Best High-Rated Self-Cleaning Fish Tanks

Although a fish tank makes a beautiful focal point in any room and can be an absorbing and fulfilling hobby, there is a downside; you have to clean it every week! Keeping the tank clean is essential if you are to enjoy a healthy, thriving population of fish. Indeed, many fish diseases are caused by poor water conditions and a dirty tank, so tank cleaning is a necessary evil!

Now, that might make you think that if you have a very busy lifestyle, you won’t have the time to spend cleaning out a fish tank, but that doesn’t mean that you have to miss out on the joy of owning one!

In this article, we take a look at the rise of the self-cleaning fish tank. And we’ve taken time out to track down and review six of the best self-cleaning aquariums that are currently on the market so that you can choose the best setup for your circumstances.

First of all, what is a self-cleaning fish tank?

What’s a self-cleaning fish tank?

Essentially, there are two kinds of self-cleaning aquariums.

The first type of self-cleaning tank is gravity-based. The tank’s pump system draws dirty water out of the tank and through the pump when you add clean water. The suction is not so strong that it could pull the fish out with the water, so the system is perfectly safe to use. All you need to do is place a suitable container or bucket beneath the pump to collect the dirty water while you add clean water to the tank.

The second system is basically a water garden that sits on top of the tank. The plants in fish tank planters use the fish waste and other organic matter as fertilizer, helping to keep the water clean and the nitrate levels low.

Our Top 6 Self-Cleaning Fish Tanks

Now, let’s take a look at our six favorite self-cleaning fish tanks. We’ve included links to the relevant page on Amazon.com so that you can read the full specification for each product, together with reviews left by other buyers. Once you’ve found your perfect self-cleaning tank, simply place your order.

1. As Seen On TV My Fun Fish Tank

My Fun Fish Tank is a gravity-operated setup that’s suitable as an attractive decoration piece for your desk at work or at home in your living room.

The tank is very small, measuring just 10″ H x 6″ W x 4.75″ D, so would really only be suitable for a single betta fish or a few tiny tetras. The tank has LED lights (batteries included) and comes complete with an artificial plant and decorative rocks.

To clean the tank, simply add clean water and watch the dirty water running out through the attached tube.

What we like:

• Very affordable
• Low maintenance
• Comes with everything you need

Room for improvement:

• Requires self-assembly, which is tricky
• Still requires weekly water changes

2. Back to the Roots Water Garden

The Back to the Roots Water Garden is remarkable in that it is a self-cleaning tank while also being sustainable. With this tank, you can create your very own mini-ecosystem that uses aquaponics to grow its own food.

The aquarium kit comes with everything you need, including a 3-gallon tank and water pump, all-natural aquatic supplies, organic seeds, five grow-pots, fish food, and a discount coupon that enables you to buy a betta fish for the aquarium.

The plants use the fish waste, which would otherwise create nitrates that would damage the water quality, as fertilizer. So, in theory, once the garden is established, you don’t need to carry out water changes, as the plants do that for you. All you need to do is remember to feed your betta fish with the food that comes with the tank.

What we like:

• The setup comes with four power cord connection points that can be used for heaters, lights, etc
• The tank makes a great educational tool for kids

Room for improvement:

• You will still need to carry out partial water changes from time-to-time

3. EcoQube Aquarium

The EcoQube self-cleaning aquarium is the perfect choice for you if you’re looking for an aquarium that requires minimal maintenance.

The aquarium is designed for a betta fish and makes a beautiful and novel decorative piece for your office or home. The aquarium is marketed as the lowest maintenance tank of all time! Actually, that could be pretty close to the truth, as this system works via a unique aquaponics filter that basically does its job without any help from you.

All you need to worry about is feeding your fish up to six times per week and topping off the water a couple of times each month. There’s no requirement for you to carry out those dreaded time-consuming, messy filter or water changes at all.

What we like:

• The perfect aquarium kit for anyone who loves fish but can’t cope with the time and expense of maintenance
• The small size makes the aquarium ideal as a desktop or coffee table decoration
• Beautiful quality. Handmade, clear acrylic panes give you the perfect view of the fish
• Comes with LED lights with push-button pre-settings that simulate a cloudy sky, sunny day, or even stormy weather
• Quiet operation so doesn’t disturb your work environment or TV viewing

Room for improvement:

• The manufacturer is a startup, so customer support is untested
• Older versions of the aquarium kit are being sold by some suppliers, which don’t contain all the accessories that you get with the latest edition. Check before you buy it!

4. biOrb Aquarium Kit

The biOrb Aquarium Kit looks just like a traditional fishbowl and comes in a variety of sizes from four to 16 gallons to suit different environments from homes to office desks.

The classy-looking bowl-shaped tanks are trimmed with silver for a chic, eye-catching look. Despite its old-school appearance, this aquarium has a built-in filtration system that uses a five-stage self-cleaning mechanism, which employs mechanical, biological, and chemical filters.

Everything you need is included with this tank, as well as detailed instructions on how to use and maintain it. There’s also a nice LED light to complete the kit.

Things we like:

• The filter only requires replacing every four weeks
• You don’t need to change the water every other day as you would with a normal fishbowl

Room for improvement:

• Small fish can be sucked into the filtration system
• Four-weekly filter replacement can be expensive
• Can be quite challenging for children or for adults who don’t have the time to learn about aquarium maintenance

5. ECO-Cycle Aquaponics Kit

The Eco-Cycle Aquaponics Kit is designed to be used by teachers for educational purposes. The tank can be kept in the classroom, enabling kids to learn about the principles of water gardening and fish care. You can email ecolifeconservation.org for the STEM K-12 curriculum.

To start with, you’ll need to buy a 20-gallon aquarium or one that has at least a 12″ x 14″ footprint. The bare tank is then transformed by the aquaponics kit into a productive garden. The setup works on the principle that you can raise plants and fish together, using the waste products from one to provide nutrients for the other, and vice versa.

What we like:

• The low maintenance aspect of this kit is great
• The kit comes with lights and a filtration system, and setting it up is easy
• Looks stunning at home, in the workplace, or in the classroom
• All the components are very well made and of high-quality
• Excellent customer support

Room for improvement:

• The automatic feeder can be tricky to install
• Cleaning the tank can be very complicated and fiddly, as you need to disassemble the grow bed area first
• You have to buy the fish tank separately

6. AquaSprouts Garden

The AquaSprouts Garden is ideal if you have a 10-gallon tank that you want to convert to an aquaponics setup.

The setup features a garden on the top of the tank that’s fed by the fish waste beneath. The plants keep the water clean, enabling the fish to thrive and removing the need for intensive, time-consuming tank cleaning. This aquarium planter system includes a garden bed that simply snaps together with its supporting legs, and the black matte finish looks great.

The garden has a removable light mount that accommodates any two-foot grow light. The submersible pump produces a powerful 160 gph flow rate. There’s a mechanical plug timer with adjustable 15-minute increments, which control the drain and flood cycles.

What we like:

• The water garden comes with a one-year warranty
• The durable growing media does not downgrade
• Excellent customer support service
• Low price, yet the setup works superbly

Room for improvement:

• The sound of water splashing from the garden back into the aquarium makes this one of the noisiest self-cleaning tanks out there
• The 10-gallon tank isn’t supplied with the kit

Benefits of a self-cleaning fish tank

If cleaning your aquarium is not your idea of a fun pastime, self-cleaning fish tanks will bring you a number of benefits, including:

• Time-saving
• You won’t need to regularly do a messy job
• Children can enjoy their pets without having to worry about cleaning the tank

That said, you do still have to do some cleaning of self-cleaning fish tanks. That could mean removing some dirty water and replacing it with clean water and cleaning the inside of the aquarium glass. Also, most filtration systems do require you to replace the filter pads every so often, which you will need to remember to do.

When replacing water in self-cleaning tanks, you’ll need to remember to treat tap water with a de-chlorinating additive or risk killing your fish. Although such treatments are not expensive to buy, that is an additional expense for you to consider.

What about heating, lighting, and tank decoration?

Most self-cleaning fish tanks do not have a heater supplied with them. So, if you want to keep tropical fish species in your tank, you will need to buy a heater. If you have a small tank, make sure that the heater has a thermostatic control so that the water doesn’t get too warm for the fish.

Most self-cleaning aquariums come with LED lights as standard. The LED light can be very bright, which might not be ideal for all fish species.

That means that you must make sure to turn the lights off at least overnight. Fish don’t have eyelids, so they can’t close their eyes to cut out the light, and exposure to continual bright light will stress your fish. Also, some fish are nocturnal hunters and feeders, so you must turn the lights out when you go to bed, remembering to feed your fish first.

Many self-cleaning setups come with pebbles and other decorations, but you can add your own too.

Plants

Plants provide color and interest for your fish tank, as well as giving shy fish species somewhere to hide. You can use living plants, plastic, or silk ones, but bear in mind that plastic can have sharp edges that may injure your fish.

Live plants help to oxygenate the water and filter out some of the nitrates produced by fish waste. However, if your tank is very small, bear in mind that you will need to prune some species of fast-growing plants so that their overgrowth doesn’t take over the whole tank and crowd out your fish.

FAQs

In this part of our guide, we answer some of the questions that are commonly asked by people who are considering buying a self-cleaning fish tank.

Q: Can you get self-cleaning fish tanks?

A: Yes. There is a range of self-cleaning fish tanks to choose from. We’ve picked out some of the best for you to consider and reviewed them for you earlier in this guide.

Q: How do you clean a self-cleaning fish tank?

A: Even though a tank is described as self-cleaning, you will still need to change some of the water fairly regularly. Also, depending on the style of the aquarium, you might have to clean or replace the biological filters every so often.

Q: What is the easiest fish tank to maintain?

A: Of the two styles of a self-cleaning fish tank that we’ve discussed here, the aquarium planter, water garden style is probably the easiest to maintain. The plants in the garden do the job of removing the fish waste from the aquarium water, effectively cleaning it for you. That said, depending on the system that you choose, you may need to carry out some maintenance tasks periodically.

Q: How often do you need to clean a fish tank?

A: A regular fish tank should be cleaned every week. You need to clean the substrate, using an aquarium vacuum, to remove any fish waste, uneaten food, and other debris that would otherwise decompose and produce nitrates that will damage the water quality and eventually harm your fish. Also, a partial water change of between 25% and 50%, depending on the needs of the fish species you have in your tank, must be carried out every week.

Biological filters must be washed through or replaced every month or so, again, depending on the type of tank and filtration system that you have.

Final thoughts

If you want to enjoy the beauty and relaxing vibe of a fish tank, but you don’t want the hassle of cleaning one, a self-cleaning aquarium could be just what you need.

Remember that even fish tanks that are advertized as self-cleaning do require a small amount of maintenance. Generally, you’ll need to make sure that you change some of the water every couple of weeks and periodically rinse and change the filter media, depending on what kind of system you choose.