Mar . 27, 2024 10:27 Back to list
pp filter 5 micron-The Best Air Purifiers
The Best Air Purifiers
WELCOME TO THE future, where clean air is a luxury. Thanks to pandemics and wildfires, air purifiers have become the gotta-have-it home appliance. Buildings let in a lot of particulate matter, volatile organic compounds, and vaporous chemicals. Indoor plastics, furniture, paint, and flooring off-gas noxious fumes too. There’s also evidence that air filters can help clean Covid-causing virus particles from the air.
Since your home might be your workplace, playground, meditation studio, dine-in restaurant, neighborhood bar, refuge, and movie theater, you want to ensure that the air you're breathing for most of the day is clean. These are our top air purifiers. We ran them in apartments and homes all across the US. We tested them during the wildfire season and in living rooms, kitchens, and bedrooms. All of these purifiers provided significant anecdotal benefits, from stopping persistent coughs and allergy symptoms to helping us wake up with clearer sinuses and less raspy throats.
Not sure if you need an air purifier or something else? We have a guide to all the different devices that can help improve your indoor air quality. For more home tips, take a peek at our other guides, including the Best Robot Vacuums and the Best Mesh Wi-Fi Routers.
Updated October 2023: We added the Coway Airmega Aim as an honorable mention. We also fixed links and pricing throughout.
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PHOTOGRAPH: COWAYBest for Small Rooms
Coway Airmega 200MFor sheer simplicity and affordability, the Airmega 200M will do the job for most people's lives, houses, and budgets. The compact, attractive device easily fits into a corner of my bedroom and is effective for spaces up to 361 square feet. It saves energy with an included air quality monitor that turns the machine off when no pollution is detected and automatically increases the fan speed if it detects particles. When my dog plopped down in her bed, or when I cooked bacon with the bedroom door open, the Airmega 200M roared to life. You'll probably want to turn off the AQ monitor's bright light at night, though. —Adrienne So
★ Alternative: If you have an even smaller space (under 250 square feet), then get the attractive Coway Airmega 150 ($170). It's ultra-quiet, and the color-coded air monitor light and touch controls are intuitive. There's also a light that indicates when it's time to change the deodorization or HEPA filter. The third prefilter is washable. It's pricey for its size but is nicer looking and comes in a variety of colors (including pink!).
The Airmega 200M is ideal for spaces up to 361 square feet; the AirMega 150 is for spaces up to 250 square feet.
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PHOTOGRAPH: AMAZONBest for Living Rooms
Coway Airmega 250Coway's Airmega 250 is the perfect size for a typical living room or den. It captures 99.999 percent of particulates down to 0.1 microns, which makes it capable of tackling wildfire smoke and big-city pollution. The washable prefilter keeps the replaceable HEPA filter lasting longer too. And, hey, it looks like the air purifier version of a 1994 Plymouth Acclaim, but in an endearingly hip way; retro without trying to look retro. —Matt Jancer
★ Alternative: The Airmega 250S ($450) is the smart version of the standard Airmega 250. You can conveniently view air status and control it with your phone via an app. If you find them both at similar prices, it might be worth the small upgrade.
The Airmega 250 and 250S are both ideal for spaces up to 930 square feet
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PHOTOGRAPH: HONEYWELLAn Affordable Option
Honeywell HEPA InSight HPA5200BThis Honeywell is rated for rooms up to 360 square feet, which is on par with the other large-room air purifiers we tested. It's also lightweight and easy to pick up and move around with its built-in handle. Inside, it packs two HEPA-grade filters and an activated carbon prefilter for trapping volatile organic compounds such as cooking odors. When air quality dipped inside my apartment, the InSight quickly ramped up its fan and sucked up the odors or invisible particulates. For around $200, you get a strong-performing purifier with an automatic set-it-and-forget-it mode, plus you can tote it from room to room. —Matt Jancer
Ideal for spaces up to 360 square feet
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PHOTOGRAPH: LEVOITA Great Smart Purifier
Levoit Core 300SThe Levoit 300S cycles the air five times per hour in spaces up to 219 square feet, so it's great for bedrooms, living rooms, and kitchens. It's marketed as a tabletop air purifier, but at almost 9 inches across, it's on the larger side, so I keep it on my living room floor. It's easy to carry around from room to room, though. It also packs a prefilter, an activated carbon filter, and an H13 True HEPA Filter that captures 99.99 percent of bacteria and mold. On top are clearly-labeled touch controls and an indicator light that changes color depending on the air quality.
Using the VeSync companion app, you can check the air quality indoors and tinker with settings. When I was cooking salmon in my tiny studio (smoke and odor filling up the space), the app listed the air quality at 209 and labeled it as “bad.” I switched the fan to high and the quality was back down to 74 (“good”) within 15 minutes. You can also set it to automatic, which will adjust the fan speed accordingly depending on the quality. It's been super useful amid the spread of smoke in New York City due to the Canadian wildfires. I've been constantly monitoring the air quality inside my apartment via the app, which gave me some peace of mind as we waited for the smoke to dissipate. —Brenda Stolyar
★ Alternative: We're also fans of the Bissell 320 Max ($340). Like the Levoit 300S, it has a prefilter, an activated carbon filter, and an H13 HEPA filter. And it works with the Bissell app for monitoring. Both the digital display and app will tell you what the air quality status is too. But with the ability to cycle air 4.8 times per hour in a 366-square-foot room, it covers more surface area than Levoit's. It's also more aesthetically pleasing, with wooden feet and a place to wrap any extra cord.
The Levoit 300S is ideal for spaces up to 219 square feet; the Bissell 320 Max is ideal for spaces up to 366 square feet.
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PHOTOGRAPH: AMAZONQuietest Air Purifier
Blueair Pure 411There's an Ikea-like simplicity to the Pure 411, aesthetically and mechanically. To change the filter, you unscrew the fan component from the air filter and then pull the washable fabric prefilter sock off the filter. There's a one-touch control on the top: Tap once for low power, again for medium, again for high, and again for off. That's it. No smartphone app, no display, no smart mode. It can cycle the air in a 161-square-foot room five times per hour. I slept with the Pure 411 just 2 feet away from my head, and I couldn't hear a thing when it was on low. Its quietness and narrow footprint make it ideal for small bedrooms. —Matt Jancer
The Pure 411 is ideal for spaces up to 161 square feet; the 411 Auto is ideal for spaces up to 191 square feet.
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PHOTOGRAPH: COWAYBest for Very Big Rooms
Coway Airmega 400The Airmega 400 is rated to clean up to 1,560 square feet and cycles all the air in that space twice per hour. But in a room half as big, its HEPA filters cycle the air four times per hour. From its touch controls to its color-coded air quality monitor light ring, it's intuitive to use. Changing filters is simple. Two sturdy covers are held on magnetically and come free easily, and the two filters snap in and out without a fuss. I tested the 400S, which includes Wi-Fi that lets you control it from a smartphone app. But if you don't need to control your purifier remotely, the cheaper 400 version is the way to go. —Matt Jancer
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