I am going to purchase a couple of canteens soon and wanted some opinions on those canteens with a wide mouth and ones with narrow mouths. Does one offer any real advantage over the other? Thank you.

That depends on how you like to be kissed.

http://m.rei.com/product/777295/humangear-capcap-water-bottle-top

I would recommend the above product to convert a wide mouth bottle to a narrow mouth.

The narrow mouth makes it much easier to drink from on the run in my opinion. A wide mouth is easier to clean and it can be used for food as well as drink.

The converter let's you have both bottles in one. The strap broke on my first one but I carabiner clipped the strap to my bag every day for many months and it got knocked around. I tied accessory cord around the lip of my Nalgene and clipped from there and so no issues with the second one.

wide for adding ice and cleaning and storing other supplies (when not needed for liquids), like food, survival or water purifying gear

narrow for drinking when moving, like in shaking vehicle

I decided to go for wide mouth canteens and I am still happy with the decision. They are much easier to fill and to clean. The option to easily add ice cubes is nice to have but no real advantage to me (YMMV).
The are plenty products that allow to drink as easily as from a narrow mouth canteen. I use the sipper insert:


I am satisfied with it and you only need one. It is easy to put in or take out and it does not add bulk.
There are no converters that add the advantages of a wide mouth canteen to a narrow mouth canteen.

I've also done well with wide-mouth water bottles that had integrated straws.

You can comfortably enough cook in a wide mouth SS bottle if needed. And you can always convert it to a narrow mouth type. Also there are plenty of attachments and adapters for water filters for a wide mouth bottles (if you stick with a Nalgene kind).

How does one handle the hot SS bottle if cooking in it? I've been considering this upgrad to my get-home pack.


Most of my Nalgenes are wide mouth but the anti-slosh inserts are really nice.
But my first-use water is a small-mouth Nalgene which I found on the trail when backpacking many years ago.

Multitool pliers make great potholders .

Or with the workgloves that is an essential part of every kit.