How hard is the water in Cuyahoga County, OH?

12.1 grains per gallon

A softener will pay its way here.

The median hardness measured in Cuyahoga County, OH is 207 mg/L as calcium carbonate, which is 12.1 gpg. That is very hard on the USGS scale. It comes from 2,470 samples at 189 sites between 1990 and 2024, drawn from every sampling site in the county, wells and surface water together.

How much it varies here

Half the sites came in between 10.7 and 13.2 gpg. The whole middle of that range gives the same answer, so a test of your own tap is unlikely to change it. Confidence in the county figure: high (how it is measured).

What to do next

At 12.1 gpg a softener pays its way here. Before you buy, check the quoted unit's grain capacity against the sizing table below, and ask whether it regenerates on demand, which uses less salt than a timer. Call your utility for its own report if you are on city water.

More on sizing a softener for your household.

From 6.5 to 42.9 gpg

The softest single sample on record in Cuyahoga County was 111 mg/L and the hardest 735 mg/L, a 7-fold gap. The top quarter of sites read above 13.2 gpg and the bottom quarter below 10.7 gpg.

What a softener would cost to run

For a household of 3, a 24,000-grain unit covers a week between regenerations. Expect about 264 lb of salt a year (7 bags of 40 lb, about $48), and roughly 2,346 gallons of regeneration water. Installed, most units run $1,000 to $4,500; spread over 15 years with salt, that is about $148 a year.

Sizing at 12.1 gpg

Cuyahoga County against the rest of Ohio

Among the 88 Ohio counties with data, Cuyahoga County is number 77 of 88 counting from the hardest. Across the whole country it is harder than 59% of counties.

Softest in Ohio: Scioto County at 5.7 gpg. Hardest: Perry County at 113.3 gpg. Closest to Cuyahoga County: Adams County (12.4), Clermont County (12.5), Brown County (11.6).