For expecting mums
You cut the wine, the sushi and the soft cheese. You didn't cut the tap water.
From the day you conceived, your baby drinks everything you drink. Some of what's in tap water is added on purpose, like fluoride and chlorine. Some slips through unregulated, like forever chemicals, microplastics and heavy metals. All of it can reach the baby's side of the placenta.
The list you already live by
You changed almost everything. Here's the one thing left.
The moment you saw two lines, you rewrote your whole day. Every one of these you've already handled, without a second thought.
It's the one thing on the list you drink two litres of, every single day of your pregnancy.
What you're actually drinking
Five things in tap water worth understanding before baby arrives.
Your placenta is an incredible barrier, but it was never built for chemicals that didn't exist a century ago, and it doesn't stop what's deliberately added to the supply. Here's what can reach your baby, and what the research actually says. None of this is meant to frighten you. It's meant to give you back a decision you didn't know you had.
What crosses over to your baby
The placenta filters a great deal, but these pass from your glass to the baby's side.
The one most parents haven't heard about
Fluoride & the developing brain
Unlike most contaminants, fluoride is added to some of the UK water supply on purpose, to protect teeth. Around one in ten people here receives fluoridated water, and UK health bodies consider it safe at the levels used. But fluoride does cross the placenta, and laboratory studies show it can accumulate in the regions of the developing brain tied to learning and memory.
Reviews of the human research, including a widely cited meta-analysis, have associated higher fluoride exposure with lower IQ scores in children, and more recent studies have linked prenatal exposure to neurobehavioural concerns in early childhood. Much of that work involved exposure levels above those used in the UK, and it remains contested and actively researched. It's simply an area some parents would rather not leave to chance.
The fluoride you swallow while pregnant offers your baby no dental benefit. Only the exposure crosses over.
Unregulated in drinking water
Forever chemicals
PFAS have been measured in umbilical-cord blood, which means they reach the baby before birth. They're called "forever chemicals" for a reason: the body has no easy way to break them down, so they build up over time. Official guidance flags developmental effects in infants and children as a concern, and standard water treatment isn't required to remove them.
Now being found where it shouldn't be
Microplastics
Microplastics have now been detected in human placentas and in breast milk by researchers around the world. They enter the water supply from countless sources, and, cruelly, one of the most plastic-exposed drinks of all is bottled water. Boiling doesn't touch them.
Added at the treatment works
Chlorine & its byproducts
Chlorine keeps tap water free of bacteria, which matters. But when it reacts with natural organic matter in the pipes, it forms disinfection byproducts such as trihalomethanes. Research has raised questions about higher exposure to these byproducts during pregnancy, and you're drinking chlorinated water precisely in the months you're told to drink the most.
Often from your own plumbing
Heavy metals
Water can leave the works clean and pick up metals on the way to your glass, especially in older homes with ageing pipes, solder and fittings.
You can't control the air, the packaging or the soil. You can control the water you fill your glass with tonight.
Every one of these is measurable, and every one of them is removable with the right filtration.
The other half of the story
You need more water than ever, right when it's hardest to drink.
Pregnancy roughly doubles the demands on your hydration. Water builds your baby's amniotic fluid, expands your blood volume, carries nutrients across the placenta and helps flush waste for two. Yet this is exactly when morning sickness makes a simple glass of water feel impossible.
Here's the part few people explain: nausea and dehydration feed each other. The queasier you feel, the less you drink. The less you drink, the more dehydrated you become, and dehydration itself makes nausea, dizziness, headaches and fatigue worse. Left unchecked, it can reduce amniotic fluid and trigger Braxton Hicks tightening. It's a loop that quietly spirals, and breaking it early matters.
The cycle worth breaking early
Nausea and dehydration reinforce each other. The easier your water is to drink, the sooner the loop breaks.
This is where the water itself makes a real difference. The BIO 500 MAX's water is naturally alkaline (pH 7.6 to 8.5) and re-mineralised with over 60 trace minerals, which many mums find smoother and gentler on a queasy stomach than sharp, chlorinated tap water. Those minerals act like gentle, natural electrolytes that support how your body takes up and holds the water you drink. When your water tastes clean and sits easily, you simply drink more of it, and that's how you stay ahead of the cycle.
Cleaner water you actually want to sip is the simplest way to protect your hydration.
You remove what shouldn't be there, and you make the water gentle enough to keep drinking through the hardest weeks. Always check specific hydration or pregnancy concerns with your midwife or doctor.
Before you reach for the obvious answer
Bottled water and jug filters feel safe. They're not the fix.
- Bottled water is one of the most plastic-exposed drinks there is. Studies have found hundreds of thousands of plastic particles per litre in popular bottled brands, and it does nothing for the metals or forever chemicals you're worried about.
- Supermarket jug filters mostly improve taste and chlorine. Most don't touch fluoride, forever chemicals or heavy metals at all. In fact, independent testing has shown that many of these filters can actually increase heavy metal contamination such as aluminium by significant margins.
- Boiling kills bacteria, but it does nothing to fluoride, forever chemicals or microplastics, and if anything it concentrates them.
| What it removes | Bottled water | Supermarket jug filter | BIO 500 MAX |
|---|---|---|---|
| Fluoride | ~ | ✕ | ✓ |
| Forever chemicals | ~ | ✕ | ✓ |
| Microplastics | ✕ | ~ | ✓ |
| Chlorine byproducts | ~ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Lead & heavy metals | ~ | ~ | ✓ |
| Adds 60+ minerals back | ~ | ✕ | ✓ |
✓ removes · ~ varies by brand or model · ✕ doesn't remove. Bottled and jug performance differs widely between products.
The problem was never that you didn't care. It's that the easy options weren't built for this.
Removing fluoride, forever chemicals, microplastics and metals takes real, multi-stage filtration, not a plastic jug.
See it in action
Watch the bench top filter at work.
No plumbing, no power, no fuss. Fill the top, and gravity does the rest, drawing your tap water down through 13 stages of filtration into clean, great-tasting alkaline mineral water. Press play below, and tap to unmute.
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The Waters Co difference
One bench top filter. The exposure you can finally switch off.
The BIO 500 MAX runs your tap water through 13 stages of filtration, engineered to strip out the contaminants a jug leaves behind, then gently re-mineralise what's left into a 7 litre hand-blown glass reservoir. So you're not just removing the bad; you're pouring water your body (and your baby's) actually thrives on.
- Removes up to 99.9% of fluoride, using a patented nano carbon compound. Very few filters touch it at all.
- Targets forever chemicals, pesticides and herbicides, the contaminants cord-blood studies keep detecting.
- Filters microplastics to 0.1 microns, plus chlorine, heavy metals and up to 99% of bacteria and cysts.
- Adds 60+ trace minerals back, so your water enriches rather than just strips.
- Naturally alkaline pH 7.6–8.5, smooth and easy to drink through the nausea weeks.
13 stages of sterilising, filtration and mineral activation, inside every BIO 500 MAX.
What comes out
The things you've been quietly worried about.
Fluoride
Patented nano carbon compound. Very few filters remove it.
Forever chemicals
The contaminant class linked to developmental concerns in infants.
Microplastics
The plastic particles now found in placentas and breast milk.
Heavy metals
Lead, arsenic, mercury and cadmium that can travel through your system.
Chlorine & bacteria
Added at the treatment works, filtered back out at your worktop.
Minerals added back
Bio-organic trace minerals your water is usually missing.
The last thing you need is another job
On the worktop in minutes. No plumber, no power.
Sit it on your kitchen worktop
Compact and lightweight, assembled by hand in a couple of minutes. It's gravity-fed, with no drilling, no electrician, no cupboard rearranging.
Fill the top with tap water
Gravity draws it down through all 13 stages into the 7 litre glass reservoir. Nothing to plug in, nothing to remember.
Pour, and stop worrying about this one
One filter set runs up to 12,000 litres or around 18 months, carrying you through pregnancy and into the first year, and a filter reminder service means you don't have to track it.
60+ minerals added
Enriches your water, doesn't just strip it.
Up to 12,000 litres
Per filter set, around 3p a litre.
Free UK shipping
Fast delivery to your door.
Verified customer reviews
The peace of mind is the part they talk about.
"Recommended by a friend after months of research to find a filter that cut out specifically chlorine & fluoride. This filter is amazing! Water is crystal clear, no yellowing, no smell and literally tastes of NOTHING. Just fresh, cool, hydrating liquid without the chemicals. The dogs are now drinking more water than ever."
"I bought this to deal with newly fluoridated water, but the biggest bonus has been raising our pH from 6.4 to 7.8, which has had a surprisingly big positive effect on our health. It's perfect for our family of three, for drinking and cooking."
"After being diagnosed with heavy metal toxicity, I needed a water solution I could trust. This filter gives me total peace of mind, removing bacteria, heavy metals and other nasties. The water tastes fresh and clean, and I feel confident serving it to family and visitors."
"After the initial set up, the water filter has been used non-stop in our house. It has my 6 and 4 year olds being more independent and excited to drink water, and I just love that I am giving them the healthiest version of water that I can."
"The difference in taste was noticeable instantly, clean, fresh and so much better than tap water. Funnily enough, it's really encouraged me to drink more water throughout the day. Compact, easy to use and a fantastic addition to my kitchen."
"I've spent so much money over the years buying bottled and boxed water, as well as using other filters that just don't work. But since finding the Waters Co filter I haven't looked back. Nothing beats the taste and convenience of having fresh alkaline water at home."
Honest answers
The questions expecting mums ask us.
Isn't fluoride in tap water there to help us?
Fluoride is added to protect teeth, and that benefit is topical, from contact with your teeth. Around one in ten people in the UK receives fluoridated water, and UK health bodies consider it safe at the levels used. The concern some parents raise in pregnancy is different: fluoride crosses the placenta, and research has associated higher prenatal exposure with lower childhood IQ, though much of that work involved exposure levels above those used here and the findings remain contested. Your baby gets no dental benefit from the fluoride you swallow while pregnant, so some parents choose to filter it out. Your midwife or doctor is the right person for advice specific to you.
Is filtered water actually better for me while I'm pregnant?
Staying well hydrated matters enormously in pregnancy, and the goal is simply to make sure the water you're drinking more of isn't carrying fluoride, forever chemicals, microplastics or metals with it. The BIO 500 MAX removes those and adds trace minerals back, and many mums find the smoother taste easier to keep drinking through nausea. For anything specific to your pregnancy, your midwife or doctor is always the best person to ask.
Do I really need this, or is my tap water fine?
UK tap water is treated to a high standard and is safe to drink. What treatment isn't required to remove is forever chemicals and microplastics, and in some areas it deliberately contains added fluoride, along with chlorine. Metals can also be picked up from older home plumbing. If those are on your mind, a 13-stage filter is how you take them off the table.
Does it remove the good minerals too?
No, and this is the part that sets it apart. Rather than stripping your water bare like reverse osmosis does, the BIO 500 MAX re-mineralises it, adding back over 60 bio-organic trace minerals so your water enriches rather than just cleans.
Will it help with morning sickness and staying hydrated?
Many mums tell us the smoother, naturally alkaline, mineral-rich water is gentler on a queasy stomach than sharp chlorinated tap water, which makes it easier to keep sipping. The trace minerals act like gentle natural electrolytes to support hydration. It won't cure nausea, and it isn't a treatment for it, but easier-to-drink water helps you stay ahead of the dehydration that can make nausea worse. If you're struggling to keep fluids down, please speak to your midwife or GP.
Is it hard to install with everything else going on?
Not at all. It sits on your worktop, assembles in a few minutes, and runs on gravity, with no plumber, no electrician, no power point and no tap connection. Fill the top, and it does the rest.
Will it still be useful after the baby arrives?
Very much so. It's the same clean water for your bottles, your toddler's cups and the whole family, and replacement filter sets simply carry it on from there.
Your purchase is 100% protected
Waters Co has led gravity-fed filtration for over 40 years, with independent lab testing behind its removal claims and certifications including NSF International, ISO, CE, FDA and the Water Quality Association. Your BIO 500 MAX ships free within the UK, from a brand parents have trusted since 1984, and is covered by a lifetime warranty and a 30 day money back policy. You're not taking a risk, you're taking one worry off the list.
One glass at a time
You can't filter the whole world for them. You can filter their water.
Of every worry that comes with a positive test, this is one of the few you can genuinely solve today, with something that sits on your worktop and pours cleaner water from tonight.
Black edition, with a 7 litre hand-blown blue glass reservoir.
This page is general information about drinking-water filtration and is not medical advice. UK tap water is treated to meet strict safety standards. Research on contaminants such as fluoride, PFAS and microplastics is ongoing and in places contested, and findings vary with exposure levels. Nothing here is intended to diagnose, treat or prevent any condition. For guidance specific to your pregnancy, always speak with your midwife, doctor or a qualified health professional.
BIO 500 MAX 7 Litre Bench Top Water Filter
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- Free & Fast Delivery
- 99% Forever Chemical Removal
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