Baby bottle teats: how to choose the right one for your baby

Welcome to the 2026 guide to choosing the best teat for your baby. We are midwives, and we have put together the best information to help you choose which is the best bottle or teat option for you and your baby, always based on the latest scientific evidence. We want to inform you, giving you tools to help you make the best decision.

There are many schools of thought, and the reality is that there is no perfect bottle for everyone. There are as many options as there are families and babies. The key is to choose a product that respects your baby's individual needs, makes feeding easier and fits in with the rhythm of each home.

Which teat will be best for my baby?

Every family is different, and so are their needs, so the first question is: what do I need a bottle for? Or what is my goal with the bottle? It may seem obvious, but there are big differences depending on our needs.

For example, if you are exclusively breastfeeding, and you need a bottle for going back to work when your baby is 4 months old, we will need to use the bottle that most closely resembles your anatomy. Your baby has been exclusively breastfed for 4 months, knows perfectly well how to suckle at your breast and is used to the palate stimulation your breast provides, which is perfect for them.

In this case, if we use a teat that is different from your breast, two things can happen. The first is that they refuse the bottle, because it feels cramped in their mouth, there is too much stimulation, or they don't quite understand how it works. The second is that they accept the bottle, but when they go back to the breast, they have had so much stimulation from the teat that something feels missing, and they stop breastfeeding.

Obviously this doesn't happen in 100% of cases, it isn't mathematical and it isn't the only factor that will influence the outcome, but it will be very important and it can make the difference between going back to work relaxed, knowing that your baby takes their bottle well, or suffering because your baby eats nothing while you work 8 hours.

If, on the other hand, another example could be: I am pregnant and I want to formula feed from day one, which bottle will be best in my case? Here, rather than focusing on it being as similar as possible to your breast, it would be more interesting to think about the concept of the bottle itself. A bottle that stimulates your baby's little mouth well, that seals well, and that, as a bottle, makes our day-to-day easier. Easy to clean, compatible with bottle warmers, sterilisers and dishwashers, and obviously anti-colic, although nowadays all bottles have their systems and they all work, as we will see later on.

“Did you know that you can customise a bottle made to measure so that it resembles your breast? It makes the transition easier, respects breastfeeding and adapts the bottle to your baby's needs.

Design your Bottle ®

What should I take into account when choosing a teat

We live in an age of too much information: we are lucky to have as many bottle options as there are families, but at the same time it can be overwhelming to work out which bottle will be best for our situation. Below we are going to break down each part of the bottle to take into account, and above all, what is meant when we see an Instagram post. It is true that there are many comparison tables of bottles, and many schools of thought. These are designed or created with good intentions, to help mums, dads and babies select the best bottle, although not all of them are based on real experience, and often what they are really looking for is to direct you to a purchase that is “negotiated” with Amazon. For our part, we want to give you the best, objective information and help you choose freely.

Which type of teat is best for my baby?

It won't be easy to answer this question, because it is very difficult to give a single answer for every baby. The most important thing is to assess which need you have to cover and look for the best option. A very striking school of thought, and one I would like to mention, promotes the use of a cone-shaped bottle, always “a triangular teat”, with the “backing” that your breast, inside your baby's mouth, always takes that “triangular” shape, whatever the shape of your breast, and that it is the best option for all babies. We obviously don't have the absolute truth, and this text is meant to help you, but we are going to unpack this school of thought of always using a conical or triangular teat with all babies. On the one hand, this school of thought imposes a theory on all babies, without taking into account that perhaps a mum's completely flat breast with a very large nipple won't take that shape, or, on the other hand, a breast that has previously had implant surgery, with a nipple measuring 0.5 cm, won't take that conical or triangular shape. What's more, if using this conical or triangular teat were an absolute truth, all bottles would be the same, since bottle brands try to give the best solution to every family. And above all, if all breasts took the same shape inside a baby's mouth with this conical teat, recommended by this school of thought always for all babies, it would be accepted in 100% of cases and would respect breastfeeding. But the truth is that 50% of the babies who try these teats stop breastfeeding, and only 39% of babies accept this teat, which is different from their mother's breast. That is why, for our part, we believe that imposing a theory that seems to work on paper, but which the scientific data do not corroborate, is perhaps not the best option. What's more, impositions and the word “always” are not realistic, and it is perhaps better to look for an option that truly respects each family in its unique and independent situation.

Your baby is unique, their bottle should be too.

Design your Bottle ®

So what might be the best teat option for my baby?

If you are breastfeeding, it may seem logical, bearing in mind that your baby is used to palate stimulation that is perfect for your breast, to look for the teat that most closely resembles your breast. It may be a generic one, if it happens to be that your breast is like that, or it may be one designed to measure according to your breast.

That way you will probably achieve a higher acceptance rate and better protection of breastfeeding. And if your breast is triangular, then that teat will be ideal: a triangular one. If your breast is flat with only a nipple, then we need a teat that is flat at the base and simulates a larger nipple. This decision can make the difference between greater or lesser success, and obviously it isn't something mathematically exact, but as a first option it is undoubtedly advisable.

Watch out for the names of teats: physiological teat or anatomical teat.

This is a very amusing topic. We are not going to become alarmists, but we will give you tools so that, when we see bottle propositions, we remember that not all that glitters is gold.

One example is when mums come to us and say: my baby doesn't want to accept the bottle, I use this bottle which says it is “the closest to the mother's breast”, but the question is which breast, yours or mine?

That is the constructive criticism of these messages: if in your case it really does coincide with the shape of your breast, then perfect, but it probably isn't.

And then we have anatomical or physiological teats, a super interesting name, but when you see them, they really have nothing to do with what your breast is like. And obviously there is nothing equal to your breast, and even less so something generic for all cases.

Kassing method and slow flow always: is it true? No

This topic is also very controversial. The idea of always using a slow flow comes from a school of thought called the Kassing method. And I'll tell you now: you don't have to use a slow flow always, although we are going to look at it in depth.

The Kassing method was developed by Dee Kassing, a certified lactation consultant (IBCLC) and nurse who published this method in 2002 in the Journal of Human Lactation, where the technique is detailed.

Let's set the scene: Dee Kassing saw how 50% of mums who used generic bottles stopped breastfeeding, so her main goal in creating this method was to provide a way of bottle-feeding that respected as much as possible the mechanics and rhythm of the baby's sucking at the breast, reducing the risk of teat-nipple confusion.

The reality is that on paper it is a very interesting theory, which made this school of thought very famous and which is still strongly promoted today, even by midwives. But it is also true that if you dig deeper into the published studies on the Kassing method, there is not a single one that evaluates a sample of mums who use it and tells us how it works.

It is a theory, with no justification proven in real mums, which perhaps should not lead to it being a practice that is always recommended for all cases. What's more, UpToDate, which, to mention it, could be the most advanced science, never mentions using a slow flow always when it talks about recommendations on bottles.

On the other hand, and now speaking from our experience as midwives, and having helped more than 35,000 mums with bottles since we launched our project, at first we recommended the use of a slow flow always, but we soon realised that it wasn't appropriate.

A premature or newborn baby doesn't suck the same way, or doesn't need the same flow as an 8-month-old baby who knows perfectly well how to empty their mother's breast, and when we offer them a slow-flow bottle, what we achieve is that they directly refuse the bottle, because nothing comes out.

Obviously, as we say, we don't have the absolute truth, but we do base ourselves on objective data, and we also have cases where the baby has always been on a slow flow and everything went well. But if I give you one recommendation about this, it would be to use the flow that corresponds to their age as a first option.

The teat should be soft.

This school of thought is very interesting too. There is nothing equal to your breast: it is perfect for your baby, and it is also soft, and your skin is very pleasant for their mouth. So it may seem interesting for the teats we use to be very soft too, to try to put the minimum pressure on the baby's palate, as well as being pleasant for your baby so that they accept the bottle perfectly.

Should the teat have a small base? Is it true?

Another school of thought assures us that it is very important for teats to have a small base. What this is looking for is for the teat to always be full of milk. And what does the size of the teat have to do with it? To understand this, let's picture a bottle feed. The recommendation according to UpToDate is that the baby should be as upright as possible, and there we bring the bottle close to their mouth. For them to suck, we need to angle the bottle towards the palate, and once they are sucking, we take small pauses by tilting the bottle down.

Well then, when there is little milk left, if the teat is very wide we will have to tilt the bottle more for the milk to reach the teat. On the other hand, if the teat is smaller, that tilting will be less necessary.

But it is also true that with a wide-teat bottle, cleaning is much easier, since your hand fits inside, whereas with a narrow “tube-format” bottle you will always have to use a special brush.

So which is better for me? Well, both options have their pros and cons, but with this information you can assess whether it is really worth it, or necessary, for the teat to have a small base, or whether, on the contrary, your baby takes the feed well and you can opt for a wide-base teat that is easy to clean.

Which material is best for the teat: silicone or latex?

As for the material of the teat, which is better? It is true that today we are lucky to have very good materials and many options, as well as health regulations that oblige bottle manufacturers to offer the best solutions, with different materials. With regard to silicone and latex for the teat, here are a few points to bear in mind:

Silicone teats: they are the most common and have a longer lifespan. They don't absorb odours or flavours, and they are easy to clean. They can be more rigid. There is also a version called food-grade silicone, widely used in healthcare and with great results. Latex teats, on the other hand: they are softer and more flexible, which can be more comfortable for some babies. But they have a shorter useful life and can absorb odours and flavours.

Also bear in mind the material of the bottle body: it can be plastic, glass or silicone. It is true that plastic is not recommended because it can release bisphenol (BPA) and other toxins. Glass is very heavy when your baby wants to hold it, and if it falls it breaks. Silicone for the body, on the other hand, can be very interesting as well as pleasant for your baby's little hands, toxin-free, and if it falls it doesn't break. In this case, food-grade silicone is also usually used for these bodies, with great results.

Anti-colic teats: are they necessary?

Yes, but they are all valid

This topic is very controversial, because nowadays all manufacturers are aware of the importance of having an anti-colic system, and most of them work; what differs is the method used to achieve it. So let's first talk about how anti-colic systems work.

The anti-colic system built into bottles works by creating a flow of air inside the bottle so that the teat doesn't collapse and milk comes out whenever your baby sucks. If there were no air flow, what could happen is that the bottle collapses, and since nothing comes out when your baby sucks, they swallow air.

That said, which anti-colic system is better? Well, as we said, all manufacturers are aware of having an anti-colic system, and there are everything from the simplest, with a perforation in the teat itself that lets air in, to more cumbersome models with special parts that carry that air to the end, or even bags that fold as the baby sucks.

Bear in mind that in general they all work, so how far should we go in complicating things and adding extra parts that we have to clean with special brushes and be careful not to lose?

It may seem useful for the system to be some perforations in the teat itself, and for there to be several of them so that they work in any position, making our day-to-day easier and meaning we don't have to keep an eye on whether the bottle is in the right position.

And it is true that there are babies who, no matter what you do, will have colic, and other babies who are quite the opposite, and won't have colic no matter how “badly” we manage those gases. Although always a bottle with an anti-colic system.

Yes, with Happymami you can design the perfect teat that cares for their wellbeing and respects their natural sucking rhythm.

Which teat is best for my baby? Final recommendation

Now you have very good information that will help you make the best decision when selecting one bottle or another, or one teat or another. We are lucky to have many options available, which can also make us doubt. But you will certainly end up making the best decision. And remember that there is no single solution for all cases: doing a small analysis of what you need in your particular case and weighing up the published opinions of other mothers will help you find the best option for you and your baby.