AQUANEAT Aquarium Surface Skimmer, Protein Skimmer, Internal Filter for Aquarium, 80GPH

Had a nasty film that just would not go away in my reef tank. Purchased this skimmer and within a few days, the film was gone and corals were already reacting to increased light penetration. Runs basically silent. The only time I’ve heard any noise is when the sponge filter gets clogged and it starts spraying air. Very easy to install and maintain. Would definitely recommend and buy again in the future.

Honest review. Only thing I would change is the media given to something a little thicker which if you have filter pads you can just cut, only reason for better/faster particulate/ film capture but really this us me trying to be critical. The unit is quiet. Have it right by my bed. Size is great. Fits very well into my uns 6L. Samarai plakat betta handles the lowest setting very well. I like how the cord has a suction cup to attach to wall of choice for cable management. All in all good skimmer. Cost effective and will be ordering more. If I can remember after some time has passed and it keeps chugging, I’d give it a solid 4.5-5 stars. If you have a nano/shrimp tank and are thinking about it, click order.

I'm not sure what the gripes were about this unit but it worked amazingly well for me. And the price, exceptional value!I had started getting what I recently learned as "biofilm" on the surface of my tank and it looked disgusting. I had to skim the water with my net every couple of days. This thing solved my problem almost instantaneously. I put it in the tank, plugged it in, kept the screen part out for the first skim and within less than 30 minutes the surface of my tank was clear. 🤯 Yay!!!After the first skim I figured best to clean it. It was super easy to take out the floater, then the little filter holder. Rinsed it off popped it back in, good to go! It's super quiet and does the job. The screen even keeps most of the small cichlid pellets out when I feed, so that's awesome as well. We'll see how long it lasts but right now this bad boy gets an "A". Works great and a fraction of the cost of other ones. Definitely give it a shot!

It does work but not how it shows to be set up. The black guard that sits at the intake (on top of the square floating tube) doesn’t allow surface water to be sucked in. Instead it sucks water slightly below the surface, avoiding any scum/oil that it is meant for. I had to partially lift the black guard to get it to work but then my shrimp got sucked in. So, I will be using this only occasionally and not leaving it on constantly.It does work when the top black part is removed and will easily remove oil/film from the surface. But it needs to be monitored. But for the money ($11 at time of review) I’d say give it a try.

Cord was entirely too short. Didn't even try it as I could not plug it in with it inside my tank (and the outlet is right under the tank). Returned it. Ordered a different one for a few dollars more, that came with a reasonable length cord and works well.

I was skeptical as to the performance at this price point but I was pretty impressed. I'm currently running it in a 10 gallon to help with surface film and to help circulate water in a dead zone. I have the skimmer set to it's lowest setting and it still provides plenty of movement for me. It does a great job collecting plants leaves and the film. I have needed to rinse out the filters once so far in the week or so that I've had it, but it had lots of stuff trapped in it. Presumably it will require less maintenance over time. It takes some experimenting to get the water level perfect but once it's set it performs very well.

The final step in eliminating duckweed from my tank is complete thanks to this unit. I skimmed 98% of the floaters with a fish net, but simply could not chase down the last few and this unit did what I could not. Within 15 minutes the last of the duckweed was sucked up. Yes it clogs and needs to be cleaned out (that is what filters do) so I am confused as to why people complained about that. Perhaps they don't understand how filters work.I left the guard off and had no issues with my nosey guppies getting caught in it either, although I could see fry or very small fish getting pulled in if they got too close. You can turn the flow back to low to prevent that for the most part. Any fish that is weak enough to get pulled in is going to probably get stuck against the guard anyway.I highly recommend this unit. It was well worth the purchase price.Added bonus: they included an extra piece of the filter media, so if one gets too clogged to clean you can pop a new one right in.

First of all there are no instructions included with the product. I set mine up like the photos show and like many others as soon as I turned it on the top was sucked below the top of the water. It will not float back up until you shut ot off. This was actually a simple fix though. The issue is the slight pressure of the water going through the small square of filter media is enough to prevent the top from floating. What I did was remove the float portion and put the filter block all the way at the bottom of the hole. Now set the float back on top. Don't push it down because if the filter media gets stuck in the float mechanism it will just pull everything under again. After I did this it floats where it needs to and does a great job of skimming the surface. On my 30 gallon salt water tank it cleaned all the particles and film from the surface of the water in about 20 min. Cleaning the filter is still really easy. The portion where the float goes is a sleeve and is easily removed, so even with the filter at the bottom you can still remove it easily to clean.