Katadyn Water Filter's BeFree 1 Liter

We use water filters for hiking, camping and bikepacking. Previously we used water to go bottles and sawyer filters. They did the job as water filters but the flow rate is poor for decanting filtered water to a larger reservoir such as a camel back bladder or cooking pot.Water filtered using the katadyn tastes great and it is so convenient to carry and fill up on the go without having to take off your back pack. Good value for money.

Nice and light, very packable and very useful where there are no water to be bought at the shops. Don’t forget after you have used the filter and before you pack it away to clean the filter with a little bleach in water look this up otherwise when you take it out again and you haven’t done this, then you will only get a trickle

The media could not be loaded. If you're considering a water filter for a backpacking trip I would fully vouch for this. I used it for a week long backpacking trip in Scotland and had no issues at all with it. The water filters out at an okay rate, faster would be better but its not painfully slow, from memory it took roughly 30 seconds to fill half a bladder. Weight is a massive bonus with this, I'm not close to being ultralight but if I was to go down that route I'd still keep this in the pack, from what I've heard about Sawyer products they're a very close competitor to this, but the ease of use having the attached bottle, that can fold into the palm of my hand makes life so much easier. I used this quite often during my trip and didn't experience any blockages in the filter, I'd assume that's because the water was quite clear.Definitely wash this with some baking power before use though, I didn't and it did have a strong plastic taste for the duration of the trip. Not sure if that flavour does go or not so I can't vouch for that.

Have had a Saywer mini for about 4 years and was under the impression they were the standard water filter but alas I noticed in a few recent youtube videos from the past year or so that EVERYBODY seems to have binned the saywer mini filter due to its ridiculously slow flow rate and vulnerability to the internals cracking if frozen during cold weather.Now everybody seems to have got one of these Katadyn be-free filters and I am just late to the party. I really can see what the fuss is about. Cleaning the filter is a piece of cake, the bottle squashes to nothing when empty, it all seems fairly well made except for the mouth piece on the filter which looks like it came straight off a bottle of the flat lucozade. However what I will say is that mine hasn't broken despite a winter of weekend use and if/when it does I will just replace it with one off a lucozade bottle so maybe its a positive not a negative.The price is only downside really, as it costs £50+ and I don't think you can buy replacement bags for them meaning if you get a puncture then you need to buy a whole new setup. not great for the environment and kind of against the message of the brand really but hey ho. overall a fab product and something every walker should have in their bag!

An excellent and convenient product, very lightweight.There are a couple of drawbacks:*The bladder is not the best, it's completely floppy and won't fit in a backpack side pocket very well, especially when half full. In the end I bought one of the compatible Hydrapak Bladders, the Flux Softbottle is a more rigid alternative.*Only filters 1000 Litres, so the filter will need replacing every so often.Other than that Katadyn have a really great product on their hands.

Brilliant piece of equiptment brilliant concept and works amazingly well price is good and quality is exellent should last for a long time

I do allot of hiking and got this so I can reduce the amount of water I carry and plan in water stops on routes where there are streams etc. The flow rate of this filter aids filling up my bladder very easy and doesnt take long at all to filter a couple of litres. Its really easy to clean rather than back flushing it uou can just swish it around in clean water. The amount you can filter isnt as much as some others on the market but then you dont need to carry around a syringe and other gubbins to back flush it. Will just purchase a new one when I think im close to 1000litres. Which will probably be quite a few hikes.

Got this because I was finding the sawyer abit of a faf and wanting something quicker, after seeing reviews on YouTube I settled with this . I've used it on dartmoor for a week , I'd finished filtering and filled the kettle up and my son in law was still squeezing with his sawyer . This one has Fast flow rate and easy to clean and it's really light weight and packs really small. Highly recommended.