Water Softener Vs. Water Purifier – What’s The Difference

​Any new thing you may encounter in your life will inevitably cause confusion. It is quite OK to be unaware of the differences or connections between particular objects.

To clear up any questions you may have about water softeners and water purifiers, we wrote this post. Each subheading introduces you to the topic gradually and provides more details on the fundamental distinctions between a water softener and a water purifier.

Hard Water: What Is It?

Most often every home typically has access to two different types of water supply. One is the less usual well water, and the other is the more typical municipal water source. While the latter is more typical in village areas , the former is typically the primary supply of water in other areas.

You might wonder how I can tell the difference if I say that the well water is hard water and the municipal water supply is soft water. Let's elaborate.

The water used by the municipality is largely treated for drinking. As a result, it goes through a number of steps to become drinkable, meaning all minerals and particulates are fully eliminated. 

In the well water supply, a groundwater pump provides us with unprocessed water that is drawn directly from the groundwater table. Therefore, the water contains a large number of particles and significant amounts of minerals like calcium and magnesium.

The quality of the groundwater where you live might range from extremely good to very awful. No matter how contaminated it is, groundwater typically has a high concentration of dissolved solids and minerals.

Your water's hardness or softness depends on whether these dissolved particles and minerals are present.

Hard water is not regarded as suitable for drinking as well as for use in daily activities like bathing and washing. Depending on the hardness, hard water can be detrimental to varying degrees. 
 
​The calcium and magnesium ions react with soap and detergent to generate calcium and magnesium residues when they come into touch with them during bathing or washing clothes or floors, respectively. These residues will appear as fading white patches, which is not very pleasing and certainly does not accomplish the goal of cleaning.

The Mechanism of Water Softening

​Now that you are aware of the distinction between hard and soft water, this is quite simple to comprehend.

There are a few techniques to transform hard water into soft water, but ion exchange is the most common and efficient one. 

​In an ion-exchange hard water softener, resin beads filter the hard water (generally common salt that you use in your home). Hard water's positively charged mineral ions are drawn to the negatively charged sodium ions in the "resin beads" and bound to themselves, rendering the water mineral-free.

Thus, water softening uses the aforementioned theory to turn hard water into soft water.

​What Processes Are Used to Purify Water?

In contrast to a water softener, a water purifier removes impurities like dirt, dust, sand, bacteria, viruses, chlorine, pesticides, heavy metals, and other toxins depending on the purification stages.

Since there are multiple layers or stages of filtration involved, a water purifier's operation is a little bit more complicated than that of a water softener.

In simplest terms, there are two steps in the process of purifying water: physical filtration comes first, followed by chemical filtration.

​Physical filtering removes impurities like dirt, dust, sand, etc., while chemical filtration removes contaminants like bacteria, viruses, chemical impurities like chlorine, pesticides, heavy metals, and other dissolved solids that are undetectable to the naked eye.

Conclusion

​We are confident that by this point you are aware of the distinction between a water softener and a water purifier. Any questions or ambiguities you had regarding either one or both of them would have been resolved by the thorough descriptions and FAQs.