The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that around 10 % of the global burden of disease can be attributed to lack of adequate drinking water, poor hygiene, and inefficient sanitation. Unsafe water is the main reason for diarrheal diseases such as dysentery and cholera, preventable and treatable disorders which claim the lives of around 1.5 million people every year, around 760,000 of these being children under 5 years. Water treatment techniques such as filtration, boiling, chlorination and ultra violet radiation, while effective may be too costly to use in developing countries or emergency situations. Solar water disinfection (SODIS) is a simple and cheap method which uses natural sunlight to treat contaminated water filled into transparent plastic containers and exposed to direct sunlight for up to 6 h. SODIS has conventionally been implemented using 1-2 L polyethylene terephthalate (PET) bottles which have shown good characteristics of microbiological inactivation in natural sunlight. To date, most SODIS based research has focused on using these 2 L PET bottles. The aim of this debate article is to identify the needs for SODIS in large volume bottles as well as to debate their limitations. The findings of this article will help to inform the global conversations around access to clean and safe water in resource-limited settings and to help develop appropriate and sustainable strategies at community level to enhance compliance with SODIS.