bestprod All-New 20 in 1 Drinking Water Testing Kit 120 Strips, Home Tap and Well Water Test Kit for Hardness, Lead, Iron, Copper, Chlorine, Fluoride

Why I added the Bestprod kit to my household routine

I keep a simple rule at home: test what you drink. Between a private well on my property and municipal water at a nearby rental, I wanted a fast way to spot obvious water issues before deciding on pricey lab work. The Bestprod water test kit has become my go-to screening tool. It’s not a replacement for certified lab testing, but as a first pass, it’s easy, fast, and surprisingly informative—especially for hardness, chlorine, pH, iron, and copper.

One note up front: the packaging references both “20-in-1” and “17-in-1.” Functionally, it’s a multi-parameter strip kit plus two separate bacteria tests (coliform and E. coli). The strip panel covers the typical suspects (hardness, free/total chlorine, pH, iron, copper, lead, nitrate/nitrite, fluoride, alkalinity, etc.) with color blocks and clearly marked acceptable ranges. Think of it as a wide-net screening tool rather than a scalpel.

Setup and what you get

• 120 reagent strips sealed in a bottle with a printed color guide
• Two separate bacteria presence/absence tests for coliform/E. coli
• An instruction set with simple timing cues
• A data sheet for logging results over time

The presentation is user-friendly. I like that the color chart is on the bottle and lined up in the same order as the pads on the strip—it sounds trivial, but it cuts down on reading errors. The included data sheet is actually useful; I now have a history of seasonal changes in my well without digging through notes.

Using the strips: simple and repeatable

The workflow is straightforward:
1) Collect a fresh sample in a clean cup.
2) Dip the strip briefly and tap off excess.
3) Wait the specified seconds for each parameter (most read at around 60 seconds; a few are faster).
4) Match each pad to the chart.

A few practical tips improved consistency for me:
- Use a timer. Some pads develop at different times; I read the lot in one go at 60 seconds, but I spot-check early- or late-developers per the insert.
- Read colors in daylight or under a high-CRI light to avoid tint bias.
- Avoid touching the pads and don’t shake the strip like a thermometer; a gentle tap keeps water from pooling.
- Compare against a white background if your room has warm lighting.

Within those bounds, the strips produce consistent results across repeated tests of the same sample. On municipal water, my free chlorine reading tracked day-to-day changes as the city toggled between routine dosing and a “boost” week. Hardness also tracked predictably against my softener’s regeneration cycle.

What the strips do well

• Hardness and alkalinity: Reliable for day-to-day tracking. If you’re tuning a softener, these strips give immediate feedback.
• Free and total chlorine: Clean, readable gradations. Very helpful during shock-chlorination or after filter changes.
• pH: Good for coarse checks. My well tends to run alkaline; strips consistently showed high readings and flagged me to retest after adjustments.
• Iron and copper: Useful for indicating whether you’re in the ballpark. When I flushed old lines at the rental, iron spiked as expected, then fell as the water cleared.

I treat lead, nitrate/nitrite, and fluoride on this kit as screening only. They’re fine for a quick “any red flags today?” but if I ever saw a concerning shade, I’d send a lab sample for confirmation.

The bacteria tests: helpful, but not lab-grade

The two separate bacteria tests are presence/absence setups for coliform/E. coli. They’re easy: collect, seal, keep at room temperature, and read in 24–48 hours based on color/turbidity change. They’re useful for basic screening after plumbing work or a well shock, but they are not a substitute for a certified lab test. In my trials, I had one instance where a lab presence/absence test called low-level coliform while the kit’s vial remained negative at 48 hours. I also had clear positives when I expected them (post-disturbance flush water). That’s typical for inexpensive presence/absence tests: they’re a good early warning, but they can miss borderline contamination.

My rule: if a bacteria vial shows positive, I act (flush, sanitize, or take a lab sample). If it shows negative after a known issue or I need certainty (e.g., before letting kids drink from a just-serviced well), I confirm with a lab kit. That balance keeps costs reasonable without compromising safety.

Accuracy and limitations

No strip kit will beat a calibrated meter or certified analytical method. Colorimetric strips have three predictable limitations:
- They’re semi-quantitative. You match a color block, not a precise value.
- Interferences happen. Very high iron or unusual chemistry can nudge certain pads.
- Lighting matters. If you read under yellow lights, values skew.

Within those constraints, this kit performs like a solid, modern test strip set. It’s especially well suited for trend tracking—“are we stable this month?”—and for validating the impact of maintenance—“did that filter change do anything?” It’s less suited to compliance-level verification or diagnosing a complex issue where precise numbers and detection limits matter.

Day-to-day value

120 strips go a long way. I test the well monthly, the rental’s tap quarterly, and run extra strips after any plumbing or filtration change. The per-test cost is low enough that I don’t think twice about checking after a heavy rain, a water main notice, or a softener tweak. That cadence has caught a drifting pH on my well early and confirmed the effectiveness of a cartridge change at the rental (chlorine breakthrough went from slight to zero overnight).

The included data sheet seems like a throwaway until you use it. I now snapshot values by date and location; seeing a quick line of “hardness holding steady” or “pH trending up” has been helpful when scheduling maintenance.

Who it’s for

• Private well owners who want an affordable routine check between lab tests.
• Renters or homeowners on municipal water who want to validate chlorine levels, track hardness, or sanity-check filtration performance.
• Anyone installing or tuning a softener, carbon filter, or RO system who needs feedback without burning through expensive reagents.

If you need compliance-level numbers for a mortgage, health department, or a specific contamination concern (lead, nitrate in infant formula scenarios, bacterial clearance after known contamination), go straight to a certified lab. Use this kit to monitor, not to certify.

What I’d improve

• Clarify the “20-in-1” vs “17-in-1” terminology on the label. It’s minor, but consistency builds trust.
• Expand the instructions for bacteria testing with a dedicated “what to do if results are unclear” section, and guidance on ideal incubation temperature.
• Provide a quick reference on potential interferences and best lighting for color reads.

None of these are deal-breakers, but they’d make a good kit even easier to trust.

Practical tips for better results

• Rinse your sample cup with the test water before collecting.
• Run the tap for a minute before sampling to avoid stagnant line water.
• Test at room temperature; very cold samples slow reactions.
• Take a photo of the strip next to the chart under daylight for your records.
• For bacteria tests, avoid touching inside the vial cap, and start a timer as soon as you seal it.

The bottom line

The Bestprod kit earns a spot in my toolbox as an affordable, easy-to-use screening solution. It shines for hardness, chlorine, pH, and general water chemistry checks, and it helps me validate basic filtration and maintenance steps without the delay and cost of lab testing. The bacteria vials are useful as an early-warning screen, but I treat them as advisory and confirm critical decisions with a certified lab.

Recommendation: I recommend the Bestprod water test kit as a routine monitoring tool for homeowners and well owners who want quick, broad insight at low cost. It’s not a lab replacement, and it shouldn’t be used to make high-stakes decisions on bacteria or regulated contaminants without confirmation. Used as intended—a screening kit with clear ranges, simple operation, and a generous supply of strips—it’s a dependable way to keep tabs on your water and catch trends before they become problems.