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Bottle Feeding

Bottles & Teats

The core kit, and the part babies have the strongest opinions about. Everything else on this page is optional.

Baby Bottle

The one non-negotiable on this list. Bottles come in different sizes (small for newborns, larger as feeds grow), different materials (plastic, glass, silicone) and different shapes, including angled and wide-neck styles. Babies can be surprisingly opinionated about which bottle they'll accept, so start with one or two rather than a full matching set of a brand your baby might veto.

Bottle Teats

Teats come in flow rates, from slow for newborns through to fast for older babies, and the right speed matters: too fast and baby gulps and splutters, too slow and they work hard for not much milk and get cranky about it. They wear out with use and sterilising too, so you'll replace them a few times along the way. Check the packet for when to size up.

Bibs

Milk has a way of escaping out the sides of even the most enthusiastic feeder. A bib catches the dribbles before they soak into the third clean outfit of the day, and during the newborn months you'll go through more of them than you think possible. Snap-off styles make mid-feed changes easy.

Burp Cloths

Some babies finish a feed, burp politely and move on. Others like to return a percentage of every feed to sender, usually over your shoulder and down your back. A burp cloth lives between you and the damage. Keep one within reach of every feeding spot in the house.

Muslin Wraps

Officially a swaddle, unofficially the most multiskilled bit of fabric in the house. A muslin does burp cloth, giant bib, pram shade and emergency mop duty, then washes and dries overnight, ready to go again. If you already have a stack from the newborn days, congratulations, you own feeding gear.

Bottle Gripper

Around four months, babies start grabbing at the bottle mid-feed, with the grip strength of a jellyfish. A bottle gripper is a soft silicone sleeve with handles that stretches over most bottles, giving little hands something they can actually hold onto while they learn to feed themselves.

Making Up the Bottle

You're about to make thousands of these, and every saved minute counts double after midnight.

Formula

If you're formula feeding, this is the engine room of the whole operation. Infant formula in Australia is tightly regulated, so every tin on the shelf meets the same nutritional standard, and "step 1" formulas suit babies from birth to 12 months. If you're unsure where to start or thinking of switching, your child health nurse, GP or pharmacist is the person to ask, and it's worth knowing bub's tummy needs a week or so to adjust to any change.

Formula Containers

Little stacked or divided containers that hold pre-measured scoops of powder, so you're not counting scoops from the tin with one hand at 3am (or worse, losing count halfway). Load them up once a day and every feed becomes tip, shake, done. Cheap, simple and one of those products mums buy a second set of.

Formula Dispenser

The bench-top version of the same idea: a container that dispenses a measured dose of powder with a press or twist. Handy if most bottles get made in the same spot, like next to the kettle. If you're mostly making bottles on the go, the little containers above probably suit you better.

Formula Travel Flask

The formula mum's out-and-about kit: an insulated flask of hot water, a tube of pre-measured powder and an empty sterilised bottle, and you can make a safe, warm feed in a shopping centre car park. Some flasks are made just for this, with a cup that doubles as a bottle warmer. Ask any formula feeding mum what's in her nappy bag and there's a flask in there somewhere.

Formula Prep Machine

A machine that dispenses water at feeding temperature and mixes the bottle in under a minute, which at 3am sounds like a gift from the heavens. Before you fall in love, know that health authorities recommend formula be made with water hot enough (around 70 degrees) to kill any bacteria in the powder, and some prep machines dispense cooler than that. Read up on how your shortlisted machine handles this and decide what you're comfortable with.

Water Filter

Some families like filtered water for mixing formula, particularly in areas with hard or heavily chlorinated tap water. A jug filter or tap filter does the job. Australian tap water is safe for formula once it's been boiled as directed on the tin, so this one is a preference purchase, not a safety one.

Gas Drops

Bottle-fed babies can swallow air along with their milk, and some end up windy, squirmy and loudly unimpressed about it. Gas drops are given before or after feeds to help trapped wind on its way. Have a chat with your pharmacist or child health nurse before starting them, since what looks like wind can sometimes be something else.

Expressing & Storing

For the mums filling bottles with breastmilk: getting it out, keeping it cold, and moving it between home, the freezer and daycare.

Breast Pump (Electric)

If bottles at your place will be filled with breast milk, a pump is how it gets there. An electric pump uses powered suction to express milk quickly and consistently, which matters once pumping is part of the daily routine, whether that's building a freezer stash, covering a return to work or letting someone else take the night feed.

Breast Pump (Wearable)

A pump that tucks entirely inside your bra, no cords, no sitting tethered to the machine. You can express while making dinner, doing daycare pickup or chasing a toddler, which is exactly when most second-time mums discover them. The trade-off is usually a gentler motor than a full electric pump, so many mums who pump a lot end up with one of each.

Milk Storage Bags

Pre-sterilised bags designed for freezing expressed milk. They lie flat, thaw quickly and take up far less freezer space than bottles, which becomes important faster than you'd think once a stash starts growing. Write the date on each one before it goes in, future you will be grateful.

Storage Containers

Reusable pots or bottles for storing milk in the fridge or prepped water on the bench. Unlike storage bags they're refillable and sturdier, so they suit fridge storage and daily rotation, while bags win in the freezer. Most families storing milk regularly end up using both.

Insulated Carry Bag

Milk needs to stay cold between home, daycare, work and back again. An insulated bag with an ice brick keeps bottles and storage bags at fridge temperature in transit, so the milk you spent twenty minutes expressing doesn't spend the afternoon going warm in the car. Daycare mums, this one's for you.

Bottle Labels

Nobody mentions these until daycare orientation, when you're told every bottle, lid and container needs your child's name on it. Bottle labels are waterproof name stickers that survive the steriliser and the dishwasher, unlike the masking tape and Sharpie you'll try first. Order them before your first daycare week, not during it.

Cleaning & Sterilising

Nobody tells you that bottle feeding is really a washing-up commitment with a baby attached.

Bottle Brush

Bottles have corners a regular dish brush can't reach, and old milk is not a smell you want to discover later. A bottle brush is shaped to scrub right to the bottom, and most come with a little teat brush hiding in the handle for the fiddly bits. Keep it just for bottles, not last night's lasagne dish.

Bottle Cleaning Solution

A gentle detergent made specifically for baby feeding gear, designed to cut through milk residue and rinse away clean without fragrance or harsh ingredients. Regular dish liquid does work, so this is one for families who'd rather keep bub's bottles away from the stuff that washes everything else.

Bottle Cleaning Machine

The dishwasher-and-then-some for bottle parts: it washes, sterilises and dries in one cycle. Firmly at the luxury end, but if you're formula feeding full time you're washing bottles six to eight times a day for months, and some parents decide their sanity is worth the bench space. Others look at the price and pick up the bottle brush.

Dishwasher Basket

A small caged basket that stops teats, valves and tiny lids flying around the dishwasher and melting on the element (it happens, and the smell haunts you). If your bottle parts are dishwasher-safe, this turns the family dishwasher into your bottle-washing workhorse for about fifteen dollars.

Steriliser

Feeding gear needs sterilising in the early months, and a steriliser does batches at the press of a button, by steam or UV, holding everything hygienic until you need it. With one baby and a few bottles you can absolutely get by boiling or using sterilising solution. With a full bottle-feeding routine, this quickly becomes the most-used appliance in the kitchen.

Steriliser Bag

A reusable bag that steam-sterilises bottle parts in the microwave in a few minutes. Each bag lasts a set number of uses, and they weigh nothing, which makes them brilliant for travel, holidays and staying at Grandma's. Plenty of families use them as their everyday steriliser too.

Drying Rack

Freshly washed bottles, teats, valves and lids all need somewhere to drip dry, and the family dish rack fills up fast. A bottle drying rack holds all the odd little pieces upright and airing (many look like patches of grass or little trees, which is oddly cheering at the kitchen sink). Not essential, but the bench chaos without one is real.

Where You'll Feed

Feeding is the thing you'll do more than anything else this year. This lot is about making it comfortable for both of you.

Bottle Warmer

Babies mostly prefer milk at body temperature, and a bottle warmer heats it evenly in a few minutes, with no hot spots and no standing at the sink jiggling a bottle in a jug of hot water while baby escalates. Worth knowing: milk should never be warmed in the microwave, which heats unevenly and can scald. A jug of warm water genuinely does work, the warmer just does it faster and hands-free.

Nursing Chair

Newborns feed a lot, at all hours, and wherever you sit for it, you'll sit there for hundreds of hours. A proper feeding chair supports your back and arms through the marathon sessions and usually becomes the most fought-over seat in the house. Bottle feeding bonus: no clever feeding positions required, so any genuinely comfortable armchair can do the job too.

Nursing Pillow

A firm, curved pillow that brings baby up to feeding height, saving your arms and shoulders from carrying the whole feed. Just as useful for bottle feeding as breastfeeding, and it moonlights afterwards as supervised tummy-time support. Your forearms will thank you somewhere around week three.

Trolley

You'll quickly discover feeds happen in the same two or three spots, and everything you need is always in a different room. A little three-tier trolley makes a mobile feeding station (burp cloths, bibs, water bottle, snacks, phone charger) that rolls wherever the feeding happens. Peak nesting purchase, zero regrets.

Every bottle feeding product here solved a very specific problem for somebody.

You won't know which problems are yours until you're a fortnight into the washing up, the warming and the 3am scoop counting. Start small, feed the baby, and come back to this list once you know whether you're dealing with a fussy teat refuser, a windy tummy or a mum who'd pay money to never wash another bottle.

The shelf will still be there.