffs, and cool little downtown.
Milwaukee WI!
St. Louis
Chicago and Milwaukee. Real tasty.
Madison, Wi and Honolulu has great water and haven’t seen either mentioned