Kraus Faucets Review & Rating Updated: February 6, 2025
Law Requirements
Warranty Footnotes:
1. "Kraus warrants the Faucet's cartridge to be free from defects in material and workmanship under normal usage for a period of five (5) years from the date of purchase."2. "Kraus warrants the structure and finish of the product to be free from defects in material and workmanship under normal usage for as long as the original purchaser resides in the residence in which the Faucet was first installed."3. The term "structure" is not defined, but Kraus evidently intends to refer to the body and spout of the faucet – parts that almost never break.4. "Kraus warrants the Faucet's sprayhead assembly (including the engine, aerators, structure, restrictors, backflow preventers, sprayer hoses, [and] braided supply line hoses which encompasses nylon, silicon and stainless steel) of the product to be free from defects in material and workmanship under normal usage for a period of one (1) year from the date of purchase."5. Non-structural components such as handles, base plates, wall plates, drain levers, etc. are not mentioned in the warranty and evidently have no warranty.
- Download/Read/Print the the Kraus faucet warranty.
- Learn more about faucet warranties.
- Read the Model Limited Lifetime Faucet Warranty
This Company In Brief
Kraus is an importer of above-average to good quality Chinese-made faucets that it sells through internet venues, including most plumbing supply sites, and big-box lumber stores such as Home Depot. The faucets are sourced from a variety of suppliers.
In addition to faucets, it sells sinks, showers, and accessories, often in coordinated collections for that well-put-together look.
The Kraus faucet warranty is sub-par, providing a mere five years of protection on the most important component of the faucet, its cartridge, and just one year on spray heads and hoses.
Since December 31, 2020, Kraus has been a part of Masco Corporation, operating as an "affiliate" of Masco's
The Company
Founded in 2007 by Russell Levi and Michael Rukhlin, two New York entrepreneurs, Kraus is an importer of above-average to good quality Chinese-made faucets that it sells through internet venues, including most plumbing supply sites, and big-box lumber stores such as Home Depot and Lowe's.
In addition to faucets, it sells sinks, showers, and accessories, often in coordinated collections for that well-put-together look. It can even provide flooring.
The company has been very successful, carefully threading its way between the obstacles that impair most faucet-seller success with a carefully selected inventory of stylish products.
It has been so successful, in fact, that in December 2020 it was purchased from its founding partners by Masco Corporation, the owner of the Bristan Group, Ltd. in the U.K.
Masco was founded in 1929 as Masco Screw Products Company by Alex Manoogian, an Armenian from Smyrna, Turkey who fled to the U.S. at age 18 from the Armenian Genocide (1915-1918). The company was renamed Masco Corporation in 1981.
Mr. Manogian's pleasant demeanor and engaging smile masked one of the shrewdest minds in American industry. Before his death at age 95, he had grown the company into one of the largest decorative plumbing products companies in the world.
The Manufacturers
Most of Masco's faucet subsidiaries are manufacturers to some degree or another. Delta Faucet makes Delta, Brizo, and Peerless faucets. BrasCraft manufactures Newport Brass faucets and Hansgrohe makes most of its own Hansgrohe and Axor faucets.
Kraus, however, is not a manufacturer – although the company routinely identifies itself as such in its literature and press releases including the release announcing its sale to Masco in which it claimed:
Kraus USA has been transforming the kitchen and bathroom industry for over a decade, with a long history of manufacturing exceptional sinks, faucets, and accessories for the modern kitchen and bathroom. (emphasis supplied)
It is evident from our research, however, that the company has no history whatsoever of manufacturing sinks, faucets, or accessories, — exceptional or otherwise. It is purely an importer — a very successful importer to be sure, but nothing more.
The only thing we can find that it has manufactured is its claim of being a manufacturer, a claim that has been manufactured from pure fantasy.
Its products, including its faucets, are manufactured by other companies, all located in China. All of its manufacturers are .
Over our look-back period of 60 months, these include:
- CAE Sanitary Fittings Industrial Co. Ltd. sells its own CAE brand faucets worldwide. It also manufactures faucets for other faucet companies including
- CAE is known for casting its faucets from DZR brass, an alloy that resists a chemical process called dezincification.
- Brass is an alloy of mostly copper and zinc. In contact with water passing through a faucet, the brass tends to lose its zinc molecules, which over many years can leave the brass weak and spongy.
- DZR is very resistant to the process but manufacturing with DZR is a little tricky since very precise temperature control is required during casting and other hot-metal operations to ensure that the brass does not lose its zincification-resistant properties.
- Some CAE-branded faucets are available in the U.S. from select outlets, however, including SolaVanity which sells some upscale CAE faucets including the award-winning Edolo faucet.
- It also manufactures faucets for other companies at almost all price points from world-class, high style faucets for
- Huayi Group, established in 1991, is a collection of companies involved in some manner in metal fabrication and finishing.
- These include (Kaiping) Frendo Sanitary Ware Ltd., Huayi Plumbing Fittings Industry, (Kaiping) Euopea Plumbing Apparatus Co., and Giada Star Sanitary Ware Co. The group also includes olating and die-casting facilities, all in China.
- Huayi sells faucets worldwide under the Huayi and Freendo brands and manufactures faucets for companies like Kraus to sell under their own brands.
- Some of its North other American customers include
- is one of China's largest faucet manufacturers for the export market.
- It sells just a few Lota-branded faucets in North America but manufactures for so many North American faucet companies that it has established a U.S.-based English-language service center to provide customer support and replacement parts.
- Lota manufactures store brand faucets for large retailers including many of the
- It also manufacturers faucets or faucet components for the who's who of the North American faucet industry, including
- (Hunan) Sento Stainless Steel Sanitary Ware Co. Ltd. is a Chinese manufacturer of good quality stainless steel faucets some of which are designed by Swedish designer Anders Kristiansson, the co-owner of Revolt Design and Radie Kb in Gothenberg.
- Mr. Kristiansson has won a number of juried international awards for his designs including the prestigious iF prize awarded by the iF International Forum Design and a Red Dot award sponsored by the Design Zentrum Nordrhein Westfalen.
- It introduced its first stainless steel faucets in 2006. It sells Sento-branded faucets over most of the world and manufactures stainless steel kitchen faucets for Kraus.
These companies have been Kraus' consistent faucet suppliers for the better part of a decade. In the past, however, it has bought faucets from other manufacturers, including Yatin Bath Corporation. This relationship has now ended.
No doubt the company will continue to change suppliers from time to time in the future.
The company does an enormous amount of importing. It has received over 3,000 shipments from Asia in the past 48 months, an average of 2.5 deliveries every weekday, and there is no indication that the volume of its imports is decreasing.
We do not expect to see much change in the near future under Masco stewardship. The company has a winning business formula and it would not benefit Masco to change it significantly.
Faucet Quality
Kraus has made what seems to be a concerted and continuing effort to distinguish itself from the deluge of Asian importers that are flooding North America with questionable quality Chinese faucets. It has improved both the style and quality of its faucet lines over the past five years.
Faucet Materials
Kraus faucets are, for the most part, well-made faucets that should give years and years of reliable service.
However, we noticed that faucets were not as heavy as those tested for past reports. The older faucets were made of thick-walled brass castings. The brass in the newer faucets is not as thick, resulting in faucets that are not as heavy.
Lead-free brass is expensive leading manufacturers to look for ways of reducing the amount used in a faucet. Better, nore exacting engineering allows the use of thinner brass, and where possible, brass components are being replaced with zinc alloys and even plastic.
Zinc or its alloys in non-critical parts is not usually a problem.
For faucet components not under water pressure such as handles, base plates, and , zinc alloys are perfectly adequate, and because it is much less expensive than low-lead brass, it saves a few dollars in production costs, savings that are typically pssed on to faucet buyers.
Plastic is another matter.
Plastic in contact with water is too prone to chemical deterioration for use in a lifetime product such as faucets and should be avoided.
Be especially wary of plastic spray heads on Kraus' pull-down and pull-out kitchen faucets. Plastic spray heads seem to be a constant source of failure problems and customer complaints, not just in Kraus faucets but in all faucet lines that use them, including some very up-scale faucets.
Kraus is very aware of the plastic problem and guarantees its plastic heads for just one year compared to a lifetime guarantee on the metal parts of the faucet.
Faucet Valve Cartridges
Many of Kraus' single-handle mixing faucets include a ceramic cartridge made by Kerox, Kft, a Hungarian ceramics manufacturer that enjoys a worldwide reputation for solid, reliable cartridges. Kerox is the ceramic cartridge preferred by many high-end European faucet brands.
We also identified mixing cartridges from Sedal S.L.U., a Spanish manufacturer that makes its cartridges in three factories in China, and Kuching International, Ltd., a China-based manufacturer of the widely used KCG cartridge.
These cartridges do not have the solid reputation of a Kerox cartridge. But, the difference between first-rank and second-rank cartridges is narrowing rapidly, and these Chinese-made cartridges are completely serviceable and robust enough to give years of trouble-free service.
Some of the Kraus two-handle faucets we examined were equipped with Flühs Drehtechnik, GmbH cartridge, considered by many to be the finest stem cartridge made for two-handle faucets.
Other faucets appear to be equipped with cartridges from Guangdong Hent Technology Co., Ltd., one of the oldest of China's technical ceramics companies. Hent makes a decent cartridge, but not of the same high quality as the Flühs product.
We have not examined every one of the hundreds of faucet models sold by Kraus, however, so we cannot guarantee that every faucet contains a good-quality ceramic cartridge.
If you are considering a Kraus faucet, check its website specifications to look for its cartridge by name. If it is not identified by name, telephone customer support for that information. If customer service cannot identify the cartridge, consider another faucet.
The Faucet Cartridge: Kraus' very limited 5-year warranty on faucet cartridges is of concern. Its cartridge is the heart of a modern faucet. It is the part that controls water flow and temperature. Its finish may fail and the faucet will still work, it may be discolored, corroded, and ugly but water still flows. But, if a cartridge fails, the faucet is out of business until it is replaced. A five-year warranty on this essential faucet component is not nearly adequate.
Faucet Designs
In addition to improving quality, Kraus has concentrated a considerable effort on improving the design of its faucets, a somewhat challenging objective when sourcing faucets from China.
Design adventures in China are rare.
Chinese manufacturers gravitate toward conventional designs to reach the widest possible market and, to reduce market risk even further, tend to copy successful North American and European designs.
If a faucet sells well on either continent, it will soon appear, in Chinese faucet catalogs (in slightly modified form to avoid patent infringement lawsuits).
That is slowly changing, however.
CAE has avoided the limitations of Chinese design by hiring an Italian company, Slide Design, to create its new collection of faucets. They were designed by Slide's noted industrial designer Itamar Harari.
Kraus Faucet Finishes
One of these designs, the Edolo faucet, won an iF Design Award in 2016. IF is an international design competition sponsored by iF International Forum Design GmbH since 1953. Kraus does not, however, sell the Edolo faucet.
Faucet Finishes
The company offers two finishes available on almost all faucets: polished chrome and oil-rubbed bronze.
Kitchen faucets are available in eleven other finishes some of which are combinations such as chrome with matte black. The pallette for bathroom faucets is more limited and includes two split finishes, brushed nickel with satin nickel and chrome with brushed nickel.
The number of finishes offered for a particular faucet depends on two factors. The first is the finishes available from the manufacturer that makes the faucet – Kraus does none of its own finishing and can offer only those finishes available from its faucet suppliers.
The second consideration is how much inventory Kraus wants to maintain. Each new finish means a considerable increase in the number of faucets, faucet accessories (base plates, wall plates, etc.) and spare parts Kraus has to maintain in stock.
Kraus Website
The Kraus website is a reasonably well-designed, no-nonsense site that does not overuse flashy full-color images that get in the way of efficient navigation.
Navigation is menu-driven and largely intuitive. At no time did we reach a point on the website from which we did not know where to go next.
Drilling down to a faucet that may meet your needs and design preference is made easy by filters that allow you to select for faucet configuration, height, finish, the number of holes required to mount the faucet, and so on. The filtering is reasonably accurate.
Selecting filters, however, can be annoying.
Each time a filter is selected the site jumps back to the top of the page requiring the user to scroll down again to select the next filter item.
It is poor web design and could easily be cured by an Apply Filters button that allows the user to select all applicable filters before the page is refreshed.
Faucets are well illustrated with multiple images showing the faucet from various angles and in several installations.
Once a suitable faucet is identified, the information needed to make an informed buying decision is extensive but incomplete and sometimes presented in code rather than plain English.
Tabs across the bottom of the listing provide access to additional information, some of which is important.
- Details: lists some of the features of the faucet in the form of what is essentially a sales pitch and can be safely skipped.
- Questions/Answers: lists questions about the faucet and answers provided by Kraus or one of its retail outlets. These are helpful only if you can't find an answer to your questions someplace else.
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Specifications: does not contain much in the way of actual specifications and often contains information that cannot possibly pertain to a faucet. For example, specifications for one kitchen faucet include the following:
"Bottom Grid Included: No".
No faucet has a bottom grid. That specification applies only to sinks.
- For actual detailed specifications, you will have to open the "Faucet Spec. Sheet" under the Documentation tab (see below).
- Reviews:. These are past customer reviews. Some Kraus faucets have more than 1,000 of them ranging, as you might expect, from five stars to one star, many taken from retail seller websites. The range of reviews seems to be normal, with no indication of manipulation by Kraus to skew the results.
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Documentation is the real source of solid information about the faucet in the form of downloadable .pdf documents.
- Faucet Spec. Sheet: Lists all of the detailed specifications about the faucet, including the material from which the faucet is made, a dimensioned drawing, finishes available, accessories included, and codes and standards certifications.
- Unfortunately, the certifications are listed in codes that mean nothing to the average buyer. To help with understanding, we have set out the codes and their meanings in a table on this page.
- Some of the specifications are a little iffy. For example, bodies of many faucets are described as being "metal", but the specific metal is not identified. We assume that the term is used to obscure the fact that a brass or stainless steel body also contains some zinc or a zinc alloy.
- Sprayers are usually identified as made of "ABS", a code used by many faucet companies to mean "plastic." A more informative description would be "ABS plastic" to clarify that ABS is a type of plastic.
- The cartridge used in the faucet is identified as a "ceramic cartridge". The source of the ceramic cartridge is not identified. As Kraus uses what appear to be good-quality cartridges, it should have no concern about identifying the cartridge by name. Util it does, however, the careful buyer will telephone customer support to get the source of the cartridge before buying.
- Faucet Instruction Manual: is the installation guide and it should be identified as "Installation Instructions" to better inform the reader. The installation instructions are clear and precise. Our plumbers had no difficulty installing the faucets and rated installation "easy" on our four-point scale of "very easy" to "very hard." The guide also contains an exploded parts diagram in case you ever need to order a replacement part. However, the diagram does not provide the part number, which as one reader pointed out, calls into question whether Kraus actually has the parts for sale.
- Care and Cleaning Guide: is a set of generic cleaning instructions for all Kraus products including its sinks. The guide is well-written and should be required reading for every Kraus faucet owner. What can safely be ignored is the document's instruction to register your new Kraus faucet in order to "Get Exclusive Kraus Offers & Promotions" unless, of course, you actually want to receive exclusive Kraus offers and promotions.
- Warranty PDF: is a link to the Kraus faucet warranty.
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Certification Translation Table
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|---|---|
| UPC () | Refers to ASME A112.18.1/CSA B125.1, the basic North American faucet standard to which all sink faucets must be certified. |
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NSF/ANSI 61 NSF/ANSI 372 |
Sometimes combined as NSF/ANSI 61/9, are the North American lead-free (NSF 372) and drinking water safety (NSF 61) standards. Faucets certified to these standards are "lead-free" and comply with the federal Safe Drinking Water Act and the state laws of California, Louisiana, Maryland, and Vermont, and dispense water that is safe to consume. |
| AB1953 | Same as ANSI/NSF 372. Indicates compliance with the lead free standards of the federal Safe Drinking Water Act and the state laws of California, Louisiana, Maryland, and Vermont. |
| MASS | Identifies faucets that may be legally sold and installed in a drinking water system in Massachusetts. |
| CEC | Identifies faucets that may be legally sold and installed in a drinking water system in California. |
| DOE | Identifies faucets that have been registered with the Department of Energy as compliant with the flow restrictions of the federal Energy Policy and Conservation Act. |
| ADA | Indicates a faucet that is compliant with the Americans With Disabilities Act and the Access Canada Act and is suitable for use by persons with physical limitations. |
| FTC | The Federal Trade Commission has issued many regulations that affect faucets. These include warranty requirements, standards that must be met for "Made in USA" qualification, and many more. We do not know what is referred to by Kraus' use of "FTC" and evidently neither does Kraus. None of the Kraus people we spoke to could tell us what law, rule, or regulation FTC referred to. |
While the information provided about its faucets is extensive, it is not complete and is not sufficient for a fully informed buying decision.
For the minimum specifications needed in a website faucet listing and the reasons the informaton is needed, read Minimum Content of a Website Faucet Listing.
Kraus Faucet Warranty
In a prior report, we identified several legal problems with the Kraus warranty that violated the Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act (15 U.S.C. §2308), the federal law that dictates the minimum content of and sets the rules for consumer product warranties in the United States, and suggested to the company that it needed a complete rewrite by a lawyer who understood warranty law.
Kraus did rewrite its warranty and it now complies more fully with federal law, but not completely.
The company has upgraded the length of its warranty from 10 years to a lifetime
warranty on some components of its faucets including its finishes. This is a step in the right direction which suggests that the company is gaining more confidence in its products.
Partial Lifetime Guarantee
The lifetime guarantee applies only to the parts that are unlikely to wear and are, therefore, unlikeley to fail.
The components of its faucets critical to their operation, the valve cartridges, have a much shorter warranty, just 5 years, and spray assemblies are guaranteed for a mere 1 year.
The very short warranty suggests that most if not all of Kraus' spray heads are plastic and that Kraus has absolutely no confidence in their longevity.
No Guarantee on Some Components
Some components do not have any guarantee at all in the Kraus warranty. Those that are not structural, not valve cartridges, and not finishes are simply omitted – not mentioned in the Kraus warranty.
These include handles, , base and wall plates, and drain levers and linkages (on lavatory faucets). These are not likely to fail but if they do, you still have a warranty, just not the Kraus warranty.
Understanding Faucet Finish Warranties
No warranty protects against all of the hazards that can befall a faucet finish, and the Kraus finish warranty is no exception.
it protects against just those defects that result from errors in the finishing process: peeling, flaking, blistering, scaling, excessive discoloration, and delamination, the so-called "manufacturing defects."
These are extremely rare, and by "extremely rate" we mean "almost unheard of." The days of peeling "China chrome" with a fingernail are long gone. Chinese faucet finishing technology is equal to any in the world these days.
Most injuries to faucet finishes result from over-zealous cleaning.
Modern finishes do not require scrubbing. They need little more than a wipe-down with a mild detergent and soft cloth. Harsh chemical cleansers or scouring pads are not needed.
You have the Warranty of Merchantibility provided by statute in your state, province, or territory which, in many respects, is stronger than the warranty provided by Kraus.
Defective Definition
The term "lifetime,' as is usual with all product warranties, does not actually mean the lifetime of the buyer or of the faucet. The Kraus "lifetime" lasts only as long as
- "the original purchaser resides in the residence in which the Faucet was first installed" and
- the faucet remains "in the location of original installation."
If you sell your house and move and take your Kraus faucet with you, your "lifetime" warranty has ended even though you may have a number of years of lifetime left.
What Kraus means by "location of original installation" is unknown. It makes little sense.
If I move the faucet to my new house, the warranty ends because I am no longer residing "in the residence in which the Faucet was first installed." But what if I just move it to another bathroom?
Evidently, the warranty ends since the faucet is no longer in its "original installation."
That can't possibly be what Kraus intends, so we simply do not understand the purpose of this provision.
This sort of definitional ambiguity is prohibited by Magnuson-Moss which requires "simple and readily understood" language – readily understood by the average consumer, not just the average lawyer or faucet company executive.
The company at one time required that all faucets be installed by a licensed and insured "trade professional" experienced "in the installation of bathroom and kitchen manufactured goods." Now such installation is merely "recommended."
Replacement Parts
Kraus guarantees to have the parts needed to fix a defective or broken faucet for just five years.
Interesting to us is the question of how the company intends to honor its lifetime warranty if, twenty years from now, a Kraus faucet breaks the but company does not have the parts to fix it, having run out of parts after fifteen years before.
Its only choice would be to replace the faucet or refund the purchase price, which may be less costly to the company than maintaining an inventory of replacement parts for several decades.
Actually, we applaud the company for disclosing this policy. Most importers do not keep replacement parts beyond a few years. Some do not keep parts at all, scavenging from unsold faucets still on the shelf if a part is needed
However, almost none admit it.
Customer Service
Customer and warranty service varies in quality. It is not unusual to experience long waits to talk to a customer service representative, and then be asked to leave a message for a callback.
Once a customer service agent is reached, he or she is often unable to provide any more information about a Kraus faucet than is available about the product on the company website.
On the other hand, you may get precisely the help you need delivered cheerfully and expeditiously from an agent who knows everything about your faucet that's worth knowing.
But, while still somewhat lacking, customer service is measurably better than it was a few years ago when it was almost non-existent.
The company is rated A+ on a scale of A+ to F by the Better Business Bureau, a rating that indicates satisfactory responses to consumer complaints made to the BBB and an impressive improvement over its C rating just a few years ago.
Kraus is BBB accredited and pledged to the ethical business practices required of accredited businesses.
Testing & Certification
Comparable Faucets
Chinese-made faucets comparable in quality to Kraus' products but not necessarily in design or price include:
All of these companies provide a stronger warranty on their faucets.
Conclusions
Overall, we like Kraus faucets.
Kraus imports some of China's better-quality and better-designed faucets that it sells at a fair and often more-than-fair price.
We do not think Kraus offers the best faucets in the world but it doesn't charge best-in-world prices either. For the prices it charges, Kraus usually gives its customers a good value.
The majority of our rating panel would be willing to install a Kraus product as the main faucet in a busy kitchen or bath "with some hesitation."
They would look for a Flühs or Kerox cartridge. The likelihood that Flühs or Kerox cartridges will give you any trouble is reassuringly remote. They would also avoid kitchen faucets with plastic spray heads.
The panel members' "hesitation" is due to the Kraus warranty.
They were not enthusiastic about the skimpy 5-year warranty on cartridges or the skimpier one-year warranty on hoses and spray heads. If this is all the confidence Kraus has in these components, it needs to find manufacturers that can provide better components – and better thanFlühs or Kerox will be hard to find.
Continuing Research
We are continuing to research the company. If you have experience with Kraus faucets, good, bad, or indifferent, we would like to hear about it, so please post a comment below or email us at our public address: starcraftreviews@yahoo.com.
We do not answer questions posed in the comments below, so, for an answer, send your question to our email address.