What does a cubic metre of water cost in 2026?

Reading time: ~11 minutes

1. What exactly is a cubic metre of water?

Your water bill shows your consumption in cubic metres. In Dutch this is colloquially called a kuub, and it is exactly 1,000 litres. Useful to know: according to Milieu Centraal, an average bath holds around 140 litres of water, so one cubic metre fills seven full bathtubs.

Your water company bills two things: a fixed amount per year (the standing charge) and a rate per cubic metre you actually use. On top of that come the tap water tax, a small provincial groundwater levy and 9% VAT. So anyone who looks only at the rate per cubic metre sees just part of the bill.

2. What does a cubic metre of water cost in 2026?

In 2026 a cubic metre of tap water costs a Dutch household an average of 2.71 euros including taxes. In 2025 it was 2.61 euros, which Vewin, the association of water companies, calls a rise of 3.7%. If you look only at the water companies' own rate, without consumption taxes, the weighted average in that rate overview is 2.05 euros per cubic metre, against 1.97 euros in 2025. That weighted average is calculated per rate area and therefore differs slightly from the water company share in the breakdown below.

There is a considerable difference between regions. Vewin calculates that rates vary from 1.75 to 2.71 euros per cubic metre (excluding VAT and tap water tax, at a consumption of 100 cubic metres per year). If you live in the area of the most expensive water company, you pay more than 50% more per cubic metre than in the area of the least expensive one. You cannot change your own address, but it does explain why comparisons online vary so widely.

3. How is the price per cubic metre made up?

Almost a quarter of what you pay for tap water goes to the tax authorities. Vewin puts the average tax burden on drinking water in 2026 at 24.9%. This is how the average consumer price of 2.71 euros per cubic metre breaks down, according to the same source:

Tap water tax: 0.437 euros per cubic metre

The tap water tax is a fixed levy per cubic metre. According to the Belastingdienst, the Dutch tax authority, the rate in 2026 is 0.437 euros per cubic metre, against 0.425 euros in 2025 and 0.382 euros in 2023. For 2026 a cap of 50,000 cubic metres per property applies. The 9% VAT comes on top of that, including over the tax itself.

Standing charge: you pay even without turning on a tap

Every water company charges a standing charge for the water meter, the connection and the maintenance of the pipe network. In 2026 that runs, according to Vewin, from 52.00 euros per year at Vitens to 121.89 euros at WMD in Drenthe. At low consumption that standing charge weighs heavily: if you use only 50 cubic metres, the fixed part can almost double your effective price per cubic metre.

4. Rates per water company in 2026

This is where things often go wrong online: one water company quotes its price excluding VAT, another including VAT and tax. That is why the comparable series from the Vewin rate overview is shown below, all on the same basis: excluding VAT and tap water tax, at a consumption of 100 cubic metres per year. The final column is what you effectively pay per cubic metre once you include the standing charge.

If you want to see the amount as it will appear on your bill, so with VAT and tax, the companies publish that themselves. Vitens charges 1.34 euros per cubic metre including 9% VAT in 2026, against 1.25 euros in 2025. Brabant Water arrives at 1.51 euros per 1,000 litres, with VAT, tap water tax and the groundwater levy already included. At PWN it is 1.98 euros per cubic metre including VAT and excluding tap water tax, with a standing charge of 97.12 euros. Dunea asks 1.45 euros per cubic metre, or 1.58 euros including VAT, and Evides 1.320 euros per cubic metre including VAT.

The clearest worked example comes from Waterbedrijf Groningen: 98.73 euros standing charge plus 100 cubic metres times 1.16 euros, plus 43.70 euros of tap water tax and 23.26 euros of VAT, adds up to 281.69 euros per year. Rounded, you therefore pay 2.82 euros per 1,000 litres there, everything included. In Amsterdam, Waternet charges 1.18 euros per cubic metre plus 90.55 euros in fixed costs per year.

Those regional price differences say nothing about the quality of your water. What does differ per region is the hardness and the composition of the water, and you will notice that at your tap and in your kettle sooner than on your bill. Read more about it in our explainer on hard water in the Netherlands, and for your own city see the figures in the overview of tap water quality in Amsterdam.

5. What does tap water cost per litre and per glass?

Work the average of 2.71 euros per 1,000 litres back down and the amounts become almost comical:

• 1 litre of tap water: around 0.0027 euros, so less than a third of a cent.
• 1 glass of 0.25 litres: around 0.0007 euros. For one cent you can pour some fourteen glasses.
• For 1 euro: more than 369 litres of tap water, or almost 370 one litre bottles.
• 2 litres a day for a whole year: around 1.98 euros per person per year.

That last figure is why the debate about drinking water in the Netherlands is never about the price, but about quality: what is still in there in terms of PFAS, microplastics, pharmaceutical residues and limescale. If you want to look into that, our explainer on the different types of water filter and how they work gives an overview of what each technology does and does not remove from your water.

6. How many cubic metres of water do you use per year?

According to Milieu Centraal, a Dutch household used an average of 129 litres of drinking water per person per day. More than 40% of that goes to baths and showers, around 24% to the toilet and 13% to laundry. The government wants to bring that consumption down to 100 litres per person per day by 2035.

Convert that into cubic metres per year and you arrive at:

These amounts are indicative: they use the national average of 2.71 euros per cubic metre, which is based on a consumption of 100 cubic metres. Because the standing charge is a fixed amount, the price per cubic metre is in reality higher at low consumption and slightly lower at high consumption.

In its rate overview Vewin works with 100 cubic metres per household per year as the national average, which fits a household of just over two people. The largest item within that is the shower: the study Watergebruik Thuis by Vewin shows that an average shower lasts 7.7 minutes and uses 56.9 litres of water. Five minutes in the shower therefore works out at around 35 to 37 litres, and so at under 10 cents' worth of water.

7. How to read your water bill

Your annual statement always consists of the same four or five lines. Find them and you will know straight away whether you are comparing like with like:

• Standing charge or capacity rate: a fixed amount per year, regardless of your consumption. In 2026 between 52 and 122 euros.
• Water supplied: your consumption in cubic metres times your water company's variable rate.
• Tap water tax: your consumption times 0.437 euros per cubic metre.
• Provincial groundwater levy: a small amount, on average 0.015 euros per cubic metre.
• VAT: 9% over all the lines above.

Do you pay a monthly instalment? That is an advance based on an estimated consumption. If your situation changes, for example because someone moves in, it is wise to adjust your instalment yourself so you are not caught out at the end of the year.

8. Tap water versus bottled water: the real price difference

Once you know the price per litre, the comparison with bottled water becomes uncomfortable. Tap water costs around 0.0027 euros per litre. A bottle of spring water from the supermarket costs, by our own estimate, tens of cents per litre, a multiple of that, plus the carrying, the plastic and the storage space in your kitchen.

At PureFilter we see customers switching for exactly that reason: not because tap water is expensive, but because they want the quality of bottled water without the cost and the lugging. If you want to see that calculation in more detail, we set it out side by side in our comparison of tap water versus bottled water.

9. What does filtered tap water cost?

A water filter does not change your water bill to any noticeable degree: you use the same number of cubic metres as before. The cost sits in the filter itself. The PureFilter Mineral+ costs 149.00 euros including the first filter for twelve months, and after that a replacement filter is 65.00 euros a year. That is less than one cent per litre, or around 5.42 euros a month for the whole household.

What you get for that is an under sink system that removes more than 100 contaminants in five stages, including PFAS, microplastics, heavy metals such as lead and copper, fluoride, nitrate, pharmaceutical residues and chlorine. It is NSF certified to standards 42, 53, 61 and 372. The Swedish Mineral Rock™ then adds magnesium, calcium and potassium back in, so the water tastes softer and fuller instead of flat. That last point is precisely what a reverse osmosis system does not do: those strip out the good minerals as well, as we explain in our piece on osmosis water and whether it is healthy or unhealthy.

You fit it yourself in 5 to 10 minutes on the cold water pipe, without a plumber and without tools. The water comes out of your existing tap, so nothing changes visibly in the kitchen. Still unsure which type suits your kitchen? Then compare the options in our best water filter comparison or browse the full range of water filters for the home.

10. Buying advice: where are your savings?

If you want to save on the water line of your budget, the gain is not at the tap you drink from. What you actually drink is only a few per cent of those 129 litres per person per day. The big items are the shower, the toilet and the washing machine.

• Shorter showers: Milieu Centraal calculates that showering for no more than 5 minutes saves 15 litres of drinking water per person per day. Over a year that is more than 5 cubic metres per person.
• Water saving shower head: according to Milieu Centraal it lets through a maximum of 7.2 litres per minute.
• Getting your instalment right: it saves no water, but it does spare you the extra bill at the end of the year.
• Stop buying bottled water: this is the only real saving in euros. At just 20 cents per litre, two litres of spring water a day costs around 146 euros per person per year, and that is more than half of an average annual bill for all the water in the house.

That last step is where a filter pays for itself. You pay 65.00 euros a year for the filter and keep the quality you expect from bottled water. If your main concern is specific substances, you can look specifically at a water filter for PFAS. And if you want to know how independent tests judge filters, we have summarised the findings in our analysis of the Consumentenbond water filter test. If limescale is your main issue and you are considering a softener, weigh up the options first in water softener or water filter.

11. Frequently asked questions

12. Conclusion

A cubic metre of water is 1,000 litres and costs an average of 2.71 euros including taxes in 2026, almost a quarter of which goes to the tax authorities. Per litre that is 0.0027 euros, per glass less than a tenth of a cent. What you pay depends heavily on your water company: effectively between 1.75 and 2.71 euros per cubic metre at a consumption of 100 cubic metres, excluding VAT and tap water tax.

Precisely because tap water costs so little, the real question is not the price but the quality. For 65.00 euros a year, less than one cent per litre, the PureFilter Mineral+ removes more than 100 contaminants from the water you already pay for and then adds minerals back in. That is still a fraction of what a household spends on bottled water, and you will never have to lift a bottle for it again.