I would like to know the answer to this myself. Leaves are a huge problem at my house also. I found two different gutters guards at Home Depot and brought one of each home but did not like the way they looked.

Commercials say they are guaranteed--so even if they get jammed they will get to clean them for you!!!

I have them on my house in MN. I lived there for only 6 months, then left it empty for another couple of years (only stayed there occasional weekends when visiting my son in the area) and have now rented it out for three years. The gutters have never had to be cleaned out. And these are not new gutters. I don't know how long they had been on the house when I bought it. I bought in the fall of 2007.

My opinion is that some of them work to keep debris out of the gutter by keeping everything out of the gutter, including water. And the one time I checked them out in detail, the price of the gutter covers was three to four times as much as the gutters themselves, at that price they could send someone out every year for 20 years and still turn a tidy profit.

When I got mine, they gave me all new gutters as well. They are an integral part.
It was interesting watching make them. (on site)
They had big rolls of metal in the back of the truck...they stuck the end in the "roller" and turned it out until they had one continuous length of the house.

I have not had any problems other than occasionally in a heavy downpour the rain will come so fast it might pour over the guard...but not often...it really needs to rain HARD.

DH is still able to clean ours, but I don't know how much longer he WANTS to do it. LOL The lawn guy charges $50. They need cleaning several times a year. I'd thought we might be money ahead to get them, but maybe not... (Thanks, Bob.)

we have the kind that are spongey and fit inside the gutters...(Costco bought) they seem to be working just fine...we also have (mi snow) the heated wires as well...this will be our 2-3 year?

We have gutter brush which is working fine.

IIRC the prices were something like $6 /foot for new seamless gutters, including installation, and something like $25/foot for the brand of gutter covers I looked at.

Gutter Helmet brand here. We've had them for 12 years and they're terrific, never been cleaned, still work like a charm and we have LOTS of trees and leaves coming down. DH who knows more about them than I do, just recently was telling a new friend how great they have been.

Our only issue is that we should have gotten them the year BEFORE he fell off the roof cleaning the gutters :(

Does anyone have a birch tree that sheds small leaves and powdery pods into the gutters? I'm wondering if any of these covers would work with that stuff raining down.

DH put hardware cloth over ours. When they put our new roof on, he put the hardware cloth under the shingles - and over the gutters. Works great and has for about 10 years.... He's a pretty handy guy though ... I think I will keep him :)

I forget what brand we have--they were supposed to be state--of-the-art when we had our roof done about 3 years ago, and I think were $10-12/foot.

They get clogged. I mean to the point where the water has no place to go and is just pouring over the gutters in a lovely (not!) waterfall.

The only difference I see, is that with the gutter guards on, it's a LOT harder to clean. You have to get up there and take everything off, clean them, then reinstall.

I think it was simpler to have just the easily-accessible open gutters. but that's just one person's opinion.

Since people's experiences vary so much, I'm thinking there must be a lot of different types of them.

I see that opinions and quality varies - we definitely stand by our gutter helmet brand, they have a website (of course). Just FYI. Good luck.

I don't remember what ours are either - maybe gutter helmet - they were put on when we had the new roof done 5-6 years ago. Have never been cleaned and never had a problem. We have a ton of leaves and our old ones would get clogged and we'd have plants growing in them on the top of the 2nd story and I hated DH getting up on the ladder to clean them - I like them a lot.

There are two kinds that I know of.

One is a long piece of metal with holes in it that lays on top of the trough and the water drops through the holes: the leaves and such have been instructed not to do that.

My friend bought one that's like a very open sponge that fits inside of the gutter, to let the water run down through, but to keep the leaves on top, encouraging them to blow off.

I was there when they were installed, but haven't heard since ... but he lives a few blocks from here, so I can visit and hear what he thinks of their service.

Will get back to you after a while.

ole joyful ... who's only occsionally accused of being all wet (and whose mind only gets into the gutter sporadically)

That sponge idea sounds good to me, and is probably not very expensive. I wonder if it gets moldy...or if you have to replace it after a few years. (Awkward getting around the gutter hangers.)