Some baby gear comes with a 14-page manual. This doesn't. If you can put a phone case on a phone, you can install a WavvyBaby, and you won't need anything from a toolbox to do it.
Still, parents ask us the same handful of fit and timing questions, so here's the whole process in one place: putting it on, checking the seal, and knowing when the cartridge is done.
The three steps
1. Wipe the spout. Give the spout a quick wipe so it's clean and dry. Soap film is the one thing that can make the cover slide around, and it takes five seconds to deal with.
2. Slide it on. Stretch the silicone opening over the end of the spout and push the cover back until it won't go further. The fit should feel snug, not loose. The silicone conforms to round and rectangular spouts alike, which covers most tubs built in the last few decades.
3. Turn on the water. That's the whole install. Water enters at the spout, passes through the cartridge inside the cover, and comes out the front. There's no bypass channel, so every drop that reaches the tub went through the filter first.
How to tell it's seated right
Three quick checks the first time you run water:
- No spray from the back. Water should only exit the front opening. A fine mist at the spout base means the cover needs to go further back.
- It doesn't rotate easily. A seated cover resists a gentle twist. If it spins freely, take it off, dry the spout, and re-seat it.
- Full, steady stream. The stream out the front should look like your normal tap flow, just softer at the edges.
If your spout is an unusual shape (some wall-mounted waterfall spouts, or very short stub spouts under 2 inches), send a photo to hello@wavvybaby.com before you buy and we'll tell you straight whether it fits.
When to swap the cartridge
One cartridge is good for about 90 baths. For a family bathing baby every night, that's roughly three months; if you bathe every other night (which is what many pediatricians suggest for young babies anyway), closer to six.
The media inside doesn't stop working all at once, it fades. Two signs it's time:
- You can smell chlorine at bath time again (that faint pool smell).
- It's been three months of daily baths, whichever comes first.
Swapping takes under a minute. Slide the cover off the spout, pop the old cartridge out, press the new one in flush, and slide the cover back on. You don't replace the silicone cover itself; that's yours for the life of the product.
Refills are $15 each on auto-delivery, timed to arrive about when your current cartridge is finishing. You can also buy them one at a time for $20 if you'd rather not subscribe.
Two mistakes worth avoiding
Nearly every install problem comes down to one of two things:
- Installing on a wet, soapy spout. The cover can slide forward over time and water starts sneaking out the back. Dry spout first, problem gone.
- Forgetting the shower diverter. If your spout has a pull-up diverter, pull it before or after the bath fills rather than mid-fill, so you're not forcing shower-pressure water through the cartridge.