Although water covers about 70% of the Earth’s surface, freshwater, including water that is safe to drink, is one of the most scarce resources on the planet.  However, a new wave of technology startups is getting to work and the solutions they are coming up with are both innovative and necessary.

How Bad is the Water Crisis?

Currently, more than 2 billion people do not have access to safe drinking water and the situation is continuing to escalate. As the climate is changing, rainfall is occurring at irregular intervals, glaciers are melting and the demand for water, both for agriculture and industry, is greater than the current supply.The World Bank has estimated that by the end of 2050, water scarcity will have a negative impact on the GDP of several nations, decreasing it by 6%, making it an issue worth investing in.

This problem is attracting serious innovation and serious funding. Global investment in WaterTech startups was $1.12 billion in 2024 and early 2025 is showing strong momentum, too.

Why Cleaning Up Existing Water Sources is Important

Having access to water means having water that is free of contaminants and to achieve this, developers and engineers need to innovate new means of treatment. Therefore, treatment innovation is equally important as supply innovation.

Extracting Water from the Air

If you told someone a startup was going to be harvesting water from the atmosphere a decade ago, you would probably receive a lot of laughs. Fast forward to today and that is one of the most exciting areas in water tech. Below are some of the top startups in this area:

Making Existing Water Go Further

Not every solution involves finding new sources of water. Some of the smartest startups are focused on a different challenge: stopping us from wasting the water we already have.

Desolenator

UK-based Desolenator has built a solar-powered desalination system that converts seawater into clean drinking water using nothing but sunlight. No fossil fuels, no complex infrastructure, just renewable energy doing what it does best. The technology isn’t just designed to help businesses facing water scarcity but also reached remote and underserved communities where traditional water infrastructure simply doesn’t reach. Desolenator’s modular technology makes it one of the most impactful startups in this space.

Oneka

Desalination Canadian startup Oneka uses a new approach to desalination, focusing on wave energy instead of solar energy. Oneka’s offshore units use a wave energy converter to push seawater through filtration membranes, letting Oneka create freshwater through a process that can be fully decarbonised. In 2023, the company closed an CA$12.5 million Series A funding round.

Water Harvesting Inc. (WaHa)

US-based WaHa uses metal-organic frameworks, highly porous materials that can adsorb moisture from the air, to harvest drinkable water even in extremely arid conditions. Receiving $8 million Series A-1 financing, it’s the kind of technology that sounds like science fiction until you realise it’s already in deployment, tackling water scarcity in some of the driest places on Earth.

FIDO AI

FIDO AI aims to solve a major crisis each year, 32 billion cubic metres of water is lost due to leaking pipes. The company has developed a machine-learning-based AI algorithm to find leaks in the water distribution network in real-time, allowing water utilities to address issues before losing a catostrophic amount of water.

StormHarvester

StormHarvester is a UK-based startup aiming to solve the problem of combined sewers and stormwater systems overloading and spilling sewer water and untreated sewage during heavy rain. Basically, StormHarvester builds AI software that turns traditional sewer systems into predictive, self-optimising infrastructure, so utilities can fix problems before flooding or pollution happens.

Salinity Solutions

Salinity Solutions and focused on developing new treatment and desalination technologies. Their system, called HyBatch, uses 30 to 55 percent less energy than other common desalination methods, making this treatment versatile in energy savings.

Waterplan

Waterplan has developed a SaaS based solution that uses satellite technology, integrated with hydro modeling, to help businesses assess water availability, determine water scarcity over time and make data driven decisions to invest in water resiliency. The platform has been used by Fortune 500 companies to manage billions of dollars in assets potentially impacted by climate change and also meets compliance needs for sustainability reports aligned with the CDP and TCFD frameworks.