Palm Beach County water, compared

Hardness affects your skin, appliances and glassware rather than safety, so federal rules leave it out of the required annual water quality report, and 13 of the county's 15 utilities skip it. Only Boca Raton (65–80 mg/L) and Tequesta (about 100–120 mg/L) publish an official figure. Everywhere else, the way to know your number is to measure it at your own tap, which is exactly what our free test does.

Neither is a safety problem at regulated levels, but they behave differently in your house. Chloramine, which nearly every utility in this county now uses, lingers longer and is harder to remove: standard carbon works slowly on it, so removing it well takes catalytic carbon and enough contact time. That's a sizing question, and it's why we design from your actual water rather than a brochure.

Membrane-treated systems generally deliver the county's softest water, but the utility still adds chloramine or chlorine for the trip to your house, hardness is often blended back for pipe stability, and none of it is measured at your tap. The free test tells you what actually arrives, and sometimes the honest answer is a small fix at the kitchen sink rather than a whole-home system.

Fifteen utilities serve the communities we cover, from Palm Beach County Water Utilities (with separate eastern and western systems) and Seacoast Utility Authority to the city plants in Boca Raton, West Palm Beach, Delray Beach and Boynton Beach. Much of The Acreage and Loxahatchee is on private wells instead.

Every community water system publishes an annual Consumer Confidence Report under EPA rules, and Florida DEP runs the state's drinking water program. We link each utility's report on this page, and your water bill names your provider.