I have a kleen kanteen thats about 10 years old. Its all dented because I’ve dropped it a million times, but it does not leak.

Any bottle will do, honestly, as long as you put only water in it and no other stuff like sugar drinks. At least in my personal experience

Contigo bottles (and coffee mugs) have proven really nice to use, cleverly designed and very durable. My coffee mug has been with me 6 years and despite having a fancy mechanism it works 100% despite being used and cleaned almost every day at least once. The water bottles have been with us 2 years but they’re doing just as well. Very impressed with em.

I wouldn’t recomend it for backpacking (not optimised for weight) or if you are gonna pound the hell out of it (a simpler design is best for heavy punishment) but for general use I think it’s the best option.

This and hydroflask are my fave brands. Durable and easy to clean.

I love and recommend hydro flasks to everyone. I’ve been using them for years and years. I carry one with me everywhere! My mainly used one is dented to hell and back because my toddler and husband drop it all the time but it still holds up like a champ. I love it. I have a few different sizes. My husband has some. My toddler has a little one. I got my mom and sister obsessed. Love ‘em!

Zulu glass is nice, but heavy. I broke one by leaving it out in the cold to freeze. I still regret and miss that bottle.

Camel bak plastic is light for travel.

Yeti is my favorite. Worth the money.

A good quality stainless steel water bottle if cleaned properly will lend no taste or smell of its own. Lots of reviews out there, mine is ~5 years old and going strong.

There's this new company I found called Maisō. Slightly pricier, but the design and quality is nice. It's been working pretty well for me currently.

Nalgene water bottles are fantastic. I had mine nearly 15 years until this sumer when I lowered a scissor lift directly down on it. It caved in but still sealed perfectly.

Yeti rambler 26oz with the chug cap. They’re dishwasher safe and way better than hydro flask and kleen kanteen.

Klean Kanteens are nice, both the insulated and non-insulated options. Hydro flask also nice, but only available with insulation

Klean kanteen for sure! Absolutely biased because their hq/distribution is local (northern California), but they make great products, stand behind them (their warranty is awesome) and take care of their employees/give back to the community.

I have a bunch of yeti's (work in construction so basically any time you do a good job someone throws a yeti at you), I actually prefer my klean kanteen water bottles. I take my 64oz tk wide everywhere and it takes a ton of abuse. Nothing at all wrong with yeti's, they are excellent, but I prefer the klean kanteen.

Truthfully though, once you get a higher end insulated SS water bottle, all of these companies make great products and performance between them is basically identical, so get the one you like the most.

Agree and you can also buy just a cap/lid if you break or lose it

I've got the TK wide 20oz. I want to get a smaller one too. I recommend the TK wide drinks insulated containers, not so much the food canisters.

I like the fact that you've got a choice of lids, and the cafe lid can be taken apart and cleaned thoroughly.

I've used Nalgene bottles for years. They're plastic, but you can beat on them pretty good and they seem to stand up. It probably isn't a problem today, but you would want to avoid the BPA stuff. Nothing recently produced, (I think by anyone), would have that anymore though. The one negative, (for some), might be the unscrew cap. If you need a bottle that has a flip top or something, I don't know if they make those. Or rather, they probably do, but that would likely become the weakest link.

For metal, I'd maybe be thinking Yeti. I don't own a Yeti water bottle, but I do have a coffee mug. One day I left it on the front of a rescue truck and forgot it was there. We went on a call and it was missing when we got back. I traced our route and found it... it had clearly bounced down a hill on a street and off a wall. So had some scratches, but was fine. Took me another 5 - 10 minutes to find the top, but that was ok too. So I'm just assuming their water bottles are similarly tough.

This. If you can’t get the smell out of stainless, you might want to try better cleaning techniques. If it’s the plastic in the lid that’s retaining the smell, look for easy to clean caps. In my experience, Contigo, Zojirushi, and Camelbak have caps that trap odor in the silicone seal rings. I’ve switched to a Humangear CapCap (widely compatible) and removed the two small silicone rings (doesn’t leak without them).

Second this, I contacted them to purchase a new o ring for a lid and they sent me a new cup as a replacement