Bonne O vs. SodaStream: The Ultimate Sparkling Water Smackdown
My husband and I are huge sparkling water fans. Before we got a SodaStream, we went through cases of La Croix on a weekly basis. In fact, it was all of the waste from can after can of sparkling water that convinced us to invest in our own carbonator. We’ve had a SodaStream for years, and recently the folks at Bonne O offered us their carbonator to review. Here, we compare the Bonne O vs. SodaStream.
The big pro to the Bonne O is that there’s no tank to buy. With a SodaStream, you purchase a tank, and when it’s empty, you exchange it for a filled one. The old tank goes back to SodaStream to be cleaned and refilled. Instead of a tank, Bonne O uses carbonation tablets.
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The tablets might seem creepy at first, but they don’t work how you might think. They’re made from citric acid, sodium bicarbonate (baking soda), potassium bicarbonate and potassium carbonate, and they don’t actually go into the water. You drop them into the machine, turn it on, and they release just CO2 into the water, carbonating it. Read more about them here.
Another pro for us was that the Bonne O is quieter. If you’ve ever used a SodaStream, you know that it makes a loud, honking noise when it shoots the CO2 into the water. My husband liked the idea of a carbonator that he could use at work without scaring his coworkers.
Both carbonators produced great results for us. The Bonnie O takes some of the guesswork out of the process, since one tablet equals one bottle of soda water. With the sodastream, you pump until you hear that loud buzz two or three times, so there’s a learning curve.
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While the Bonne O is quieter, it does make a low sound, and it takes longer to carbonate than a SodaStream. It also has a slightly bigger footprint than the SodaStream.
The SodaStream measures 5.3″ wide by 16.4″ tall by 9.2″ deep. The Bonne O is 6″ wide by 14″ tall by 12″ deep. The SodaStream is taller, though, so how which works best, space-wise, depends on how you’re planning to store it.
The Bonne O tablets are smaller, but cost-wise, they don’t really math out. A 3 month supply of tablets on their site costs $50. With a SodaStream, you pay $30 for a tank, but refills are cheaper. At the Bed, Bath and Beyond near my house, refilling the small tank costs $15. This site estimates going through a SodaStream tank in 3-4 weeks, so the SodaStream ends up costing about the same for refills.
Overall, I’d say the two are pretty comparable. Which would work best for you depends on where you’re planning to use and store it. In an office setting or anywhere else that noise is an issue, the Bonne O is probably ideal. If you have more vertical space than horizontal and are planning on at-home use, the SodaStream strikes me as a bit better, since it is faster and doesn’t use electricity.
Do you have a water carbonator? I’d love to hear what you use and how you like it in the comments!
