Zoo Med Nano 10 Canister Filter: Perfect for Aquariums up to 10 Gallons

bob: Working amazingly and super quiet

United States on Oct 30, 2023

Amazon Customer NYC: The filter has decent flow, and can be easily controlled by adding some foam into the intake cage they provide. Buyers should be aware that because it is fairly 'weak', the filter needs to be placed at the same level as the tank - so cannot hide it below, as can be done with stronger and larger filters. This is understandable for nano tanks. Would be great if there were more elbows with the package. Overall, worth the price.

United States on Jul 28, 2023

16th: I'm giving this a 4-star review because I don't think it's necessarily a bad filter, it's just not what I need.

Pros:
-$40 for a good filter and the company seems pretty good about providing replacements when needed (per Reddit).

Cons:
- Because it's so small, there's not a lot of suction power. The provided hose is over a foot long and the motor has trouble pumping if the hose is more than 8-10in above the output. It'll basically only work if it's attached to the tank wall.
- The filter is extremely loud. I am not sure how people say it isn't. It can't be anywhere near a bedroom or frankly anyone if it's on.

United States on May 30, 2023

Drakkenfyre: Update: The filter ran great for a few months under light duty (plants/snail no other livestock) but then out of nowhere it started having issues. It started rattling like it does upon first fill and priming (air being flushed out of the filter/tubing) but unlike before this never stopped. Worse yet it started LEAKING. A rapid trickle coming out of the seam between the body and the lid. Wipe it up and seconds later the surface it was sitting on was soaking wet again. I tried reseating and relocking the lid, made sure everything else was tight. Didn't help. Just kept leaking. I'm glad I caught it because at the rate it was going it would've emptied most of my nano tank overnight.

I'm really disappointed in this. For the amount paid and the simple design it shouldn't have any real issues. I've updated my review accordingly.

One of my tanks is a 3 gallon nano cube and it used a mini-HOB but the extremely small amount of clearance on the shelf it's on made cleaning it a total pain and after a messy cleaning I neglected it for awhile and it started to clog up and the flow became a trickle. So I decided to get the ZooMed nano canister so I'd have an external that would be...

United States on Jan 04, 2023

DanielaDaniela: Decent filter for the price. Actual pump is near silent, though the outflow can get a little aggressive so be sure to submerge it underwater for complete silence. Easy setup compared to my Classic Eheim. Would appreciate shut off valves on the hoses, as I can foresee future maintenance being a hassle without one. great all around, HOWVEVER: the size of the hose needs to be clearly listed, as it’s making ordering new lily pipe replacements a PAIN. this seems to be a manufacturer shortcoming than a seller shortcoming.

Canada on Jul 24, 2021

Harvey: The filter ran great for a few months with no issue, was very quiet. It was only about 5 months in I notice a significant drop in water flow. I cleaned the filter bi-weekly, however on one occasion I skipped a week and enough bacteria built up due to lack of flow in the filter caused a terrible toxic buildup of bacteria which was fatal to all the fish and all the plants.

Even though I skipped that week, it usually shouldn't be an issue with most filters that run normally. However, within less than 3 days of noticing symptoms (sluggish fish and melting plants and not suspecting the filter) the entire tank was toxic and plants started to melt, and all the fish died.

I immediately cleaned the filter, which smelled horrible, and the flow of water was still down to a trickle.

As my plants are recovering, I'm now switching to a more expensive & reliable filter brand.

Canada on Nov 22, 2020

Shotzi21Shotzi21: I bought this Zoo Med canister filter to replace a horrible submersible filter that came as a kit with my 6.5 gallon aquarium. It works flawlessly, is silent and does an excellent job on my tank. I have a pretty heavy load in my tank as I have a betta and 3 African dwarf frogs, in a planted tank. Setting up the filter was easy but I previously had an Eheim canister filter on my last tank, so I have experience with canister filters.

I did run into 1 issue during set up as I could not get the top off, so I called Zoo Med and their customer service is excellent, which says a lot. They answer the phone, so there’s no waiting for an email response, etc. What I ended up doing re: the top, was to put my thumb in the fill hole and pull up from there, which worked perfectly!

The canister has a divider in the middle, so it gives you plenty of options for any type of filtration, you want to add. It comes with a round blue sponge for mechanical filtration, that fits in one side, and has a bag of carbon and ceramic media that fits in the other side. I included a pic. of the ceramic media and carbon bag. I opted not to use either on the other side as my tank is live planted, I...

United States on Oct 08, 2020

Jassmine: Thought I'd try this out as all the filter reviews I read said canister filters are silent. I have no doubt that they are but mine was not. It was somewhat quiet the first time I set it up but after that it created a rattling noise and no matter how many times I took it apart to see why, it still made the same noise. My tank is in my room so I cannot use this. Took a bit to setup as there is a lot of pieces and the lid was a struggle to lock and unlock. I will keep it as the tubing it came with is good and I can use the filter inserts for other filters, but I'm a bit disappointed as it was expensive.
Presentation wasn't good either; the box it came in was beat up and had some oily substance on it which was disgusting.

Canada on Sep 09, 2020

Amazon Customer: Great little canister filter. I like how it is divided into 2 sections inside, makes it easy to customize types of media. The ceramic rings it comes with are not the best. If you can I would replace them with a higher quality bio-media. I did use the rings that it came with but I am using the filter on a 5gal planted shrimp tank so the bio load is low.
My only complaint is that it comes with very short intake and outflow hoses making it difficult to place. I also do not like that the filter must be kept at the same level as the tank.
The filter does advertise that it can go up to 10 gallons but i wouldn't recommend that unless its just for a couple of fish or in my case a shrimp tank. The flow rate on this thing is pretty low.
All in all its great little filter and suits my needs very well.

Canada on Jun 25, 2018

Brendan C: It was between a 3 or 4/5. I like the small size of it and that it has very small parts that conceals its existence in your tank which gives it a nice clean look. It was very quiet and the flow was wonderful. My only concerns are the impeller (which randomly broke on me in a day which made it excessively loud) and the way it actually works. The water being pulled in goes through the bio media immediately, which makes them super dirty, so I custom cut my own foam and filter floss to fit on top of the bio media, to change that out easier. The water then makes its way under the divider which has just a pure sponge to filter through, which is useless. What I did was cut the sponge down to make it more narrow, and then fill around it with bio media. Still had great flow with all the media and foam i used, which i liked. If youre ready to do some upgrades and hope your impeller wont break, its a great unit. But, at the price it costs, its worth it to get the Eheim 150 (2211) which has equal or better flow than the zoomed 10 had. It can also be concealed under your desk/stand without losing flow. Not to mention it has a reputable name and comes with everything you need without making any...

Canada on Feb 28, 2016