If you are checking hardness for an Edinburgh stay, keep the supply-area name, measurement year and unit with the number. Follow a search snippet about soft water to the original utility table and check which zone and year it describes.
Match the supply-area name
DWQR directs readers to local supply-zone information and explains that consumer-tap samples represent an area, with some variation from plumbing. Start with its local water-quality guidance and identify the zone for the address you actually want to check.
Do not pick a row merely because its name is familiar from an Edinburgh waterworks article. A works name, a city name and a regulatory supply-zone name are not interchangeable labels. If the returned zone is unclear, ask Scottish Water to identify it and retain that answer with the report. We have not obtained an address-to-zone result for your accommodation here.
Read the year and the unit
The original Scottish Water table calculates hardness from average calcium and magnesium results for 2024, organised by regulatory supply zone. Its Glencorse C row lists calcium at 10.04 mg Ca/l, magnesium at 1.35 mg Mg/l and calculated hardness at 30.60 mg/l as CaCO3, classified as soft. That row is a dated example; it has not been matched to your Edinburgh address. The actual 2024 table
The table also expresses hardness in Clark, French and German degrees. Read the heading before copying a figure: calcium concentration and total calculated hardness are different columns. Keep the unit rather than describing either number simply as the water's mineral level. Original column headings
An annual average answers a question about that reporting year. Opening the file later does not turn it into a measurement made at your tap today. When recording a value, include the year in the same sentence so that it survives a copied note or screenshot.
Check the document, not only the download label
When the document index was read on 15 October 2026, the link labelled Water Hardness Data 2024 still described averages for 2023. The linked PDF itself says 2024. Use the year in the original table heading when the surrounding description disagrees. Scottish Water's document index and the linked original
The file name is also not a publication-date field. The measurement year is explicit; a calendar publication day remains unconfirmed.
What to do with a hardness result
DWQR explains hardness through dissolved calcium and magnesium salts and describes effects on soap use and limescale. It also says Scottish Water can provide a typical local hardness value. DWQR's hardness explanation
For an appliance question, ask for the current typical value in the unit its instructions require. For a report comparison, keep the same named zone, period and unit; otherwise a difference may be in the labels you chose rather than an observed change. Hardness alone does not answer every water-quality question, and this article supplies no test of your property's plumbing.
Our Edinburgh city guide is a travel overview. Keep the year on historical figures. If the zone has not been matched to the address, ask Scottish Water before applying that row.
