Tushy Classic 3.0 Review 2023

Jun 12, 2023

The Tushy Classic 3.0 was the best-value bidet in my overall tested best bidets review. Ahead, learn more about this surprisingly stylish washlet and why I recommend it.

A cold water bidet is essentially a nozzle that connects to your toilet tank and shoots a stream of cold water at your rear to clean you off. It lacks many of the bells and whistles of its electric hot water counterparts, but if you’re just getting into bidets or want something easy to install and use, I found that the Tushy Classic 3.0 is the best-value bidet after weeks of testing for my larger best bidets review. The Tushy handled the basic bidet functions with panache, while also being the most aesthetically pleasing and customizable option out of other budget-friendly bidets I tested.

The Tushy Classic 3.0 won as best value bidet in my tests.

Its friendly, cheeky instruction manual and user support are also great for people who’d like to have a bidet option but don't want to opt for the seat models, which typically will run you at least $350. Read on for why it's a winner.

Tushy

Style: Toilet seat attachment, Cold water | Special Features: Color options for model and knobs | Warranty: 60 day trial period | Requires an outlet: No

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Bidets are funny. They’re devices that shoot water at your butt—there's just no way around the humor in that. Tushy has become a ubiquitous name in the bidet-slinging game because, thanks to a Millennial-focused advertising campaign that you see all over Instagram, it acknowledges that fact. The company manufactures a warm water model and an electric seat, but the most well-known—and if the site's reviews are to be believed, by far the most popular—model is the Tushy Classic 3.0. (It's also the least expensive model, and much, much more budget-friendly than any of the electric seat models I tried.) The Tushy Classic 3.0 is a simple plastic seat that hooks up to your toilet tank and allows you to control a stream of cold water thanks to a knob and a switch in a side panel. Like all cold water models, "it's basically just a valve that sprays water at your undercarriage," says BidetKing owner James Lin. "They’re powered by your home's water pressure."

The Tushy Classic 3.0 hooks up to your toilet tank, and lets you control functions with a knob and ... [+] switch on a side panel.

This cold water model works every bit as well as any higher-end model—all the extras, like warm water and an air dryer, which come with fancier bidets are essentially just there for added comfort. The Tushy cold water model "works great," Lin said. That in itself isn't that remarkable—there are several other models, like the Neo Luxe 120, which I also liked, that will do the same job.

What sets the Tushy apart is that it takes how it looks into account. For me, as I began the process of bidet testing, the idea of an extra toilet attachment wasn't all that appealing. An added seat can easily veer into unsightly, ticky-tacky plastic territory. What's nice about the Tushy is that, unlike most bidets I tested, it's downright cute. It has a low profile, and the knob—the model I tested had a bamboo one—felt solid and sleek.

The Tushy Classic comes not just in white, but also in biscuit and in seasonal colors, like blue or black as of this writing. The knob color options include chrome, brass and gunmetal, which provides a nice way to adapt the bidet so that it blends in easily with the rest of your bathroom settings. The Tushy Classic is not the least expensive bidet out there, but it's one that you won't mind hanging on to, and even feels like a bathroom upgrade rather than a grudging acknowledgement toward rectal health.

Another potential pain point when it comes into getting into the world of bidets is the act of actually installing one onto your toilet. If you, like me, think that anything beyond a basic unclogging of a drain in a bathroom probably requires a plumber, rest easy. The Tushy instructions take into account potential reluctance to mess around with the water system in your bathroom. The brand estimates installation to take eight and a half minutes, which was pretty accurate in my experience.

If for whatever reason you panic or lose the instructions that come with the Tushy Classic, there's a simple diagram available on the Tushy website, as well as test, phone, video and chat support for "real pooping humans" to connect with "Poo-rus" help with everything from installation to finding the right angle for your posterior.

One of the major drawbacks of the electric seat style of bidets, aside from the higher cost, is that you need to have a good handle on what kind of toilet you have (elongated or round) and access to a nearby outlet. Through my research, I learned that not all electric bidet seats work with round toilets. If you have a French curve toilet, you have fewer options still. The Tushy Classic 3.0 will fit onto anything you’ve got and has a slim enough profile that it will work even for toilets that fit into tighter spaces.

The Tushy Classic 3.0 will fit on most toilets.

The Tushy also comes with a 60-day risk-free guarantee, so if you bring it home and decide you dislike the entire process of shooting water at your butt, you can return it without any hassle. Overall, out of any option I tested, the Tushy Classic 3.0 is one of the easiest, chicest ways to start using a home bidet.

As well as a person who regularly uses the bathroom, I’m a veteran journalist with a long track record writing and editing for food and lifestyle publications like Food & Wine, Vox, New York magazine, and Condé Nast Traveler, among others. Previously, I tested the best pillows, best juicers, best meal kit delivery services and best coffee grinders for Forbes. For this piece I installed and used six different bidets and had many very funny conversations about pooping with an anal surgeon, a bidet store owner and my own plumber.

If you don't need all the extras that the Toto C5 Washlet provides—a deodorizer, user presets, an air dryer, a heated seat—and you just want a simple, attractive attachment, the Tushy 3.0 is the way to go. It's several hundred dollars less expensive than other models I tested, and the cold water works just as well as the heated kind. It's also great if you have a bathroom without easy access to an outlet. As a bonus, it's sleeker and less of an eyesore than the other budget model I tested, the Neo Luxe 120.

To test the best bidets, I installed and used each of them on my own toilet without the help of a plumber or even one of Tushy's Poo-rus, going by the enclosed instructions for each model. I tried out the functions of each bidet over the course of several days, making note of which features were particularly comfortable or useful. I had my husband do the same, and we compared notes. I also paid attention to the overall look and feel of the attachment in the context of my bathroom, looking for bidets that blended in rather than stuck out. Finally, I performed a water pressure test involving spreading shaving cream on Saran Wrap attached to the toilet seat to see how quickly and easily each model removed the shaving cream.