Best Sippy Cups for Toddlers (in my Opinion)
In this blog post, we will take a look at our favorite sippy cups in each category: no-spill cup, straw cup, open cup, stainless steel cup. We started transitioning our daughter from a baby bottle to a sippy cup around the age of 14 months - pretty much as soon as we introduced cow milk into her diet. The transition for us was gradual but easy - try a sippy cup once of twice a day, then increase frequency.
Here are our best sippy cups we used for our toddler!
Since our littles ones are not exactly coordinated at that age, open cups were not going to happen without milk and water going all over the floor. So, we got a few straw cups and no-spill cups to try. We also got some tiny cups from Ikea, which a toddler can easily hold with one hand.
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Best no-spill cup for toddlers
The winner in this category for us was Munchkin 360 (the kind that has handles; see below). These are the cups we leave in bed with our toddler all the time. Our daughter wakes up thirsty sometimes, so we always have one of these cups with water sitting in her bed. The handles make it easy for her little hands to grab and drink. The best part is they do not spill even when she shakes them pretty hard. If the cup hits the floor it might drip a tiny little bit, but drips are easy to clean.
The Munchkin 360 cups are pretty easy to clean also as the top rubber piece can be pulled off and cleaned (make sure you do that or otherwise bacteria can build underneath of it). We normally put them in the dishwasher but we also wash them by hand by using a cup brush.
Best straw cup for toddlers
Our daughter's favorite straw cup is the Minnie Mouse one below. The straw is very flexible and the bottle is a nice size so it is easy for her to hold by herself. The obvious reason why our daughter loves this bottle is she LOVES Minnie Mouse and Daisy Duck! And because it's pink! We have certainly spent hours discussing what Minnie and Daisy are doing in the pictures of this bottle, and we take it regularly on our car trips as it fits nicely in the toddler car seat cupholder.
The thing I like about it is that the water flows out of the bottle easily when she drinks, so she can take big sips. We have few other bottles with straws, such as the Contigo Spill-Proof and Nuby kind that you can buy from CVS or grocery stores. But those you have to suck pretty hard to drink from them (although the no-spill feature is handy for those).
The thing I do not like about it is that the top plastic lid is quite weak, so at this point, you have to press hard to close it, which used to frustrate my toddler when she couldn't close it by herself. Although we still use it every week, after 1 + year of using this cup it is definitely approaching the end of its life. This bottle does leak if you turn it, and the straw will break if your toddler chews on it.
Favorite open cups for toddlers
KALAS and DUKTIG by Ikea are our winners in this category. The DUKTIG plastic cups are super easy for our daughter to hold with one hand. Although they are technically in the toy section of Ikea, she loves drinking milk from them. Added benefit - if milk spills it's a pretty small amount, so not too bad to clean. The KALAS cups were a natural progression and they were only $1.99 per 6 pack. Now that she is 3 years old, we use a lot of stainless steel and glass cups (stainless steel cups are a bit heavier so those were hard for her to handle last year).
Best stainless steel bottle for toddlers
We have two of the below Simple Modern stainless steel bottles - a 12 ounce one and a 17 ounce one. They work really well for keeping water cold in the summer and the hot chocolate hot in the winter. They come in various fun colors and the ones with the handle lid are super convenient for carrying it around. We frequently attach those to the backpacks and strollers by using a simple carabiner clip.
Transitioning our toddler from a baby bottle to other types of cups was a pretty easy process. I also asked our pediatricians and dentists about their opinions and the types they liked and the ones to avoid. At the end of the day, some trial and error were necessary.
Do you have another recommendation for a toddler drinking cup? Let me know in the comments below!