Aquaforest vs Salifert phosphate tests

Darsh · May 15, 2020

Hi everyone, I'm sure this has been answered numerous times but I can't find a comparison thread with these 2 specific tests.
Hanna is out of my price range before you ask ;)
I see that a lot of people get zero readings on their Salifert kits, hopefully that means their actual levels are close to zero. Not much info on Aquaforest tests.
Does anyone have any experience with these 2 tests? What are the pros/cons of both??
Thanks :)

Rybren · May 15, 2020

I had been using Salifert for quite a few years, but the last time I went to replace it, the LFS was out of stock so I bought an Aquaforest kit.

I ran a couple of side by side tests with both kits and got very similar results. I say similar results because the AF test chart has 7 colours between 0 and 0.15 and the Salifert has 8 between 0 and 3.0 so it is hard to do a direct comparison. You can, however, double the sample size and amount of reagents with the Salifert and then cut the colour reading in half.

Both tests are easy to use. I have a lot of trouble distinguishing between the various shades of colours on most tests so I use a colour matching app on my phone.

Darsh · May 15, 2020

Rybren said:
I had been using Salifert for quite a few years, but the last time I went to replace it, the LFS was out of stock so I bought an Aquaforest kit.

I ran a couple of side by side tests with both kits and got very similar results. I say similar results because the AF test chart has 7 colours between 0 and 0.15 and the Salifert has 8 between 0 and 3.0 so it is hard to do a direct comparison. You can, however, double the sample size and amount of reagents with the Salifert and then cut the colour reading in half.

Both tests are easy to use. I have a lot of trouble distinguishing between the various shades of colours on most tests so I use a colour matching app on my phone.

Ah okay, thanks for that :) So it's not possible to double the amount with the Aquaforest one?