The Okaysou AirMax8L is an excellent, … It differs only in that it uses three-month VOC filters (a year’s supply comes with it) versus the 5500-2’s one-year VOC filter, and lacks the remote control the 5500-2 comes with. (Compare that with the Blue Pure 411’s measurements: 87.2% on high and 70.7% on medium.) And on medium, it reaches a rate of 3.5 ACH, more than enough to keep the air clean under normal conditions. And by mid-2020, that language had been withdrawn, after many of the company’s claims were ruled against in a case before the National Advertising Division and upheld in a later appeal before the National Advertising Review Board. To look at the Blueair Classic 405 doesn’t look like much: it’s a rectangular, plain-looking box. The smaller Medify MA-40 has specs similar to those of our top pick, the Coway AP-1512HH Mighty, and in fact it achieved the same reduction in particulate pollutants: 98.9% on high. The Winix also draws more electricity than the Coway: 13 watts versus 8.1 watts on the medium setting that we recommend for daily use. One great budget option is the GermGuardian AC4825 22-inch 3-in-1 Full Room Air Purifier, which delivers the same air-purifying power for a fraction of the price. Renpho, Aviano, Mooka, Keenstone; This is an air purifier that was designed with performance first, functionality & convenience second. Read more in How we picked. The Blue Pure 211+ is not true HEPA, but it has undergone CADR testing, which in some ways is a more rigorous standard. The Levoit costs a bit more than half as much for the same upkeep—and, of course, roundly outperforms the Air Mini, as well. We believe that the Airmega 200M, with its nearly identical design, interchangeable filters, and slightly more powerful motor, would undoubtedly perform at least as well. HEPA air purifiers do one thing and do it very well: remove fine particles from the air. If you want a device that’s useful practically all year round, you need the Dyson Pure Cool Tower. And we know of at least one Wirecutter reader and one Wirecutter staffer who didn’t realize they needed to remove the plastic before turning their purifier on, which rendered their purifiers useless. The technology was developed during World War II and designed to trap radioactive and other dangerous particles in the labs developing the atomic bomb. The Honeywell HPA200 and HPA204 (black and white versions of the same machine) barely meet our 4 ACH minimum in a 350-square-foot room (with standard 8-foot ceilings), so you’d have to run them on high constantly to get the performance we expect. In comparison, the similarly specced GermGuardian AC5900WCA, a 2019 competitor, consumes about $60 of electricity annually and needs a new $70 filter at least every eight months—so its five-year cost is about $900. At a cost of $1,000, the Aeris Aair 3-in-1 Pro is a high-end purifier—a growing category that we plan to explore in depth in the future. On its lowest and quietest setting (speed 1; 33.1 decibels), the Mini’s filtration performance dropped further, reducing the smoke by 60.3% in 30 minutes. #mergeRow-gdpr fieldset label {font-weight: normal;} Air passes through almost unimpeded—thus the “high efficiency” in HEPA—but the mazelike web of fibers traps almost all the particles, from “big” stuff like pollen (10 microns or so) down to ultrafine, 10-nanometer (0.01 micron) stuff. If you need to clean the air in a space of around 200 square feet, the Levoit Core 300 is a solid and inexpensive purifier. The Hathaspace Smart True HEPA Air Purifier has solid reviews and costs a bit less than the Coway AP-1512HH. We do not prioritize smart functionality, which generally means receiving more information from and having more control of a purifier via an app. Both results indicate that it’s a highly efficient purifier, in the same league as the Coway AP-1512HH and the Winix models above. That 0.3-micron diameter is not arbitrary: It is considered by the Association of Home Appliance Manufacturers, a trade group, the toughest size of particle to remove by physical, HEPA-type filtration. Interestingly, those numbers closely mirror our results on the Auto setting with the PECO system turned on, suggesting the possibility that the Molekule mostly relies on its physical prefilter, not its proprietary PECO mechanism, to eliminate particulates. Tim placed the machines at the midpoint of the room, approximately 3 feet from the wall and away from any obstacles. The Molekule was also not remotely comparable to the Coway AP-1512HH Mighty or the Blueair Blue Pure 211+, which reduced particulates by 98.9% and 99.3% on their high settings and by 87.6% and 99.2% on medium, respectively. Airsoap’s claim that it will save you “thousands” in the cost of replacement filters is ridiculous—you’d have to replace the filter on the Coway AP-1512HH 20 times to reach even $1,000, meaning you’d have to run it for two decades. We’re continuing to test the app’s stability amid its frequent firmware updates, and reaching a conclusion as to whether its smart functions actually prove useful in real-world use. Xiaomi Mi Air Purifier Pro is an interesting compromise between price and possibilities. But we had originally extrapolated this claim from our past discrete 20-, 30-, or 60-minute test results on each setting, so in 2018 we specifically tested it on the Coway AP-1512HH Mighty and Airmega 400 over the course of three hours—one hour on high, followed by two on medium—after burning 15 wooden matches to create an initial heavy load of fine smoke particulates. The most striking feature has to be its attention to detail in the purification of a wide range of air allergens as well as its real-time air quality feedback using AeraSense infrared sensor and three stage coloured light indicator. Take that off. Other criteria also matter. John Holecek, who co-wrote and performed testing for previous versions of this guide, holds a master’s degree in earth science, with a focus on climate, aerosols, and analytical chemistry. Many employ a second filter, containing adsorbent compounds like activated carbon, to capture gases and odors (volatile organic compounds, or VOCs)—but we have not found these to be very effective. Read more in How we picked. Most purifiers with an ionizer let you toggle the feature on or off. Of them, the TP04 performed better, but neither measured up well against our top pick, the Coway AP-1512HH Mighty, and our large-space pick, the Blueair Blue Pure 211+. If your air quality is bad and you don’t have an air purifier, an HVAC filter taped to a box fan is better than nothing. Air purifiers use a fan to pull in dirty air at one end, remove pollutants, and output clean air at the other end. Air Purifier Guide. The official CADR ratings bear this out, with low ratings for smoke, pollen and dust: CADR ratings: 80 (smoke), 89 (pollen), 78 (dust). Typically, this Medify model also costs more than the Coway. When looking at the specs for an air purifier, pay very careful attention to the language used to describe the type of filters it uses. Purifier manufacturers typically recommend annual replacement, but check the manual to be certain; some call for less-frequent or more-frequent replacement. We may earn a commission if you click a deal and buy an item. And the filters need to be replaced every eight months, at about $25 a pop. At a certain point, these results look worse than what you see with no purifier running at all. Rather, in HEPA purifiers, a fan draws particles suspended in the air through a dense, felt-like filter that has billions of tiny gaps of varying size. We conducted the same tests on the Molekule Air as we did on the HEPA-filtration competitors, taking baseline readings, burning five matches to create a mass of fine airborne particulates, and then measuring the reduction in those particulates over the course of 30 minutes on all three of the machine’s speed settings (called Silent, Auto, and Boost, akin to low, medium, and high). The Inofia PM1320 claims to work in rooms as large as 800 square feet. Regarding effectiveness, the Air 300 has high CADR ratings:428 (smoke), 392 (pollen), 278 (dust). Instead, it uses washable, electrically charged plates to capture airborne particulates. It’s extremely powerful, delivering our recommended 4 ACH (air changes per hour) in spaces as large as 650 square feet (assuming an 8-foot ceiling). If you need to clean the air in a space of around 200 square feet, the Levoit Core 300 is a solid and inexpensive purifier. This said, it is to our eyes a more attractive machine than the Winix 5500-2, and it features WiFi connectivity and a basic app that lets you control its settings and monitor its air-quality readings remotely. HEPA air purifiers are extremely efficient at removing smoke particles from the air. That’s louder than our picks for large, standard, and small spaces on their “quiet”/medium speeds. Philips Air Purifier Review. In short, the higher the CADR rating for each type, the better. But high is usually too loud to watch TV or sleep with. That said, after we created the abnormal smoke conditions at the outset of the tests, from then on the New York test room was subject to only the natural, ambient air conditions and whatever leakage infiltrated the test room. If you simply need to remove particulates from your air in a large space, the Blue Pure 211+ is easier to live with—it’s quieter, smaller, and better looking, which is why it’s our main pick for large spaces. Well, duh: Any air that passes through a HEPA or medium-MERV filter will be virtually particulate free. Some models of air purifier also have an ionisation option. And its five-year cost of ownership—about $1,150, including the up-front cost and the annual cost of electricity and replacement filters—is comparable to most large-space purifiers. In a dark room, the lamp can be a distraction, and we wish there was an option to shut it off on every setting, as you can with the Coway. The numbers get worse when you factor in running costs: five years of running the Coway on medium and replacing the filters on schedule will max out at around $265, and less if you don’t pay the high New York electricity rates we base our calculations on. The Levoit LV-H133 is another competitor to the Coway AP-1512HH, and it produced similar test results—98.8% and 92.9% reduction in particulates on high and medium, versus 98.9% and 87.6%. Every consumer loved it. It’s an equally solid choice on performance, but as of October 2020 is only available direct from Winix, where it costs $250. These are harsh chemicals that can be found in everything from old furniture to cleaning sprays. Features Easily the best luxury option we’ve tested, this Series 2000i air cleaner removes up to 99.97% of all ultrafine particles in your air. The NK100 also has lower specs than the Coway AP-1512HH Mighty and typically costs a bit more. This purifier is also pricey to buy and to run. In our office, even at a distance of 50 feet, the noise was intrusive during conversation.). The incense continued to burn for another 20 minutes or so, and the purifiers ran for 50 minutes total. Oversized is better than undersized. It’s a derivation of an older technology, PCO (photocatalytic oxidation). We believe this approach supports the best apples-to-apples comparison because it eliminates absolute particle concentration—which even under pure lab conditions is virtually impossible to exactly reproduce test-to-test and machine-to-machine—in favor of a common measure. Like all Winix purifiers, the 5500-2 features PlasmaWave technology: It uses ionization to create hydroxyls (highly reactive molecules composed of one hydrogen and one oxygen; they quickly bind to airborne matter or else break down into water and harmless atmospheric hydrogen). (On high, the Levoit achieved 97.4% reduction.) We’ve been testing air purifiers since 2013, and we have always judged them not just by how well they perform but also by how easily you’ll be able to live with them running constantly in your bedroom, living room, or office. Another is filter-replacement costs. In the summer of 2019, we purchased a Molekule Air (the flagship model) and tested it. (You can’t physically block the glow with a coin or tape, because doing so would block the Molekule’s delivery of air.). This process resulted in: 1) heavy initial smoke conditions for the purifiers to deal with, 2) roughly 20 minutes of the purifiers dealing with both initial and ongoing smoke, and 3) roughly 30 minutes of the purifiers working to clear the air after the source of smoke had disappeared. It adds Wi-Fi capability and a rudimentary app, and it costs a few dollars more than the 5500-2. Almost all of them are certified to the North American HEPA standard, unofficially known as “true HEPA,” which requires purifiers to capture at least 99.97% of particles 0.3 micron in diameter in a single pass. (This said, we keep getting occasional reports from buyers who receive models that lack this function. (We use smoke to test them, in fact, so our picks directly reflect their ability to remove it.) 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