Is Softened Water Safe to Drink? The Straight Answer

You’re staring at your kitchen faucet, wondering if that soft water is secretly loading you up with salt. It’s a fair question every homeowner with a softener asks.

We will cover how sodium gets in your water, what it means for your health, and the clear rules for drinking it.

I’ve installed and serviced hundreds of these units. Here’s the bottom line: for most people, it’s perfectly fine, but you need to know your numbers.

The Quick Answer About Safety and Sodium

For most people, yes, softened water is safe to drink.

This question, “can I drink softened water,” comes up on nearly every service call I do for a new install. The short answer is yes, humans can drink softened water. The concern always boils down to one thing: sodium. A softener works by trading the calcium and magnesium that make water hard for sodium ions. It’s a straight swap.

Think of the sodium added not as a spoonful of salt, but as a light seasoning. The amount of sodium added to your drinking water is often comparable to what you’d find in a single slice of bread or a couple of bites of a pickle. For anyone on a standard diet, this is not a significant source of daily sodium.

Water Science Snippet: How the Sodium Swap Actually Works

To get why this isn’t a big deal, you need to know how the swap happens. Hard water minerals like calcium and sodium aren’t big chunks. They’re tiny, electrically charged particles called ions. Your softener’s resin tank is filled with tiny beads that love to hold onto sodium ions.

Here’s the process. Imagine the resin bead is a hotel. Hard water, filled with calcium and magnesium ions, flows in. These hard mineral ions are stronger guests. They kick the sodium ions out of their hotel rooms and take their place. The sodium ions that got evicted then flow out with your now-soft water. During the regeneration cycle, a salty brine solution washes through, kicking the hard mineral ions out and restocking the beads with fresh sodium guests. The cycle repeats.

We measure the hardness being removed in grains per gallon (gpg). If your test shows 10 gpg, that’s the amount of calcium and magnesium being traded away. One thing a softener does not do is purify water. Softening changes the makeup of your Total Dissolved Solids (TDS) by swapping minerals, but it doesn’t reduce the overall TDS count. For that, you need a separate filter.

How Much Sodium Is Really In Your Glass?

Let’s do the simple math. For every one grain per gallon (gpg) of hardness removed, your softener adds about 8 milligrams (mg) of sodium to each quart of water.

Here is a real world example. If your untreated water is 10 gpg hard, then each quart of softened water will contain roughly 80 mg of added sodium. A typical 8-ounce glass holds a quarter of that, so about 20 mg.

Keep this in perspective.

• A glass of softened water (from 10 gpg hard water): ~20 mg sodium.
• One slice of white bread: ~130 mg sodium.
• 12 ounces of canned soup: often 700-900 mg sodium.

The sodium from softened water is a very small part of your daily intake unless you are on a strictly physician-mandated low-sodium diet. This is an estimate. Your actual sodium increase depends entirely on how hard your water is to begin with. The harder your water, the more sodium is added in the exchange.

Who Should Think Twice Before Drinking It

For most people, the sodium in softened water is no big deal. But for some, it can be a real concern.

If you are on a doctor-ordered, sodium-restricted diet, you need to pay attention. The sodium added during softening counts toward your daily limit. This directly affects people with specific conditions.

• Hypertension (High Blood Pressure): Extra sodium can cause your blood pressure to rise.
• Kidney Disease: Damaged kidneys struggle to remove excess sodium from your body.
• Heart Failure: Sodium makes your body retain fluid, which puts more strain on your heart.

If you manage one of these conditions, the sodium in your water is not just a number on a test report it is part of your medical equation.

Households with infants using powdered formula should also be cautious. Babies consume a large volume of formula relative to their size. Using softened water to mix formula makes it their sole source of nutrition and sodium, which can be too much for their small bodies. It is a common oversight I have seen in many homes.

For anyone in these groups, the next step is simple. Talk to your doctor. Do not guess about your health ask a professional for advice tailored to your specific situation.

You do not need to rip out your softener. The immediate solution is to get drinking water from a different line. Your softener should have a hard water bypass valve. Flip that valve to send untreated, hard water to your kitchen cold tap. This lets you keep soft water for your showers and appliances while your drinking water stays sodium free. If your system is not plumbed for a kitchen bypass, installing a separate drinking water faucet is a standard job any good plumber can do quickly.

Your Softened Water Usage Guide: What’s Safe, What’s Not

Can I Cook with Softened Water?

You can cook with softened water. It’s fine for boiling pasta, making soup, or brewing coffee. The water softener simply swaps hardness minerals like calcium for sodium (or potassium). For most everyday cooking, the small amount of extra sodium won’t affect your food’s safety or flavor.

Pay attention to two specific tasks: baking and pickling.

• Baking: Some bakers swear by the precise mineral content of their water for perfect bread or pastry texture. Softened water can sometimes yield slightly different results.
• Pickling & Canning: Follow the recipe. Many explicitly call for distilled, filtered, or non-softened water. The added sodium can interfere with the preservation process and alter the taste of your pickles.

My rule is simple. For general cooking, use the softened water from your tap. For a sensitive recipe from an old cookbook, use water from a bypassed outdoor faucet or a dedicated drinking water filter.

Is Softened Water Good for My Appliances?

This is where a water softener shines. Softened water is excellent for your major appliances.

• Water Heaters: This is the biggest win. Without scale buildup, your heater runs efficiently, uses less energy, and lasts years longer. The glass lining in many tanks also stays better protected.
• Dishwashers & Washing Machines: You’ll use less soap and detergent. Your dishes and clothes will come out cleaner without mineral spots or stiffening. Appliances that heat water will avoid costly scale damage, saving you money on repairs and replacement parts.

I’ve serviced water heaters in homes with hard water that were half-full of rock-like scale. The ones fed by a softener looked nearly new inside, even after a decade.

Can I Use Softened Water Outdoors?

Generally, no. Using softened water outdoors is wasteful and often causes problems.

Can I fill my pool with softened water? Don’t do it. It’s a massive waste of salt and regeneration water. Fill your pool with hard water from a hose bib, then balance the chemistry. The pool’s filtration system is designed to handle those minerals.

Can I fill my hot tub with softened water? Avoid this. The soft water lacks the calcium hardness that helps stabilize the water chemistry. It often leads to excessive foaming and can make it difficult to maintain proper sanitizer levels, creating a murky, unpleasant soak.

For watering your lawn or garden, use a hard water bypass. Plants don’t need the sodium, and over time, it can build up in the soil.

Is Softened Water Safe for Pets and Wildlife?

This area requires caution. The needs of animals are different from our appliances.

Can I use soft water in my fish tank? Never use straight softened water in an aquarium. The softening process removes calcium and magnesium that fish and beneficial bacteria need. It can crash your tank’s ecosystem. Use a remineralization filter or prepared water. Softened water safe aquariums are possible when properly remineralized and tested. We’ll cover how to do that in the next steps.

Can I use softened water for hummingbird food? Do not use it. The sodium is not good for them. Always make nectar with plain, filtered tap water or distilled water. It’s a simple step to protect these tiny visitors.

For dog and cat water bowls, the small amount of sodium in softened drinking water is typically not a health concern for most pets. If your pet is on a strict vet-ordered low-sodium diet, provide water from a filtered source.

Can I Water My Plants with Softened Water?

The answer depends on where your plants live.

Outdoor Plants & Lawns: They are usually fine. Rainwater naturally dilutes any sodium that accumulates in the soil. If you live in a very dry climate and irrigate constantly with softened water, you might see soil issues over many years. Using a hard water bib is still the best practice.

Potted Indoor Plants: Here you need to be careful. Watering indoor pots exclusively with softened water can lead to sodium buildup in the confined soil, which eventually harms the roots and prevents the plant from absorbing nutrients.

Let your tap run for a minute to clear the softened water from the pipes (often the kitchen cold line is bypassed anyway), or use filtered water for your houseplants. You’ll see the difference in their growth.

Alternatives: Different Paths to Soft Water

If you’re concerned about sodium, you have options. A traditional salt-based softener is not your only choice. You can pick a different softening method, or you can treat your water after it’s been softened. This is especially important if you’re worried about sodium content in softened water.

Salt-Free Conditioners vs. Salt-Based Softeners

Let’s clear up the biggest confusion first. A salt-free system is not a softener. It’s a conditioner, often called a TAC system (Template Assisted Crystallization).

A salt-based softener trades hard minerals (calcium and magnesium) for sodium. It physically removes them. A TAC system doesn’t remove anything. Instead, it changes the shape of the hard mineral crystals.

These altered crystals can’t stick to your pipes, fixtures, or heating elements, so they prevent scale without adding sodium.

Here’s the simple comparison:

• Salt-Based Softener: Removes hardness minerals. Adds sodium. Stops scale completely. Requires salt and regeneration.
• Salt-Free Conditioner (TAC): Alters hardness minerals. Adds nothing. Prevents scale formation. No salt, no regeneration, no wastewater.

Choose a softener for true soft water that feels slippery and is best for appliances. Choose a conditioner if your main goal is scale prevention and you want zero sodium or maintenance.

Dual-Tank Softeners and Potassium Chloride

You can keep your powerful salt-based softening but eliminate the sodium. The trick is to use potassium chloride pellets instead of sodium chloride (salt).

Potassium chloride works the exact same way in the ion exchange process. The resin beads swap hardness ions for potassium ions instead of sodium ions.

This gives you genuinely soft water with zero added sodium, which is a perfect solution for strict low-sodium diets.

There are two catches. First, potassium chloride pellets cost about three times more than salt. Second, for large families, a standard single-tank softener can’t keep up if you use potassium, as it’s slightly less efficient. The solution is a dual-tank system. While one tank is in service, the other is on standby or regenerating, ensuring you never run out of soft, potassium-treated water.

The Post-Softening Filter: Reverse Osmosis

This is the most popular solution in my own service area. You get the whole-house benefits of a salt-based softener (appliance protection, clean plumbing, better washing) and then you polish the drinking water at one faucet.

You install a point-of-use Reverse Osmosis (RO) system under your kitchen sink. The RO membrane acts like an incredibly fine filter.

A reverse osmosis system will strip out 94-98% of the sodium added by your softener, along with a huge range of other contaminants like lead, nitrates, and fluoride.

It gives you ultra-pure water for drinking, cooking, and making coffee or ice. It’s a targeted fix. You keep your soft water for showers and laundry, and you get premium drinking water from one tap. Just remember, RO systems produce some wastewater and require filter changes every 6-12 months.

Tools & Materials Checklist for a Bypass or RO Install

Whether you’re installing a bypass valve for maintenance or hooking up an RO system, having the right gear makes the job smooth. Here’s what you need on your bench.

Essential Tools

• Tube cutter (for PEX or copper) or a hacksaw with a sharp blade
• Adjustable wrenches (two are better than one)
• Phillips and flat-head screwdrivers
• Teflon tape (the pink stuff for water is good)
• Deburring tool or sandpaper (to clean pipe ends after cutting)
• Drill with bits (for mounting brackets)
• Measuring tape and marker

Basic Plumbing Materials

For adding a bypass valve or connecting an RO unit to your water line:

• Bypass valve kit (for your specific softener model)
• Shut-off valves (angle stops or inline ball valves)
• PEX tubing and fittings, or copper pipe and fittings (match your home’s plumbing)
• Mounting brackets or a board for securing the RO unit
• Pipe hangers or clips
• Bucket and towels (for the inevitable spill)

Standard Under-Sink RO System Kit Components

When you buy a reverse osmosis system, it should include most of this. Verify before you start.

• RO membrane housing
• Pre-filter and post-filter housings (usually 2-3 stages)
• Faucet (to mount on your sink or countertop)
• Storage tank (typically 3-4 gallons)
• Feed water adapter (a saddle valve or better yet, a proper tee valve)
• Drain line saddle clamp
• All necessary tubing and quick-connect fittings
• Mounting hardware

Turn off your main water supply before you cut into any pipe. Always follow the manufacturer’s instructions for your specific RO system, as connection orders can vary.

The DIY vs. Pro Verdict on System Changes

For a handy homeowner, modifying your system for better drinking water is a manageable project. The key is knowing exactly where your skills should stop. This isn’t about installing the main softener. It’s about smart, targeted additions.

Difficulty Rating: 4/10 for installing a bypass valve or an under-sink RO filter.

This rating means you need basic plumbing confidence and the right tools. You’re not building from scratch. You’re connecting pre-made components. If you can confidently measure, cut pipe, and solder or use push-to-connect fittings, you can handle this. If the thought of shutting off your main water supply makes you nervous, bump that rating up to a 7.

Define the DIY line: a handy homeowner can add a drinking water bypass or install an RO system.

Your DIY zone is after the main water softener. Your goal is to create a separate, unsoftened line for your kitchen cold tap or to polish already-softened water.

For a drinking water bypass, you’re typically adding a tee and running a new 1/2-inch copper or PEX line from before the softener to your kitchen sink.

Here’s the basic sequence:

1. Shut off the main water supply and drain the lines.
2. Identify the main cold water line entering the softener.
3. Install a tee fitting on that line.
4. Run the new pipe from that tee up to the cold water inlet under your sink.
5. Install a separate shutoff valve under the sink for this new line.
6. Connect the new line to your faucet’s cold water port (you may need a new faucet or a dual-feed model).
7. Check for leaks, restore water, and flush the new line.

Installing a reverse osmosis (RO) system under your sink is often even simpler, as most are designed for DIY with push-connect tubing. You mount the unit, tap into the cold water line (often with a saddle valve, though I prefer a proper tee), connect the drain hose to your sink’s drain pipe, and install the faucet. The hardest part is usually drilling the hole in the sink or countertop for the new faucet.

Define the Pro line: re-piping the main line for a softener bypass or installing the whole softener is best left to a licensed plumber.

This is where you call someone. A full softener installation involves cutting into your main 3/4-inch or 1-inch water line, installing a bypass valve manifold, and connecting drain and overflow lines. One wrong solder joint on your main supply can mean a catastrophic leak inside your wall.

A licensed plumber ensures the system is installed to local code, which often includes a proper air gap for the drain line and correct venting to prevent back-siphonage. They also handle the permits if your area requires them. Most quality softeners need 120v power, which a plumber can safely wire. Getting this wrong can fry the control valve or create a shock hazard.

Similarly, if you want a whole-house bypass so that no water is softened (for irrigation, for example), that requires re-routing the main line. The plumbing there is more complex than a single drinking water line. The risk and cost of a mistake are too high for most DIYers.

Mention Code & Compliance: point to UPC/IPC for proper drainage and air gaps on RO systems, and NSF/ANSI 44 for softener certification.

Codes exist for health and safety, not to make your life difficult. For the RO system you install, the drain hose connection is critical. The Uniform Plumbing Code (UPC) and International Plumbing Code (IPC) require an air gap to prevent contaminated drain water from being sucked back into the RO unit. That little air gap faucet on your sink isn’t just for looks. It’s a code-required safety device.

When you buy a water softener, look for the NSF/ANSI 44 certification mark. This means the system has been independently tested to verify it reduces hardness correctly and doesn’t add unsafe levels of contaminants to your water. A pro will know to install an NSF-certified unit. If you’re DIYing a bypass, you’re starting with a system that should already meet this standard.

Maintenance Schedule: Keeping Your System (and Water) Honest

You own the machine, so you own the maintenance. A softener is a simple beast, but ignore it and your water quality, appliance efficiency, and plumbing will suffer. This schedule isn’t just busywork, it’s how you protect your investment and your water.

Weekly: Check Salt Level in Brine Tank

This is your five-second health check. Pop the lid on the big plastic brine tank (the one with the salt). You want the salt level to always be at least one-quarter to one-half full. Running it completely empty is the number one reason for hard water suddenly coming through your pipes.

Letting the salt run dry lets hard minerals back into your water supply, and your appliances will start to scale up immediately.

I keep a bag of clean solar salt in my garage. When the level in my tank gets to that halfway mark, I dump the new bag in. It takes 30 seconds and saves me a potential service call.

Monthly: Feel for Salt Bridges or Mushing in the Brine Tank

Salt doesn’t always dissolve nicely. Once a month, after you check the level, take a broom handle or a piece of PVC pipe and poke down into the salt. You’re checking for two problems:

• Salt Bridge: A hard crust forms over an empty cavity. Your handle will hit a hard shelf before hitting wet salt or water.
• Salt Mushing: A thick, gooey sludge of undissolved salt and impurities forms at the bottom.

Both stop the system from making brine, which stops the softening process. Break up a bridge with your handle, and for mushing, you’ll likely need to scoop out the sludge during your annual cleanout.

Annually: Clean the Brine Tank, Sanitize the Resin Tank

Set a reminder for the same weekend every year, like when you change smoke detector batteries. Here’s the drill:

1. Unplug the softener.
2. Scoop out all remaining salt from the brine tank. Use a wet/dry vacuum for water and sludge at the very bottom.
3. Wipe the tank interior clean with a mild detergent and water. Rinse thoroughly.
4. To sanitize the resin tank (the tall, usually black tank), add one cup of unscented household bleach directly into the brine tank. Manually start a regeneration cycle. This sends the bleach solution through the resin beads to kill any bacteria.
5. After the cycle, run a bucket of water from a nearby tap to flush any residual bleach from your home’s lines before using water for drinking or cooking.

This annual cleanout prevents mushing, ensures efficient brine drawing, and keeps the system sanitary.

Every 2-5 Years: Consider Resin Bed Cleaning or Replacement

The resin beads inside the tall tank are what actually grab the hardness minerals. Over years, they can get coated with iron, manganese, or organic gunk from your water, reducing their grip.

If you notice your soft water doesn’t feel as “slippery” or you see a slight tint, the resin may be fouled. You have two options:

• Resin Cleaner: A liquid cleaner you pour into the brine tank and run through a regeneration. This is a good first step for minor fouling.
• Resin Replacement: This is a full DIY project. You drain the tank, open it up, and replace all the old resin beads with new ones.

If your water is very hard or has high iron, plan for cleaning or replacement closer to every 2-3 years. With good city water, you might get 5-6 years.

Filter Changes: RO Pre/Post Filters Every 6-12 Months; Whole-House Filters Per Manufacturer

If you have a reverse osmosis (RO) system for drinking water, it has separate filters. The sediment and carbon pre-filters protect the RO membrane. Change these every 6 to 12 months, no matter what. The post-filter polishes the water; change it on the same schedule.

A whole-house sediment filter, if you have one, is different. Its change schedule depends entirely on your water’s dirtiness. Check the filter housing monthly. When the clear casing looks dirty or your water pressure drops, swap the cartridge. That could be every 2 months or every 6. My own well filter needs changing every 90 days like clockwork.

Write the date on the new filter with a marker. Your future self will thank you.

Red Flag Troubleshooting Guide

Your water softener gives you signs when something’s off. Ignoring them can lead to bad water, wasted salt, or damage to your plumbing. Here’s what to look for and how to respond, including when to consider upgrading your system.

Slimy skin or hair after showering

That slippery, soapy feeling means your water is too soft. The softener is removing too much hardness, likely because it’s adding excess sodium to compensate for an incorrect setting.

This is almost always a programming error, not a mechanical failure. Your softener is set for water harder than what you actually have.

Check and adjust two settings on your control valve:

1. Hardness Setting: Input your city’s actual water hardness in grains per gallon (gpg). Get this number from your municipal water report or use a test strip.
2. Salt Efficiency Setting: If your valve has a “Salt Dose” or “Efficiency” setting, ensure it matches your salt type (pellets vs. crystals) and is not set excessively high.

Correcting these settings will fix the slimy feel within a day or two. My own unit did this after I moved and forgot to update the hardness from my old house.

Salt taste in water

If your drinking water tastes salty, stop drinking it immediately. This is a critical failure. The softener is injecting concentrated brine directly into your home’s water lines.

A salty taste points directly to a faulty brine valve or a control head that’s stuck in the brine draw cycle.

Your first step is to put the softener into bypass mode. This stops all treated water from entering your home. Then, turn off the water softener and check two things:

• Inspect the brine valve (usually a small plastic assembly on the control head) for cracks or debris.
• Listen to the control head. If it sounds like it’s constantly sucking or cycling, the timer or piston is malfunctioning.

Replacing a brine valve is a common DIY fix. A stuck control head usually means a rebuild kit or a professional service call.

White deposits (scale) returning

You installed a softener to stop scale, and now it’s back on your showerhead or faucet aerators. This means your softener isn’t regenerating properly. The resin beads are saturated with hardness minerals and can’t grab more.

Run through this checklist:

1. Salt Level: Is there enough salt in the brine tank? Is it a solid bridge of salt you need to break up?
2. Timer/Clock: Is the digital timer set correctly? For mechanical timers, is the clock running or is it unplugged?
3. Water Flow: Ensure the bypass valves are fully open. I’ve been on service calls where a partially closed valve was the only problem.
4. Resin Bed: Older resin can lose capacity. If settings and salt are correct, the resin may need replacement.

Rusty or cloudy water from softener

Brown or cloudy water coming from your softened lines is a sign of a dirty resin bed. Iron and manganese from your well or city supply can coat the resin beads, reducing their effectiveness and staining your water.

A fouled resin bed needs to be cleaned, not necessarily replaced. You can often fix this yourself.

Get a resin bed cleaner from a hardware store. It’s a liquid you pour into the brine tank just before a regeneration cycle. The cleaner will scrub the iron off the beads. For persistent problems, you may need to sanitize the entire tank with a bleach solution, following your manufacturer’s guidelines carefully to avoid damaging the resin.

High blood pressure concern

If you or a family member has hypertension, kidney disease, or is on a sodium-restricted diet, talk to your doctor before drinking softened water regularly.

Treat this as a medical red flag, not a plumbing one. The added sodium in softened water is a health consideration, not a system fault. If you’re concerned about salt, you might want to consider salt-free alternatives to traditional water softeners.

Your best solution is to stop drinking softened water from that tap. Install a reverse osmosis (RO) system or an activated carbon filter at your kitchen sink. These systems will remove the added sodium, along with other contaminants, providing dedicated drinking water. It’s a simple bypass line that any plumber can install in an hour.

What Helped Me: A Personal Take

In my own home, I use softened water for everything. The showers are fantastic, my appliances are protected from scale, and my plumbing is happy. But for drinking water and cooking, I ran a separate hard water line straight to the kitchen sink. It was a weekend project that gave me total peace of mind.

This bypass is simpler than it sounds. I tapped into the main hard water line before it reached the softener and ran a dedicated 1/2-inch PEX line to the kitchen. I installed a simple tee fitting and a small shutoff valve to control it. This way, my coffee, pasta water, and anything we drink comes from unsoftened water. I never have to think about sodium content or the slightly different taste some people notice.

This setup solves two problems: it completely removes the sodium question for consumption and it saves your softener salt, as you’re not regenerating to soften water you’re just going to drink.

A Practical Pro-Tip

If you’re worried about sodium but love soft water, try potassium chloride softener pellets. They cost more but add potassium instead of sodium. My neighbor with heart issues uses this setup on his doctor’s advice.

Potassium chloride works exactly like salt in your softener. You just pour the bag into the brine tank instead of sodium chloride pellets. The ion exchange process is the same, swapping hardness minerals for potassium ions. It’s a direct swap you can make today. For those considering water softener salt potassium chloride, this option keeps the switch simple and familiar. Just follow your softener’s brine-tank guidelines to ensure proper regeneration.

The main drawback is cost, often two to three times the price of traditional salt, and it can be less effective in very cold water. You also need to clean your brine tank more often, as potassium chloride is more prone to forming mush or bridges. Check it monthly.

For most people, the sodium added by a softener is minimal. But if you are on a strict, doctor-ordered sodium-restricted diet or simply want to eliminate it, potassium chloride is your best alternative without changing your entire water system.

Common Questions

Is softened water safe for daily drinking?

For most people, yes-the sodium added is minimal, akin to a bite of bread. However, if you’re on a strict low-sodium diet for medical reasons, consult your doctor first to be safe.

How does a water softener actually work?

It uses ion exchange: resin beads swap hardness minerals like calcium for sodium ions. This prevents scale but doesn’t purify water, so overall dissolved solids remain unchanged.

Should I be concerned about sodium levels in softened water?

Typically, no-the amount is small, often under 30 mg per glass for average hardness. But if your water is very hard, test it and consider a bypass for drinking to ease your mind.

Who should definitely avoid drinking softened water?

Individuals with hypertension, kidney disease, heart failure, or infants on formula. For these cases, use a hard water bypass at the kitchen tap to eliminate sodium exposure.

What are my options if I want soft water without sodium?

You can switch to potassium chloride pellets, install a salt-free conditioner, or add a reverse osmosis system at your sink. Each provides soft or purified water without the sodium concern.

Making the Right Call on Softened Water

The most important step is to test your softened water’s sodium level and discuss the results with your doctor if you follow a sodium-restricted medical diet. If you have hypertension or are sodium-sensitive, softened water can affect daily intake. The topic of water softener salt and blood pressure effects is relevant to this discussion. For everyone else, the sodium added by softening is minimal, and the benefits of removing scale from your home’s plumbing and appliances are significant.