Most of the pools that homeowners have nowadays are disinfected using chlorine as the main disinfecting agent, and saltwater pools are no different. Although salt is added to the pool, it’s broken down by the brominator into its two distinct parts: sodium ions and chlorine ions. In the saltwater pool, the chlorine ions are then turned into Hypochlorous acid—an ingredient that disinfects but doesn’t end up irritating the swimmer’s eyes like chlorine can.

Not just any type of salt can be added to a swimming pool, however. Although the salt that’s used in these pools are chemically similar to table salt, they manufactured in a way that makes the conversion process that occurs in the pool a lot smoother. To help our readers convert their current pool to saltwater or keep their saltwater pool in good condition, we’ve listed the ten best pool salts below.

Best Pool Salts

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10Morton Fast Dissolving Salt

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This high-purity swimming pool salt from one of the most trusted salt companies around is designed to help people keep their saltwater pools up and running. By using this product, no one has to store chemical chlorine around their home because this product will be converted into chlorine by the swimming pool’s salt chlorinators. This is not only a pure salt but is also a fine-grade salt, so it’s designed to dissolve quickly in the pool’s water. As long as all directions on its package are followed, and this salt is evenly distributed, then it will do a great job of keeping the swimming pool sanitized.

9Aquasalt Swimming Pool & Spa Salt

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Aquasalt is one of the highest grades of pool salt available, and it says so right on its package. However, that’s not just a boast by this product’s PR agency but it is true. This product is 100% pure and is certified by the USP to be used for spa and swimming pool chlorine salt generators. It’s a fine grade that’s designed to be greatly distributed over the surface of the pool and is designed to dissolve quickly. And because it comes in a 40-pound bag, there’s plenty to treat large pools, if used according to Chlorine Generator Manufacturer’s Guidelines.

8Clorox High-Purity Pool & Spa Salt

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Clorox is a universally recognized company that’s well known for making chlorine products for both laundry and pool applications. However, there aren’t a whole lot of people that realize they also make a high-purity pool salt that’s free of adulterants that may be found in other pool treatments. This product is over 99% pure and is made into fine granules so that it can quickly dissolve in pool water. Because of its quick dissolve time, this product can go right to work disinfecting the pool so people can enjoy nice clean water to swim in. Water that won’t sting swimmer’s eyes or fade their clothing.

7Easy Care Pool Tec Chlorine Salt Cell Booster

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Pool Tec is a product that’s designed to work as a chlorine salt cell booster, as a water clarifier and an algaecide all in one. When used according to its label’s directions, this product will treat a 20,000-gallon pool and help to improve and maintain water quality. Although this isn’t a pool salt, it does help salt cells work better and helps to cut chlorine use by up to 65-percent. It also provides great algae control and can help to winterize pools without having to add chlorine to the pool. That makes this a great maintenance product for any saltwater pools.

6Natural Chemistry Salt Water Pool Maintenance Kit

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This saltwater pool maintenance kit is designed to keep these type of pools in good working condition. These chemicals help to prevent pool surfaces from staining and remove harmful phosphates from the pool’s system. It’s also designed to regulate salt and mineral levels so that the chlorine generator can work to its maximum potential. Because this product doesn’t contain any water softener additives, it won’t stain pool surfaces like other saltwater pool products have the potential of doing. That makes it a good product to use to keep pools in good working condition. It’s not a pool salt, but it helps to make pool salts work more efficiently.

5Hayward SAS-Cell Salt & Swim Chlorination Cell

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Designed to be used in in-ground swimming pools that are equipped with a salt cell system, this high-quality product from Hayward is capable of producing over 200-pounds of chlorine in the pool’s water over time. This means that it provides complete sanitization of the pool system but produces a type of chlorine that doesn’t irritate eyes or dry out the skin. By using this product, pool owners can avoid having to constantly use chlorine tablets or mix and measure out liquid chlorine products. Another benefit of using this product over chlorine is that it’s 50% cheaper to use over a year.

4hTH Salt Cell Saver

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This product may not be a pool salt but it’s designed to work with the pool’s chemistry to keep salt generator cells in good condition. Once introduced into the pool water, this product will help to prevent scale formation and stains that may be caused by excessive minerals in the water. It’s also capable of keeping the salt cell’s electrodes in good working condition, so it can continue to work as intended. This product is also stable and effective in all water temperatures, even when temperatures get above 90-degrees Fahrenheit. All of which makes it a great product for maintaining any saltwater pool.

3Morton Salt Pro 40-Pound Pool Salt

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Manufactured by one of the leading salt companies in the U.S, this high-quality salt is ready to disinfect just about any pool. It comes in a convenient to use a 40-pound bag and is a salt product that contains no additives whatsoever. The only thing that’s in this bag is sodium chloride, so it’s capable of being chemically converted by saltwater chlorinators quickly and efficiently. This product has a fast dissolve rate as well, and that allows it to start working quicker than swimming pool salts that dissolve at a slower rate. No wonder it’s one of the best products for keeping a pool clean that’s available at the moment.

2Diamond Crystal Salt 40-Pound Bag

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Designed to work with just about any electric chlorinator system that’s currently manufactured, this quality salt from Diamond Crystal works quickly and helps disinfect pools completely. One introduced into the pool’s water, this salt dissolves quickly so that the chemical process can get well underway. It’s able to do this because its made from a fine-grade salt that’s been obtained through the evaporation process. That makes it an additive-free and all-natural disinfect that won’t produce the same strong odor or eye irritation that chlorine does. It’s a 99.9% pure product ready to make anyone’s pool cleaner.

1Morton’s Professional Choice Easy-Pour Jug

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Mortons is well known for creating high-quality table salt products, so it really shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone that they also make some great pool salt products as well. Take this one, for instance. It’s 20-pounds of granulated salt that comes in an easy-pour jug. This jug allows the pool owner to carefully and evenly distribute the salt over the entire surface of the swimming pool. This even distribution allows the salt to dissolve faster and helps in the chemical conversion process. Now a clean pool can be easily achieved without having to wrestle with oversized bags.

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A Guide To Buying & Using Pool Salt

Since so many people are switching to saltwater pools, we thought it might be relevant to talk about how to buy the best pool salt products and how to use them effectively. Regardless of whether you’re going to purchase one of the products from our above list or are looking for some other brand of pool salt, this guide is sure to provide you with all of the information you are going to need. Let’s get started and delve into this subject a little bit further.

How To Buy Pool Salt

Salt products are extremely important to civilization. This product is so important that it comes in a myriad of different forms, from the table salt that we use to season food to the road salt that’s used to treat roads during the winter. However, when it comes to pool salts, the consumer only has three different options available. These three types are Mined Salt, Solar Salt, and Evaporated Salt. Let’s take a closer look at each of these pool salt types to determine which ones are the most effective.

  • Mined Salt – As its name implies, this type of salt is mined from rock salt mines. This type of salt is used for a variety of different applications, but there’s probably no application where it’s more effective than in a swimming pool. That’s because this salt is some of the purest types of salt the pool owner can find, with some brands having an almost 99% composition of Sodium Chloride. That’s why this type of salt is the one that most pool owners prefer. It’s also the type that we recommend the most for saltwater pools.
  • Solar Salt – The next type of salt that’s available is solar salt. What is solar salt, you ask? Well, it’s a salt that’s made by placing ocean water in an open holding bin, where it is then exposed to the sun. When the ocean water evaporates, it leaves behind salt. Solar salt is produced because it’s one of the cheapest ways that manufacturers can produce salt. Unfortunately, the type of salt is not without its drawbacks. One of its main drawbacks is that ocean water just doesn’t contain particles of salt in it, but it also contains microorganisms–microorganisms that die during the evaporation process. That means the when pool owners are adding solar salt to their pool, then they’re not only adding sodium but they’re also adding the carcasses of various microorganisms such as brine shrimp. Because of salts’ inherent nature, bacteria can exist in it, but there are still those microorganisms contaminants to think about. Of course, these contaminants will be filtered out by the pool’s filter. However, why add something that has to be filtered out in the first place? That’s why solar salt is not a preferable type of salt for pool owners.
  • Mechanically Evaporated Salt – Mechanically evaporated salt is made from ocean water that isn’t dried by the sun but is instead dried by mechanical methods. This process kills microorganisms in the salt faster, then solar stills do. This process allows the manufacturer to remove some of the organic contaminants from the water but it doesn’t remove some of the mineral contaminants from the water. These contaminants can include iron, silicates, phosphates, calcium, copper, and nitrates. These contaminants might require the pool owner to have to adjust their pool chemistry more than they would have to if they used a pool salt that uses mined salt.

How To Use Pool Salt

Having just covered what pool owners should look for when shopping for pool salt, we thought that we should now talk about using pool salt effectively. Although the following tips shouldn’t replace the directions of both your swimming pool and your pool salt product, it does contain some information that some pool owners might find useful.

Step One: Read All The Directions

Yes, we understand that we just stated that the pool owner should read the directions of the Salt Chlorine Generator’s Owner’s Manual as well as the pool salt, but we think it’s worth repeating here. Most Salt Chlorine Generators operate with a target range of 3,000-4,000 parts-per-million, but there are exceptions, so definitely read the directions. Once you understand the salt concentration levels required, you can then proceed to step two.

Step Two: Check The Pool’s Salt Level

Once you understand the salt concentration levels required for the pool, it’s time to do some tests. If the pool is brand new, the salt concentration will, of course, be at zero parts-per-million, but if you’ve used the pool before, then you are going to test the water. You are also going to have to test the water if you are converting from a standard chlorinator to a saltwater chlorinator. In those cases, you will usually find that the salt levels are somewhere in the 300 to 550 ppm salt range. Salt testing strips are readily available both online and at pool stores.

Step Three: Determine How Much Salt Is Needed

The next step is to determine how much salt the pool needs. For most systems, the salt range will have to be brought up to 3,500 to 4,000 ppm. To determine how much salt is needed to reach that level, you need to figure out the current saltwater level, and how many gallons of water is in the pool. Then those figures can be plugged into a Salt Water Pool Table (they can be found online or in pool stores) to figure out how much salt is needed. Below we’ve listed some common examples that we’ve taken from Salt Water Pool Tables.

For example, suppose you have a 10,000-gallon pool and your current salt level is 1,500 parts-per-million. In that instance, you would need 167 pounds of salt. On the other hand, if your pool’s salt level is at 0 PPM and you have a 20,000-gallon pool, then you are going to need 584 pounds of salt to be added.

Step Four: Add The Salt To The Pool

Making sure that the Salt Chlorine Generator is turned off, it’s time to add salt to the pool. During this process, the pool’s pump can be left on to circulate the water and speed the process of the salt dissolving, but the generator should remain off until the salt has dissolved completely. Salt shouldn’t be poured into the skimmer but should be poured into the shallow end of the pool. It can take up to 24-hours for the salt to dissolve, so be patient. Once it has dissolved, turn on the salt chlorinator. Now it’s time to check the salt level of the pool. Make sure that the salt level isn’t too low, which can reduce chlorine production, or isn’t too high, which can shorten the life of the cell. If the salt level is in the range recommended by your Salt Chlorine Generator, then your job is done and you can now enjoy your pool.