Home air purifier comparison tips

There is a number of air purifier comparison criteria that can help you compare air purifiers on the market to find the best home air filter for your particular situation. Among the most important aspects that every proper rating of air cleaners should include are the performance, convenience, and cost.

The air cleaner performance shows how effectively (how fast and how properly) the purifier removes particles of pollutants from the air. When looking at air purifier comparison or ratings it is important to check tests and reviews of smoke and dust removal efficiency.

Note also that for the same air purifier the performance can differ dramatically between the low and high settings of its power, and, depending on their make, some air purifiers can perform particularly well or particularly poorly on one or more of those settings. An air purifier comparison may be very biased if it does not specify at which settings (High or Low) the tests were done.

The convenience factors includes many aspects, from how easy it is to switch the cleaner on and off to how easy it is to replace the filter or clean the working parts (like the plates in an electrostatic/ionic purifier) or to move the purifier around (its weight). It is also good to have an idea of how much inconvenience you may have from an ozone smell or crackling noise of an ionic purifier or from the motor noise in filter based models (such as HEPA purifiers).

If you search for a silent air purifier, keep in mind the performance rating as well. For example, some HEPA air purifiers used at low speed setting can be sufficiently silent and still outperform some totally silent air purifiers used at full power. The costs of having an air purifier mainly include the cost of buying the air purifier itself, the cost of replacement filters, and the cost of electricity. Depending on the room air cleaner model, every year you might spend like $30-200 dollars on replacement filters and $30-150 on electricity. As the costs of filter replacement and electricity can be comparable to the air purifier buying price, in an air purifier rating or comparison it makes good sense to consider all those three cost factors together.

While you can find many customer reviews with superficial comments and varying personal impressions, it is more difficult to find sufficiently unbiased and complete data for a proper air purifier comparison. Fortunately, time after time there are some credible research studies, such as those published by the Consumer Reports magazine. One of the most recent reports of detailed air purifier ratings is in Consumer Reports October 2003 issue (page 26).

After the performance, convenience, and cost, there is also an issue of air purifier design, of how nicely the cleaner fits in your room interior. But this to a large extent a matter of taste and the specific setting of your home. This aspect is more difficult to include within an objective air purifier rating.

Finally, in your air purifier comparison, don't forget to check the air purifier working area (square footage) to make sure it covers the area you need it for.

HEPA air purifier comparison tips
HEPA air cleaner basics. What a HEPA media air purifier does and where it can help.