Tap water · WI
Milwaukee Water Works
EPA system ID WI2410100 · serves about 626,000 people. Every US utility must publish an annual water quality report — here’s the official one (2025), and below it, our plain-English translation.
Read the official report →What Milwaukee Water Works found in 2025
47 detected analytes from the utility’s own annual report, hand-normalized — nothing was near or over a federal health-based limit.
| Detected | Level | Limit | % of limit | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Chlorine, Total | 1.61 ppm | 4 ppm | 40% | Within limit |
| Lead (90th percentile) | 5.3 ppb | 15 ppb | 35% | Within limit |
| Total Dissolved Solids | 173 ppm | 500 ppm | 35% | Within limit |
| Bromate | 2.2 ppb | 10 ppb | 22% | Within limit |
| Fluoride | 0.64 ppm | 4 ppm | 16% | Within limit |
| Sulfate | 27 ppm | 250 ppm | 11% | Within limit |
| Trihalomethanes, Total | 8.6 ppb | 80 ppb | 11% | Within limit |
| Chloride | 17 ppm | 250 ppm | 7% | Within limit |
| PFOS + PFOA | 4.4 ppt | 70 ppt | 6% | Within limit |
| Copper (90th percentile) | 0.061 ppm | 1.3 ppm | 5% | Within limit |
| Sodium | 9.8 ppm | 250 ppm | 4% | Within limit |
| Total Haloacetic Acids 5 | 2 ppb | 60 ppb | 3% | Within limit |
| Perfluorooctanesulfonic acid (PFOS) | 2.2 ppt | 70 ppt | 3% | Within limit |
| Perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) | 2.2 ppt | 70 ppt | 3% | Within limit |
| Nitrate | 0.3 ppm | 10 ppm | 3% | Within limit |
| Antimony | 0.17 ppb | 6 ppb | 3% | Within limit |
| Barium | 0.02 ppm | 2 ppm | 1% | Within limit |
| Chromium, Total | 0.8 ppb | 100 ppb | 1% | Within limit |
| Atrazine | 0.02 ppb | 3 ppb | 1% | Within limit |
| Zinc | 0.019 ppm | 5 ppm | 0% | Within limit |
| Manganese | 0.17 ppb | 50 ppb | 0% | Within limit |
| Chlorite | 0 ppm | 1 ppm | 0% | Within limit |
| Total Solids | 191 ppm | — | — | No federal limit |
| Strontium | 113 ppb | — | — | No federal limit |
| Chlorate | 105 ppb | — | — | No federal limit |
| Calcium | 34 ppm | — | — | No federal limit |
| Bromide | 20 ppb | — | — | No federal limit |
| Magnesium | 12 ppm | — | — | No federal limit |
| Erucylamide | 3.8 ppb | — | — | No federal limit |
| Silica, Total | 2.2 ppm | — | — | No federal limit |
| Lithium | 2.1 ppb | — | — | No federal limit |
| o-Phosphate as PO4 | 1.74 ppm | — | — | No federal limit |
| Potassium | 1.5 ppm | — | — | No federal limit |
| Total Organic Carbon | 1.44 ppm | — | — | No federal limit |
| Rubidium | 1.1 ppb | — | — | No federal limit |
| Bromochloroacetic acid | 0.99 ppb | — | — | No federal limit |
| Bromodichloroacetic acid | 0.99 ppb | — | — | No federal limit |
| Molybdenum | 0.98 ppb | — | — | No federal limit |
| 1,1,1-Trichloro-2-propanone | 0.4 ppb | — | — | No federal limit |
| Bromochloroacetonitrile | 0.39 ppb | — | — | No federal limit |
| Chloropicrin | 0.35 ppb | — | — | No federal limit |
| 1,1-Dichloro-2-propanone | 0.3 ppb | — | — | No federal limit |
| Ammonia | 0.28 ppm | — | — | No federal limit |
| Chromium, Hexavalent | 0.15 ppb | — | — | No federal limit |
| Perchlorate | 0.1 ppb | — | — | No federal limit |
| Aluminum | 0.07 ppm | — | — | No federal limit |
| Metformin | 0.02 ppb | — | — | No federal limit |
Levels and limits are as printed in the utility’s report (“limit” is the EPA MCL, action level, residual limit, or secondary guideline that applies to that row; “ND” = not detected). Utilities publish these reports annually — we re-check every covered utility each July, after the federal publication deadline. Detected doesn’t mean dangerous — most detections sit far below their limits. This is education, not medical advice.
Your tap, if it were a bottle
How Milwaukee Water Works water stacks up against the bottled aisle
Same minerals, same units — the tap values below come from the utility’s report, placed next to the closest match in our bottled-water database.
| Mineral | Your tap | Closest bottled match |
|---|---|---|
| Total dissolved solids | 173 mg/L | Highland Spring at 170 mg/L |
| Calcium | 34 mg/L | Crazy Water at 34 mg/L |
| Magnesium | 12 mg/L | Ty Nant at 11.5 mg/L |
| Sodium | 9.8 mg/L | Summit Spring at 10 mg/L |
| Sulfate | 27 mg/L | Ice Mountain at 27 mg/L |
| Chloride | 17 mg/L | Ferrarelle at 16.9 mg/L |
| Potassium | 1.5 mg/L | Bru at 1.5 mg/L |
Tap values are the headline levels from the utility’s annual report (often a highest or average figure); bottled values are label- or report-derived. A closest match is a numeric comparison, not an equivalence or an endorsement.
Zip codes covered
53202 · 53203 · 53204 · 53205 · 53206 · 53207 · 53208 · 53210 · 53212 · 53215 · 53216 · 53218 · 53220 · 53221 · 53224 · 53228 · 53233
Boundary zips partially served by other systems are deliberately unlisted — check your exact zip.