Best Test Kit?

Hi all!

Just wondering which test kits you all favour? I have bought AquaOne liquid tests recently and always get a 0 for nitrate and nitrite so I was a bit  hmmmm... I have made my son shake the nitrate solution until his arm aches, but the grey powder doesn't seem to dissolve completely.
Also the ph reading is higher than the reading they give me at the LFS.

Thanks!

Another vote for API.

What I do is order the Nitrate tester separately as that's the one that I use most now my tank is old and established, plus it's 10 drops so gets used up more quickly than the others.

I also use API, but as with most liquid testers the nitrate test is only approximate. pH, ammonia and nitrite are good enough for our purposes, and nitrate is best used to follow a trend rather than an absolute measure eg is it going up during a cycle; how much does it go up from an hour after a water change till just before the next one (a guide to if you are over or under stocked)

If you want the best on the home testing market, Salifert are the ones to get. These don't come in a set, you have to buy them separately; and although they cost about the same as other makes to buy they do less tests per pack so are more expensive per test.

This is quite an old post. I wondered if anyone has different suggestions to the same question?

I have a Seneye that measures Ammonia, pH and temperature far more accurately than my traditional thermometer and liquid test I previously had. I'm looking for tests for hardness and nitrate (and perhaps the other main plant nutrients) to complement the Seneye.

I got a box of Easylife 6 in 1 test strips, but am not finding them great. The nitrate result is either 0 or 20, with nothing in between. And the test tabs don't colour evenly, so I'm not even sure what reading I have got.

I’ve used a variety of test kits over the years.

For nitrate and nitrite, I struggle to read the liquid-based test kit results, irrespective of brand; I’m currently using Waterlife but plan to try JBL next time as I find their products very easy to use. I always cross-check nitrate and nitrite liquid-based tests with test strips (either Tetra or JBL) as I find them much easier to read.

For ammonia/ammonium, I use JBL which I’m happy with – and it’s possible to buy refills rather than an entire new kit. I also bought API ammonia strips but find the liquid-based JBL kit easier to read.

For GH and KH, I currently use Tetra and API respectively, although any of the brands I’ve tried before have been fine / easy to use and decipher. A useful tip, which I picked up from Sue, if your reading is borderline/difficult to decipher, is to test 10ml rather than 5ml, then half the overall number of drops required. For example, for my low KH, I find that 3 drops are usually required in the 10ml to produce the colour change, equating to 1.5 drops for 5ml and therefore a KH of 1.5. I find that the test strips (both the aforementioned brands) give an inflated GH reading while the KH reading is difficult to decipher but seems to be inflated too, in comparison with what I would expect from my water company details.

For PH, I currently use JBL. I tend to find any of the liquid-based kits err slightly on the inflated side, while the test strips err on the lower side of what I might expect from my water company details.

The test strips have the added advantage of a chlorine test on them.

Hope that’s helpful.

Testing nitrite can be useful if for some reason the tank goes through a mini cycle. With a heavily planted this would only occur if there is a massive plant die off. In a non-planted tank, this could happen whenever new fish are added; over cleaning of a young filter; changing the filter media; changing the substrate etc but with lots of plants they'll use all the ammonia made by the fish so there will not be any nitrite made.
And strips should be good enough - with nitrite all you need to know is zero or not zero.



(Of course, a nitrite tester is necessary when cycling by either method. The tank in question has been cycled)