Smart water fountain with app control, triple-action filter, and stainless steel top. Encourages hydration for cats.
App-controlled
Stainless steel top
Triple-action filter
Ultra quiet
Expensive
App sometimes glitchy
Filter replacements costly
Quality: 9/10 · Features: 9/10 · Ease of Cleaning: 8/10 · Value: 7/10
These are our own scores for the things that can be judged from the specification, the materials and how the product is built. They are not Amazon's customer rating.
Cats evolved from desert animals and have a famously weak thirst drive. On a wet-food diet that matters less, because the food carries the water. On dry food it matters a great deal, and chronic low-level dehydration is part of the picture in feline lower urinary tract disease and in the kidney problems that show up in older cats.
A fountain does not force a cat to drink. What it does is remove the two things that stop cats drinking from a bowl: still water that tastes stale within hours, and a bowl position where the cat cannot watch the room while its head is down. Moving, aerated, filtered water in a wide dish gets used more. That is the whole mechanism, and it is why a fountain is a reasonable thing to own even though the marketing around them is overheated.
The Smart version is the app-connected one. Over the non-connected PIXI you get:
Water-level and filter reminders on your phone. The genuinely useful part, because the failure mode of every fountain is an owner forgetting the filter and the pump running dry.
Scheduling and flow modes. Continuous or intermittent running, which cuts pump wear and noise overnight.
A stainless steel top plate. This is the part worth paying attention to, and we would rate it above the app.
Plastic fountains develop a slimy biofilm and, in some cats, a chin acne reaction from bacteria harboured in scratched plastic. Stainless steel is non-porous, does not scratch the same way, and wipes properly clean. A fountain with a steel drinking surface is materially easier to keep hygienic than an all-plastic one, and if your cat has ever had chin acne this alone is the reason to choose it.
The reservoir underneath is still plastic, so "stainless fountain" means the surface the cat's face touches, not the whole unit.
Every fountain review that ends badly ends with cleaning. Plan for it:
| Interval | Task |
|---|---|
| Every 1–3 days | Top up the reservoir. Never let the pump run dry. |
| Weekly | Strip it down, wash the bowl, top plate and reservoir in hot soapy water, rinse thoroughly |
| Weekly | Pull the pump apart and clean the impeller — this is the step people skip and the reason fountains get loud |
If you live somewhere with hard water, limescale builds on the pump and the steel plate and the fountain gets noisy and slow. Using filtered or previously boiled and cooled water in the reservoir dramatically extends pump life. It is the single most effective thing you can do beyond cleaning the impeller.
Do not remove the old water bowl. Put the fountain down alongside it, unplugged, for a day or two, then run it. Some cats take a fortnight. Cats that dislike the sound often accept intermittent mode where continuous mode put them off — which is one of the few genuinely useful things the app buys you.
Keep it away from the food bowl. Many cats dislike drinking beside where they eat, and a fountain in the wrong place gets ignored for reasons that have nothing to do with the fountain.
They help by removing the reasons cats avoid bowls — still, stale water and a poor drinking position. More cats drink more from moving, filtered water. That matters most for cats on dry food, and for cats with a history of urinary or kidney problems, where water intake is genuinely part of management.
Every two to four weeks, and sooner in a hard-water area or a multi-cat house. The app version reminds you, which is the main practical reason to choose it.
Nearly always the pump impeller. Cat hair and biofilm wrap around the shaft and the pump labours. Take the pump apart, clean the impeller and its housing, and refit. A low water level also makes a fountain gurgle, so check the reservoir first.
For the surface the cat drinks from, yes. Plastic scratches and holds biofilm, which is linked to feline chin acne in some cats. Steel wipes properly clean. The reservoir here is still plastic, so it needs the same weekly wash.
Leave the old bowl out, place the fountain away from the food bowl, and give it two weeks. Try the intermittent flow mode if the continuous sound seems to put the cat off. Forcing the issue by removing the bowl risks a cat that drinks less, not more.