Comotomo vs Philips Avent: which should you buy?

Side by side

This is not a close contest on quality — both are good bottles. It is a contest between two different kinds of convenience: Comotomo buys you easier cleaning today, Avent buys you more room to change your mind later.

Comotomo's case: the washing up

Over a year you will clean bottles something like a thousand times. The Comotomo's opening is wide enough to put a hand inside, it is three parts, and there is no internal vent tube to lose down the sink. That is the whole product, and it is a better product than it sounds at 6am.

The soft body has a second, smaller benefit: it survives being dropped on tile, and it gives under compression, which some babies take to more readily than rigid plastic. Whether yours is one of them is not knowable in advance.

Honest cons: the flow range is short and Comotomo does not publish flow rates per level, so if your baby needs something other than slow or medium your options run out fast — and flow rate causes more bottle-feeding problems than bottle choice does (see bottle nipple flow sizes). The bottle tips over, will not stand reliably on a drying rack, and its squat wide shape does not fit a lot of warmer wells. If you own a warmer, check it against our warmer picks first.

Avent's case: room to be wrong

Nobody gets bottle feeding right first time. The Avent's value is that being wrong is cheap: step the nipple flow up or down without changing system, move from plastic to glass without changing nipples, screw a sippy top onto the same body a year later, pump straight into the bottle you will feed from. One system, many adjustments.

Its nipple does something real as well. Flow stops when the baby pauses, which makes a feed harder to rush and makes the bottle behave a little more like nursing — useful for a baby who moves between breast and bottle. See best bottles for combination feeding if that is your situation.

Honest cons: venting is milder than Dr. Brown's, which matters for a genuinely gassy baby; the flow numbering is confusing to buy; the wide base fits warmer wells no better than the Comotomo's; and the inside still needs a brush.

Spit-up, gas and what a bottle cannot fix

Both bottles manage air sensibly, and neither treats anything. Spitting up is extremely common and usually not a problem to be solved; the AAP's explanation of why babies spit up is worth reading before you buy a third bottle. Persistent crying, poor weight gain or arching mid-feed belong with your pediatrician, not with a shopping decision. Our fuller treatment is best anti-colic bottles and best bottles for reflux.

On hygiene, both follow the same rule. Per CDC guidance, clean after every use; sanitize daily only if your baby is under two months, was born prematurely, or has a weakened immune system. The Comotomo is dishwasher safe on the top rack and the Avent is dishwasher safe; a cycle run with hot water and a heated drying or sanitizing setting needs no separate sterilizing step at all, which is the finding behind do I need a bottle sterilizer.

The verdict

Buy the Philips Avent Natural Response as your default. It is the bottle that makes the fewest decisions final.

Buy the Comotomo if your baby already feeds happily on a slow or medium flow and you would rather optimise your own life than your options. It is the right bottle for the person doing the washing up.

Buy Dr. Brown's Options+ wide-neck if gas is the actual complaint. Its vent system is the most thorough here, at the cost of more parts to wash — the trade is laid out in Dr. Brown's vs Comotomo. And if what you really want is silicone, the closer contest is Comotomo vs Nanobebe Flexy.

How we chose

Researched, not hands-on. Sizes, parts counts, materials and dishwasher claims come from Comotomo's own range and Philips Avent's published specifications, both models confirmed currently sold. Independent hands-on testing of the category comes from Mommyhood101, hygiene rules from the CDC and the spit-up framing from the AAP. We weight cleaning burden and flow-range breadth heaviest here. Rubric: how we choose.