Independent buying guides
For owners weighing a feeder, fountain, camera or tracker against the chore it replaces. Each guide answers one buying question, shows the running cost month by month, and cites every figure with the date we checked it.
Each guide answers one buying question and shows the figures behind the answer.
How to choose
Feeders, fountains, cameras and trackers solve four different problems. Compare them on cost per year and on the job each one genuinely removes.
Photo: Giraldillo · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons
Budget and prices
Monthly plans turn a cheap gadget into the most expensive thing in the house. Four-year totals, import duty arithmetic, and where the money really goes.
Photo: Grand Canyon National Park · CC BY 2.0 · Wikimedia Commons
Safety
Coin cells, mains power next to a water bowl, and a camera on your home network each carry a specific risk. Here is what the rules require and what to check.
Photo: Tdorante10 · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons
The decisions that actually change what you end up with.
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Photo: Tdorante10 · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons
Standards, warnings and the checks worth doing.
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Photo: CezarADA · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons
What changes as a child or pet grows.
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Photo: Jules Verne Times Two · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons
What the total comes to once everything is counted.
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Photo: Gareth James · CC BY-SA 2.0 · Wikimedia Commons
Order, frequency and how long a bottle lasts.
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Photo: Giraldillo · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons
Fixing it before you replace it.
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Photo: Grand Canyon National Park · CC BY 2.0 · Wikimedia Commons
Each calculator shows its formula, units and assumptions. Nothing is estimated for you in secret.
Spreads purchase price, consumables and repairs over the years you expect to keep it.
cost per year = (purchase price - expected resale value + consumables per year x years + expected repairs) / years
Replacement intervals turned into a yearly cost for filters, pads, pods and brush heads.
replacements per year = 365 / interval in days; yearly cost = replacements per year x unit price x units per change
What a cross-border order really costs once shipping, duty and tax are added.
landed cost = (item price + shipping) + duty + tax, where duty = item price x duty rate, and tax = (item price + shipping + duty) x tax rate
Every figure in a guide is taken from a named source, with the date it was checked. Where a number is an assumption or an example, it says so in the same sentence.
We do not run paid product tests, we do not publish reader reviews, and we do not claim to have handled every product mentioned. Where a claim needs a lab or a long-term test we do not have, the guide says that plainly.
Photographs are free-licence images from Wikimedia Commons or Openverse, credited to the photographer with the licence named. Charts are drawn from the figures printed in the same guide.
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