Spring Water vs. Purified Water: Which Should You Drink?

The short answer: spring water is collected from a natural underground source and bottled with most of its minerals intact, while purified water is treated — usually by reverse osmosis, distillation, or deionization — until nearly all dissolved minerals and contaminants are removed. Both are safe, regulated drinking water. The difference is taste, mineral content, and what you plan to use the water for.

If you have stood in a store aisle in Indio comparing labels that say spring, purified, distilled, and mineral, you are not alone. It helps to know what those words legally mean, because the FDA defines each one. Under those rules, most bottled water falls into one of these categories based on its source and how much treatment it has had:

Below we break down each type, answer the question we hear most often in the Coachella Valley — is Culligan water spring water? — and explain which option makes the most sense for a household drinking Indio tap water.

The difference comes down to two things: where the water starts and how much is taken out before it reaches you.

To be labeled spring water, the FDA requires that the water come from an underground formation from which water flows naturally to the surface. It can be collected at the spring or through a borehole that taps the same source. Spring water is filtered and disinfected before bottling, but the treatment is designed to leave the naturally occurring minerals — calcium, magnesium, bicarbonates and others — in place. Those minerals are what give spring water its slightly rounded, characteristic taste, and they are the main reason people choose it.

To be labeled purified, water must meet the U.S. Pharmacopeia purity standard, which in practice means total dissolved solids of no more than 10 parts per million. The source can be anything — including municipal tap water — because the process does the work. The FDA recognizes several methods: reverse osmosis, distillation, deionization, and other equivalent processes. Each strips out all but the most basic water molecules, so what is left is water in its most elemental form. When a label says “reverse osmosis water” or “deionized water,” that is your clue that it is purified water.

So in one sentence: spring water is defined by its source; purified water is defined by its process.

Culligan water is purified water, not spring water. Culligan does not bottle water from a natural spring. Whether it comes out of a Culligan reverse osmosis system under your kitchen sink, a Culligan bottle-free cooler in your office, or bottled water sold under the Culligan name in markets that offer delivery, the water started as ordinary tap water and was then filtered — most often through reverse osmosis — to remove dissolved minerals, chlorine taste, and contaminants.

That is by design. Purification gives a consistent, clean-tasting result no matter what the local water supply looks like, which matters in a place like Indio where the tap water is very hard. Some Culligan drinking water systems add a mineral boost stage after the RO membrane, which puts a small, controlled amount of healthy minerals back into the water for a taste closer to spring water — without the variability that comes with a natural source.

Here in the Coachella Valley, Culligan of Indio provides purified drinking water two ways: reverse osmosis drinking water systems installed at the sink for homes, and bottle-free water coolers that filter your existing water line for offices and busy households. Neither one is spring water, and neither one requires lifting a bottle.

Four labels show up most often on bottled water in Indio stores. Here is how they compare side by side:

Two details worth noting from that table. Distilled water is not a separate category from purified water — it is one way of making purified water. And mineral water is legally different from spring water: it must contain at least 250 ppm of total dissolved solids straight from the source, and nothing can be added to reach that number.

For most people, neither is meaningfully healthier than the other. Both must meet the FDA’s bottled water standards, which mirror the EPA’s rules for public tap water. The health question really comes down to two smaller trade-offs:

The honest summary: if you want a few extra minerals, spring water gives them to you. If you want the lowest possible level of everything that is not water, purified water wins. Both are healthy choices.

Taste is where people have the strongest opinions, and it is almost entirely about minerals. Dissolved calcium, magnesium, and bicarbonate give spring water a fuller, slightly sweet character. Purified water has almost none of those, so it tastes clean and neutral — some people describe it as crisp, others as flat.

Context matters. Purified water is the preferred choice for coffee, tea, and cooking because it lets the flavor of the food or beans come through without mineral interference. For plain drinking, it is genuinely a matter of preference. If you find reverse osmosis water too flat, a mineral boost or alkaline stage on the RO system adds a touch of minerals back and is the most common fix we install in Indio homes.

One local note: many Coachella Valley residents describe their tap water as tasting “heavy” or leaving a film on glasses. That is the hardness minerals talking, and it is a big reason bottled water is so popular here. Purified water removes that heaviness completely, which is often the first thing people notice after switching.

Indio’s tap water is groundwater pumped from the Coachella Valley aquifer and delivered by the Indio Water Authority, with the Coachella Valley Water District serving much of the surrounding valley. That water is safe to drink, but it is very hard — roughly 250 to 300 ppm, or about 15 to 17 grains per gallon — and it carries a correspondingly high mineral load. In practical terms, our tap water already has more dissolved solids than most bottled spring water, so buying spring water rarely feels like an upgrade to people here. What most Indio households are actually looking for is purified water.

The most cost-effective way to get it is to make it at home rather than haul it from the store:

Pricing for an RO system or cooler depends on your home’s water and how much purified water you use, so the first step is a free in-home water test. A Culligan of Indio water expert will measure your hardness and total dissolved solids, show you exactly what is in your tap water, and recommend the simplest way to turn it into the water you actually want to drink — no bottles required.

No. Culligan water is purified water. Culligan reverse osmosis systems, bottle-free coolers, and Culligan-branded bottled water all start with tap water that is filtered — typically by reverse osmosis — to remove minerals and contaminants. It is not collected from a natural spring.

Distilled water is one type of purified water. Purification can be done by distillation, reverse osmosis, or deionization; all three meet the same FDA purity standard by different routes. Distilled water tends to have the lowest mineral content of the three.

Purified water removes minerals, but the amount of calcium and magnesium in any drinking water is small compared with a normal diet. If you prefer minerals in your water, a mineral boost stage on a reverse osmosis system adds them back in a controlled amount.

No. Indio tap water is groundwater drawn from the Coachella Valley aquifer through municipal wells, treated and delivered by the Indio Water Authority or Coachella Valley Water District. It is safe and regulated, but it is very hard, which is why many residents filter it before drinking.

Purified water. Its low mineral content lets the flavor of coffee, tea, and food come through cleanly and prevents scale buildup in coffee makers and kettles — a real issue with Indio’s hard water.