Distillation is water’s version of a spa day, but with boiling. You heat the water until it becomes steam. Then you catch that steam and cool it back down into liquid gold.
This leaves all the gross stuff behind—minerals, bacteria, even heavy metals. They’re too heavy to fly away with the steam. It’s like making water evaporate into a better, purer version of itself.
Fun fact: Distillation is how sailors made drinking water from the ocean for centuries. Imagine sipping your grandma’s tea, knowing it came from a stormy sea. Weird, right?
Purification: The Mega Team
Purified water is a catch-all for many methods. You’ve got reverse osmosis (pushing water through a super-fine sieve). You’ve got UV light (zapping bacteria like a tiny laser gun). And yes, distillation is one of the methods.
But here’s the kicker: to call it “purified water,” it must meet strict standards. The U.S. FDA says it has to have less than 10 parts per million of total dissolved solids. That’s cleaner than most tap water—way cleaner.
Distilled water usually hits that mark easily. But so does reverse osmosis water. So, distilled is always purified, but purified isn’t always distilled. Confusing? You bet.
