Pool Salt Calculator
Table of contents
How much salt do I need for my pool?How do I use the salinity calculator?Pool salt calculator example: How much salt to add to the pool?Additional metricsFAQsWelcome to the pool salt calculator! With its soaring temperatures 🔥, the summertime can be quite difficult, and one of the popular leisure activities to beat the heat involves frequent visits to the pool 🏊. While enjoying the backstroke or freestyle can be fun, have you taken a moment to think about how much salt the pool has? This pool salt calculator will help you figure out exactly how much salt you need for your pool to maintain that perfect salinity level, so you can frequently indulge in a dip whenever you feel like it 😎!
How much salt do I need for my pool?
An acceptable salt concentration in a swimming pool is between 2700-3400 ppm (parts per million), with 3200 ppm being the ideal level.
What is ppm (parts per million), you ask? It's simply the amount of the substance (salt) in milligrams present in one liter of the solution (water).
So depending on the volume of your pool, you'd need to add enough salt to bring the salt concentration to the acceptable range.
How do I use the salinity calculator?
- First, key in the volume of your swimming pool in the salinity calculator. If you need help with that, our pool calculator would greatly help you.
- Next, measure the current salt concentration in ppm. Any standard chlorine generator will give you the reading.
- Finally, specify your desired concentration of the swimming pool salt in ppm.
- If the current ppm levels are lower than the desired levels, the pool salt calculator will show you how much more salt you need to add.
- On the other hand, if the current ppm levels are higher than the desired levels, then the salinity calculator will show you how much water you need to replace. This means that you need to drain out a specific amount of pool water and replace it with fresh water to bring down the salt concentration.
Pool salt calculator example: How much salt to add to the pool?
Let's say your pool volume is 100 gallons, and the salt ppm of the pool reads 2000 ppm.
Consider that your desired concentration of salt is 3200 ppm.
When you key in these values, the pool salt calculator will give a result to add 1 lb of salt.
This means that you need to mix 1 lb of salt in your swimming pool to increase the concentration to 3200 ppm.
In this manner, you can effortlessly find out how much salt to add to your pool to get the desired concentration.
On the other hand, if the current salt ppm of the pool reads 4000 ppm, that means the concentration is higher than the desired level of 3200 ppm.
In this case, the pool salt calculator would show that you need to replace 20 gallons of pool water with fresh water to bring down the concentration level.
Additional metrics
Another metric you could keep track of for your pool water is its water hardness. You can learn more about that by checking out our water hardness calculator;
So, are you ready for a swim yet 🏊? You could also easily check out your swim time and the calories burnt while swimming while you're at it using our swim time converter and our swimming calorie calculator!
Why is the salt level important?
Generally, we use a chlorine generator to produce chlorine in the pool from the salt present in it. Chlorine keeps the water clean and safe to swim in by neutralizing harmful bacteria. So, an optimum level of salinity is important to produce the right amount of chlorine that will keep your pool water sparkly clean.
What happens if the salt level is too low?
The chlorine generator needs sufficient salt in the pool water to produce chlorine. So if your pool has a very low salt level, you may not produce enough chlorine to keep the water clean. Consequently, there's a chance for bacteria and algae to begin growing in the pool.
What happens if the salt level is too high?
A very high amount of salt (salt ppm — parts per million) in the pool can lead to unnecessary chemical expenses and can deteriorate the pool water quality. An acceptable range for the salt ppm in a pool is between 2700-3400 ppm, with 3200 ppm being the ideal level.
How much salt do I add to a 10,800-gallon (40,000-liter) pool?
In order to achieve the recommended salt concentration of 3200 ppm in a 10,800-gallon pool, we need to add about 290 lbs (130 kg) of salt (assuming no salt has been added yet).
How much salt do I add to a 15,000-gallon (56,800-liter) pool?
If we have a 15,000-gallon pool containing only freshwater, we'll need to add about 400 lbs (180 kg) of salt, to achieve the recommended salt concentration of 3200 ppm.