I've bought other bottles and I am very impressed with these over any others. They come in different sizes and I have both the beer bottle size & the larger. I recently used them for bottling some Kombucha and they work well. I like that they come with extra gaskets and the metal hinge top is already attached on arrival. They also are easy to close - the company offers other bottling options (sizes & shapes) and they give extra safety instructions which is thoughtful. No broken bottles and they easily stand up to a second fermentation. I am very pleased with my purchase.

Love the quality of these bottles as compared to other brands that I have been using for bottling water kefir.

Reasons for the good rating if comparing to the similarly priced curved and straight-sided bottles of other brands. The flip top bails are Stainless steel vs Galvanized steel; thickness of glass is heavier than my old Italian bottles, and other brand and more important uniform; good packaging; seals are higher quality higher pressure seals; bails are longer resulting in a better lever cam, bail tightness is uniform and not too hard to undo; straight sides are perfect for labeling.

These bottles are strong and withstand the higher pressures required for some of my water kefir that has exploded some other brand bottles.

Have used both the Clear & Brown bottles. For water kefir, I prefer the clear for easier filling and seeing the stage of the second ferment along with aiding in the opening and cracking / slowly opening high carbonation without campaign style spouting of contents.

Really like the bottles. I ordered this set because I needed a single jug to make homemade vanilla extract. The bottle needs shaken up every other day or so. If I'm not careful when shaking the bottle then drips of liquid come out of the top (leak out of the seal). So, fixing that is as simple as holding my thumb snugly over the closed swing top while shaking the jug. If you're looking for something 100% air-tight then these aren't the bottle for you. They're pretty good though! Just not when being shaken. They came packed well and had the extra set of stoppers.

It was 6:15am, May 13, 2017 and I had barely woken up. I heard a sound akin to a bomb through the double-wall oven in the kitchen all the way to my closed-door bedroom. I bet the neighbors heard it. And it was not a simple crack or two in the bottle -- the glass was broken down into pieces as small as 0.5mm and all were smaller than an inch. Had this bottle been on the counter, someone nearby would have sustained major injuries.

Now I understand how Kambucha got its name -- KOMBoooom -- oUCHA... ;-)

It was regular kombucha tea brewed in bookish accuracy (low sugar), then mixed with about 50% juice comprising of half and half: fresh grapes and frozen strawberries. The brewing bottle was only about 1 day and 20 hours into the fermentation.

The reason for 1-star is because the manufacturer claims on this page are very misleading:

"Adding fruit or a lot of priming sugar to your brew? No problem! Forget about popped caps or bottle bombs. These are high-quality Grolsch style bottles and caps."

There are also reviews that say Grolsch type bottles are safe and the lid pops before the bottle bursts.

See the 2nd picture which shows a closeup of the burst bottle's neck compared with the same part from another product I bought (North Mountain Supply 16 oz Glass Grolsch-Style Beer Brewing Fermenting Bottles - With Ceramic Swing Top Caps - Case of 12). Compare the dimples in the glass that hold the swivel cap's steel wires: the latter has a semi-spherical dimple with smooth rounded edges that could allow the steel wire to slip off in case of high pressure (at least much better than this one), whereas the bottle from this product that burst has very sharp edges which obviously did not allow the metal to release, thus causing the explosion.

In addition, the material of these bottles (glass) is not as strong as the supplier claims. I believe the fermentation would have slowed down after CO2 exceeded a certain level as is normal in chemical reactions (excess presence of products of a reaction slows down the forward reaction), so it was unlikely that the CO2 was beyond expected levels.

WATCH OUT FOLKS -- DON'T HURT YOURSELF.

I was so excited to get this package in the mail! The bottles were all packed perfectly and had no flaws at all. I washed them and sat them on my counter next to our brewing kombucha to wait to be filled. They made my brewing station in the little corner of my kitchen look so professional. I bottled our brew and set them to ferment a little longer. Three days later I opened one to check the fizz and BAM! Fiz was there and it was just what I wanted:) The bottles withheld the blast and the kombucha was the best I have made yet!