Whether you’ve just bought a new air purifier due to air-quality issues or you’ve owned one for years, getting the most out of it means it proper setup, operation, and occasional maintenance. None of this is hard, but all of it is important, and it’s stuff you’ll want to do before the next smoke event or other air-quality crisis strikes.
Perfect for bedrooms, playrooms, and living rooms, the AP-1512HH is one of the best performing, most durable, and most economical purifiers we’ve tested.
The 200M and the AP-1512HH are virtually identical in performance, but the 200M has an appearance that you may prefer, and it’s a great alternative if you find it at a lower price.
Remove the filter wrappers
Most air purifiers arrive with the filters installed in the machine—where, hidden from view, they are sealed in plastic wrappers. Leave aside the complete senselessness of manufacturers hermetically sealing things whose entire job is to get dirty. The fact is, many first-time purifier owners don’t realize they have to open up their new machine and unwrap the filters. And that means many people have gone months or years running an air purifier that’s doing nothing.
You can find pages of comments about this topic on the Amazon listing for our top pick, the Coway AP-1512HH Mighty, alone. During the 2018 California wildfires, a Facebook group that a Wirecutter staffer belongs to revealed something like a dozen people who had made the same mistake. And even though—in response to us pointing out the issue, we’ve been told—most purifiers now come with high-vis tags on the outside reminding you to do it, we still hear from people who didn’t. So if you get a new air purifier, open it up and set the filter free.
The rest is fairly straightforward, but worth a quick recap.
Give your purifier room to breathe
Try to place the air purifier at least a foot from the wall and any furniture, ideally near the midpoint of the room you’re using it in. It needs to be able to draw in air and circulate it unobstructed to perform well.
One purifier per room is best
Purifiers work best in a contiguous space. If you want to clean the air in both the living room and a bedroom, for example, get a purifier for each room or to move a single purifier around with you throughout the day.
Oversized is better than undersized
It’s better to have “too much purifier” than not enough. Manufacturers typically base their room-size recommendations on tests with the machines set on high—but high is usually too loud to watch TV or sleep with. Purifiers rated for spaces larger than the one you plan to use them in can operate at lower, quieter speeds. All our picks are sufficiently oversized that running them on their quieter medium settings will keep the air clear in the rooms they’re sized for.
Keep your purifier running
We recommend running air purifiers 24/7 on their highest “quiet” setting—usually medium—or leaving them on their auto mode if they have that feature. On an auto setting, they’ll self-adjust the fan speed to address any changes in your air quality. (By “quiet” we mean below 50 decibels, though on many machines the medium setting produces much less noise, in the low 40s.)
Under known bad-air conditions, such as during a nearby wildfire, we recommend running purifiers on high for an hour and thereafter on medium or auto. Our tests have shown this to be effective at creating and maintaining clean air.
Close doors and windows
You should keep the doors and windows closed when you’re using an air purifier and the outside air is bad. A draft or an open door can draw outdoor air into a room faster than the purifier can deal with it. (Normal in-and-out foot traffic isn’t an issue; just close the door behind you.)
The Winix 5500-2 is an exceptional performer, but its stark look, lack of a display shutoff, and slightly higher electrical use are minor shortcomings.
With quiet operation, good color options, and performance matching our other picks, this is a great choice, although the cost of filter replacements can run relatively high.
Similar in performance to other purifiers its size, the Levoit impressed in initial and long-term testing.
Clean the prefilter monthly
For optimal performance, vacuum, wipe down, or rinse off the prefilter every month or so. (it looks like a window screen or plastic netting and sits in front of the HEPA filter.) The prefilter catches larger particles such as pet hair, and keeping it clean helps the HEPA filter work unimpeded on fine particles.
Schedule filter replacement
It’s easy to forget the occasional obligation of replacing your purifier’s filters, so set a calendar reminder. Purifier manufacturers typically recommend annual replacement; check the manual to be certain. We think it’s wisest to follow the manufacturer’s recommendation, but we have also found that HEPA filters continue to perform almost like new even after a year of continuous use,so if you do blow past the deadline, it’s not a crisis.
We recommend using the manufacturers’ own filters when doing replacements, but they are sometimes unavailable or high-priced. The third-party filters we’ve tested (made by Cabiclean and Durabasics, for the Coway AP-1512HH Mighty) performed just as well. If you can’t get an manufacturer replacement for whatever machine you have, we think most good-quality third-party filters will be satisfactory—and certainly better than no filter at all during an air-quality crisis.
