Originally Posted by
Siempre Viajando
Ice and tap water are generally safe in Chile. I've lived in Chile and have travelled there frequently for the last 20 years, and I've never had any serious problems.
Mind you, the tap water in Santiago is very hard, unpleasantly so for drinking, so you'll want to drink bottled water. Or better yet wine, which is abundant, affordable and of very high quality.
As long as the tap water is safe to brush teeth, then I do not mind the taste. I only ask because I have relatives in countries like those in the West Indies where some buildings and homes have no water filtration. In such a case it would be a matter of basically untreated and unfiltered tap water with high amounts of bacteriae rather than a tourist using clean, filtered tap water that might rarely cause stomach upset due to a lack of familiarity with that water. They told me that under no circumstances do they drink the tap water unless it is sufficiently boiled due to the high amount of microbacteriae present. They also have to use either boiled tap water or bottled water to brush teeth and wash fruits. But I suppose that even though Chile is close to countries such as Peru where tourists need to boil tap water for use, the water in Chile has a filtration system.