The Aarke Carbonator 3 is a sleek soda maker with a solid handle that is why soda jerks must have gotten into the business in the first place. The soda maker produced gentle rolling bubbles for rounded bubbly water with a few short pulls of the handle. I admit that I haven’t always been a fan of seltzer (I thought it tasted like boring soda), but at some point in my mid-20s everything changed. The LaCroix boom happened, and sparkling water suddenly burst onto the scene as a new, young, cutting-edge beverage. Now, in the age of spiked seltzer and CBD soda waters it’s hard to overstate the culture impact seltzer water has had, and I have to confess, I’ve started to love it, too. What could be a better pairing with any meal? A more invigorating drink on a swelteringly hot summer day?

Able to make 700ml of fizzy water at a time, the glass bottle is made from high-quality glass with a sleek polished steel lid to match your Carbonator Pro. It’s suitable for refrigeration, so you can make your soda water or fizzy flavours in advance and chill them to perfection until you’re ready to serve, and when you’ve supped all the delicious fizz inside, you can pop it straight into the dishwasher for an easy clean. For the home seltzer enthusiast, bubble structure — essentially, the type of fizziness the water holds — is undoubtedly a top priority. A loose bubble structure can feel like slightly larger bubbles, and give a less aggressive sensation of fizz, while a tight bubble structure features tiny bubbles, and a more prominent burn from the carbonation (think McDonald's Sprite). While there are merits to both, I prefer a tighter bubble structure (go big or go home, you know?) which I find more bracing, and also helps to better cleanse your palate between bites at mealtimes.Want to turn normal tap water into sparkling water at the touch of a button? Aarke’s Carbonator Pro does exactly that, so you can enjoy fresh fizz in the comfort of your home without a disposable plastic bottle in sight. And with its sleek, stylish design and Polished Steel finish, it’s bound to look right at home on your kitchen worktop. This is a manual machine, nice if you want to use it somewhere where you don’t have a plug handy. You depress the button on top until you hear a hissing noise (after only a second or two). Three pumps created a strong, fizzy drink, even with the user guide suggesting that five pumps was “strong fizz.” The soda machine can only be used to carbonate water. The third generation of Aarke’s soda maker is even more efficient than its predecessors. The precisely tuned carbonation system ensures the perfect bubble size while keeping CO2 use to a minimum, so each gas cylinder lasts longer, and models are now fitted with even higher quality sustainable parts to withstand the test of time. The pressure release valve has been updated for a quieter, more refined sound and the interior tech has been modified for a more controlled release of pressure, too. All of this combines to give you an effortless experience every time you use your Aarke carbonator. Sleek style Ideal for garden parties, mobile home owners and off-grid holidays, because the carbonation is created solely by the gas cylinder, you don’t need to plug your Aarke Carbonator in to create fizzy drinks, so you can make them anywhere you’re happy to take the carbonator. It was among the quietest models we tested. The DrinkMate OmniFizz comes with a 28-ounce bottle and 14-ounce bottle (nice if you’re looking to make a single serving of sparkling water) that are not dishwasher-safe.

The glass bottle is dishwasher safe, so users can easily keep it clean, and the machine itself requires little to no cleaning. The DrinkMate OmniFizz produced drinks with gentle, rolling bubbles. It was a bit like drinking white noise. You depress the button on top multiple times in short bursts to carbonate water (there’s a max amount of carbonation that is still relatively mild) before releasing the built-up pressure via the attached infuser. With a press of the top button, the Aarke Carbonator Pro produced slightly smaller bubbles than the Aarke Carbonator 3 and the water had a slight minerality (likely the glass bottle allowing us to taste the mineral content of the tap water). The machine also had a tendency to drip slightly on the base tray when removing a bottle. The SodaStream Terra is the right blend of price and performance with an intuitive design and small profile that fits on a bar top or in a cabinet. It produced medium-sized, assertive bubbles — the kind of sparkling water that should suit people who are daily sparkling water drinkers.Developed to work perfectly with Aarke carbonators, the brand’s Flavour Drops come in a variety of flavours, like sweet Wild Strawberry and refreshing Cucumber and Lime. Sugar free and made with natural flavourings, just add five drops of Aarke flavouring to a glass of freshly carbonated water and enjoy. Each 50ml recyclable bottle of Flavour Drops makes up to 40 litres of flavoured fizzy water, so you can save on those trips to the shops. Accessory appeal That’s where Aarke’s Carbonator Pro comes in. The at-home water carbonator features a simple interface, a reusable glass bottle, recyclable and renewable CO2, and, most importantly, produces top-notch soda water. How’s the seltzer? Please note: Recycled SodaStream Cylinders are only available when you return a used SodaStream cylinder. Used cylinders can be returned to any of our stores.

Whether you're concerned about the environment or your health (or, in most cases, both), reducing plastic in any capacity is always a plus. The MySoda Woody produces the closest cousin to canned seltzer — assertive, rolling bubbles that hit the front of your tongue and you almost feel in your nose. First, I wouldn't feel comfortable taking this bottle out into the world, at least not without some kind of silicone sleeve for protection (which Aarke doesn't offer). It might be ideal for filling up and placing on the table during dinner, but it's less convenient for travel. Of course, you could always empty the sparkling water into a travel bottle of your choice, but that just adds one more item to the dirty dishes pile at the end of the day. The carbonation tank (you’ll need to buy a threaded 60-liter tank separately) is screwed into the tower after you lay the machine on its side, while the 27-ounce plastic bottle (that needs to be hand-washed) is likewise twisted onto the top. It was one of the easiest models to set up.Although sparkling water is undoubtedly an incredible beverage, it’s not always simple to procure; lugging those liter-sized bottles or a case of full cans from the grocery store is a pain, and delivery can be expensive. The environmental impact, too, can make it difficult to justify buying bottles of sparkling water. It’s hard to enjoy some nice bubbly water when you’re drinking it out of a single use plastic, or an aluminum can or glass bottle that may or may not get recycled. After unboxing the Carbonator Pro and accompanying manual, it wasn't long before the gas cylinder was installed, the machine was buzzing, and I was drinking pleasantly sparkling seltzer—without opening a can or single-use bottle. The most time-consuming part of the process was probably filling the glass bottle with fresh water (which, as you might guess, didn't take long). The innovative design The SodaStream Fizzi One Touch takes the guesswork out of one of the big questions raised by soda makers: how many times to push the button.