How can I protect my gutter from leaves?

Are there any trees nearby that would make it worth installing such a fence? If not, you might just do it later when you see a significant amount of leaves going into the gutter.

We have plastic grates that snap into place. It doesn't look pretty, but luckily I don't look at the gutter that often. If at some point they break, I'll switch to these round grates because you can't see them from below.

Our neighbor had a deciduous tree growing pretty close to the house, so we were getting quite a few leaves into our gutter every fall. So we bought one of those plastic leaf guards with plastic fasteners. It was easy to install and worked well. The only bad thing was that when the snow slid off the roof, the fasteners would come off and we had to grab the ladder every year to reattach the grate.

So make sure you use something more stable.

Then there are the grids that are installed at the top of the downpipe. I don't have them myself, but I don't think it's very beneficial if a lot of leaves accumulate there and the water can't run off. That would mean taking a ladder and cleaning it out.

I can imagine leaf separators mounted 0.5 or 1.0 feet above the ground in the gutter would be a better solution.

We have gutter guards. Under the trees the gutter is cleaned 3-4 times a year, on the street side not much less often. Coffee cups, baking bags, cigarette packets, etc. clog up there regularly. I wonder how those things get in there?

We have a Fiskars water purifier with a telescope. It works without a ladder.

We were advised not to use the leaf guard. I can't remember the reason.