Point-of-use (POU) water filters nowadays are widely used worldwide to get highly purified potable water. In this study, people opinions about household water filters were obtained via well-constructed questionnaire distributed to 1200 participants in the state of Kuwait. Analyses revealed that respondents installed multiple household filtration systems due to the doubts that municipal water could include physical (40 %), chemical (36 %), and biological contaminants (31 %) that induces infectious and non-infectious diseases. Subsequently, total of 56 waters samples without and after using POU filters were collected from 28 homes in Kuwait distributed over all residential areas of Kuwait. The POU water filters were not found efficient to remove physical, chemical, and microbiological parameters and conversely water quality deteriorated in most houses after the POU filters. This is possibly due to lack of tanks and filter maintenance and therefore POU filters became reservoirs of various types of chemical, physical, and microbial impurities. Based on results of questionnaires, published studies, and market study, a testing station was developed and eight different configurations of household water filters were investigated for 10 continues months. Results demonstrated that singular filters can efficiently remove water impurities if these household filters undergo to periodic cleaning activities. Removal efficiency of filters, with a proper regeneration, varied from 75 % (carbon wrapped filter) to 91 % (ceramic filter) for turbidity, from 58 % (polyspun filter) to 83 % (ceramic filter) for total coliforms, and 100 % for TSS with all filters over the tested period. (C) 2020 Institution of Chemical Engineers. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.