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Does it matter what kind of pacifier/bottle nipples you use?
—Anonymous
Generally, no, there isn’t a “best” pacifier or a “best” nipple.
In the case of pacifiers, you will sometimes hear people suggest that some pacifiers are better for mouth development or speech. These claims aren’t well supported by data. Doctors caution against pacifiers that are attached around a baby’s neck with a cord, since those can be a strangulation risk, but among loose pacifiers, there’s no best option.
Bottle nipples do have an additional consideration, which is flow speed. Smaller babies need milk to flow more slowly; a very fast milk flow can cause air bubbles and result in choking or spit up. Older babies need faster milk flow so they can get more calories in a shorter amount of time. As your child ages, you’ll move through nipple sizes (generally, denoted by numbers). This is true for any brand of nipple, and there is no “right” type of nipple.
A consideration with both of these dimensions: babies may have preferences. If you are planning to use a pacifier and your infant rejects one option, try another. Similarly, if you are trying to get bottle feeding started — especially if you’ve been exclusively nursing and your baby is not taking to the bottle option — some nipple types may be an easier transition.
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Something I didn’t realize when people said babies have a preference was that they weren’t necessarily going to just reject one bottle type and only drink from another. We got a box of samples with five different bottles. Our baby could drink from all of them, more or less, but as she got older, we noticed that there was one she consistently drink out of much faster. I would say if your baby is taking more than 15 minutes to finish a bottle it’s worth trying a different type.