This Smart Water Bottle Made Me Realize I Wasn't Drinking Enough Water

Even though I'm a wellness writer who knows how important it is to hydrate every day, I haven't always been the best at making sure that I'm actually drinking enough water. Before, I would simply drink water whenever I felt thirsty, but would sometimes end the day feeling dehydrated. However, once I started tracking my hydration with a smart water bottle, I realized I definitely wasn't drinking enough water previously.

When I tested the hydration-tracking LARQ Bottle PureVis 2 for CNET's best self-cleaning water bottle list, it taught me the importance of tracking your water intake. This is why I love it, and what I think could be improved.

LARQ Bottle PureVis 2 $139 at Amazon

What I love about this smart water bottle

The LARQ PureVis 2 was primarily designed to keep your water sanitized with UV-C LED technology to remove 99.999% of Salmonella and 99.99% of E. coli. It also comes with a filtered straw that removes pharmaceuticals, chlorine, PFOS and PFOA. The latter two are lab-made chemicals that may have harmful health effects. 

However, my favorite feature is that it connects to the LARQ app, which lets you track your water intake. 

To establish how much water you should be drinking each day, LARQ asks for your birthday, sex, height, weight and activity level. You can also adjust this amount yourself.

Multiple water intake visuals

On the LARQ app's main screen, there is a percentage, a fraction and a line graph showing how much you drank today. Based on the time of day, a curved status bar also shows whether you've been drinking enough water at a pace that will allow you to meet your daily goal. In the app, you can set your "awake" and "sleep" hours so it knows your timeline. 

I love that this bottle offers multiple visual indicators to show how much water you've been drinking, so I can easily tell at a glance if I need to take more sips. You can also set up hydration reminders that will prompt the top of the water bottle to glow during the hours you're awake, nudging you to drink more water. This glow is surprisingly bright, so you won't miss it.

In the middle of the app's two tabs at the bottom is a plus sign you can click to add drinks that didn't come from your water bottle. Admittedly, sometimes I forget to do this. Six options are included -- water, coffee, tea, soda, juice and milk -- for which you can add the number of ounces and the time you drank the beverage. 

Dive into your hydration history

At the top, it shows the days of the week, each surrounded by a curved status bar, so you can look back at how much water you've drunk. If I've been feeling off or low-energy for a few days, I'll often look back at this schedule and realize that I didn't drink enough water, as dehydration can cause fatigue. 

Beneath the line graph is a "Streak" section that displays how many days in a row you've reached 100% of your hydration goal and your personal best. At the very bottom is the "History," where you can view each time you drank water from the bottle and how much you drank. 

Eco-friendly analytics

When you click on the "Devices" tab on the bottom bar, you can see your device, its battery level, the last time it was purified with UV-C LED and information about the filter in your straw, if you choose to use it. If you click the filter, you can see its age, the filtered volume, the percentage it's depleted and the option to order a three-pack of new filters ($30+). 

At the top right, there is an analytics button that shows some of my favorite data. There is a bar graph displaying how many gallons of water you've drunk over the past week, month or six months. Below that, you can see your environmental and financial impact: how much money you saved on bottled water, your reduced carbon footprint and reduced plastic waste.

The long battery life

One full charge with the included USB-C cable lasts two to three weeks. Usually, mine lasts about three weeks, but I don't use "adventure mode," which requires more power and takes 3 minutes to self-clean the bottle with the UV-C LED. It is best used with less reliable water sources in the backcountry, such as on hikes.

Instead, I allow my bottle to automatically clean itself in normal mode, which activates every 2 hours for 10 seconds. Sometimes I also press the top button once (twice triggers adventure mode) to turn on normal mode for 1 minute. 

What I don't love about the PureVis 2

Price: As for the reason why I hate how much I love this water bottle, it's primarily the price. The 23-ounce version costs $129, while the 34-ounce bottle (the one I have) is $139. That's expensive for a water bottle. A cheaper alternative would be a bottle with time and ounces markers, but you'd have to track the daily total yourself. This one also has motivational phrases. 

Manual cleaning: Another downside is that you still have to clean the bottle by hand. Even though it is "self-cleaning," that only applies to the water and parts of the bottle that the UV-C LED technology can reach. So, LARQ still recommends giving the bottle -- and especially the cap where buildup may occur -- a warm, soapy rinse every so often. 

The straw: Tired of cleaning the straw, and because I've been having trouble keeping it in place in the bottle's mouth, I decided to remove it. I'm already filling the bottle with filtered water and avoiding using it with less reliable sources, such as running water on hikes, so I don't feel the need to keep the straw. 

Size: Lastly, the only other downside I can think of is that the 34-ounce bottle doesn't fit in my car cup holder, so I have to slide it into the compartment in my car door or lay it on the passenger seat. However, it does fit in my backpack's side bottle pocket when I travel. It did fall out of the pocket once and survived the fall with only a small dent on the stainless steel bottle and a tiny scrape on the BPA-free plastic cap.  

The final verdict

Even with the cons I mentioned, I still love this water bottle. The hydration-tracking feature has helped me ensure I drink enough water each day, which supports my health and, specifically, my energy. I also love that it gives me data about how much plastic waste I've prevented by drinking from this reusable bottle. 

Essentially, this has become my emotional support water bottle. I'm grateful that it gives me one less thing to keep track of during the day, albeit one of the most important: my hydration.