It took me some time, but after trying out the air purifiers at my friends’ apartments and listening to the advice of experts, I finally agreed to invest in an air purifier for myself.
So I did the research, measured the area of my home where I plan on using the air purifier, and searched for the best models available. And eventually, I was able to find a great air purifier that was the perfect size for my room.
But then I read a couple of online forums that told me that I should keep my air purifier on 24/7. And as much as I wanted to follow that advice, I was very hesitant as I didn’t want my air purifier to cause my electric bill to sky-rocket.
That’s why I dove into tons of articles, videos, and other sources of information to find out if leaving my air purifier on around the clock would kick up my electricity bill. In other words, I went to find out if air purifiers were expensive to run.
And to be honest, I found a lot of useful information.
So, if you’re wondering if air purifiers are expensive to run – in this article, I will not only tell you whether or not they are expensive to run but also how you can calculate how much electricity your air purifier will use depending on your needs.
Keep on reading to learn more.
Does an Air Purifier Use a Lot of Electricity?
Modern air purifiers are designed to not use that much electricity. Even if you don’t get a premium air purifier or one that’s certified to be eco-friendly, you can generally rely on the device to operate without consuming too much energy.
The reason air purifiers don’t consume a whole lot of energy is because they are pretty simple devices. They are essentially a fan with a filtration system installed in the middle, which traps all of the harmful particles before the air is released back into your room.
As a result of that, all your air purifier really needs is enough power for the fan and the mechanical filter to function properly. Sometimes, air purifiers have automatic modes, ionizers, and other features that require electricity, but even these features don’t need that much power.
This is why it’s completely fine to run your air purifier 24/7. Granted, keeping an electronic device on that long will cause a slight uptick in your electric bill. However, you’ll find that it won’t add that much cost, and considering the benefits of having an air purifier, it’s a pretty fair trade-off.
How Much Does It Cost to Run an Air Purifier?
While most air purifiers don’t require that much electricity, it’s still helpful to figure out just how much it will cost you to run your air purifier. This will allow you to budget accordingly and see at what cost you will get to breathe clean air.
With that said, it can be hard to determine the exact cost of running an air purifier. This is because all air purifiers work differently. On top of that, there are other factors like the size of your room, fan speed, and air quality, which can all impact the electricity the air purifier will use.
So, I recommend figuring out the exact type of air purifier you have, the wattage of the unit, the area of your room, and other factors to calculate how much power your specific air purifier requires to function.
How To Calculate the Energy Consumption of Your Air Purifier
I must say that I’ve never done this before but for the sake of this article, I went out and found the perfect formula for calculating just how much energy your air purifier will consume. That way, you can get a ballpark figure.
The first step is to get the total wattage consumption of your air purifier per day. So, if you have a 70-watt air purifier that you keep on for 18 hours a day, then your first calculation will be 70 watts x 18 hours.
Then, you convert the result of the calculation to kilowatt-hours by dividing it by 1000. So, 70 x 18 is 1,260, divided by 1,000 which would be 1.26-kilowatt-hours.
From there, you can multiply that amount by the number of days per month. For our example, that would be 1.26-kilowatt hours x 30 days, which is 37.8-kilowatt-hours per month.
Then, you can take this number and multiply it by your local electricity rates. The average rate in the US is around 10 cents per kWh (kilowatt-hour), so let’s use this rate as an example.
Multiplying 37.8 kWh per month by $0.10 per kWh, you get around $3.78 per month. So, if you keep your 70-watt air purifier on for 18 hours a day on average, this is how much you have to spend on electricity per month.
Increasing Your Air Purifier’s Efficiency
While I was pretty happy to learn that most air purifiers don’t consume a whole lot of electricity, I still wanted to find ways to keep the cost down as much as possible. After all, it would never hurt to save some extra money every month, even if it is just a couple of dollars here and there.
So, I decided to find ways to make the most out of my air purifier. To start, I made sure to get an air purifier that was energy efficient. There are plenty of great choices on the market – one of my favorites being the LEVOIT Core 300. It’s truly great and you should definitely check it out.
Consider Your Room Size
Before you buy an air purifier, it’s a great idea to measure the size of your room. That way, you can buy an air purifier that is just powerful enough to be able to purify the air within your room.
What you want to avoid is buying an air purifier that doesn’t have the air purification capacity for your room.
For instance, let’s take the LEVOIT Core 300 I mentioned above. That particular model has an air purification capacity suitable for rooms no larger than 219 square feet.
If you have a larger room and get the LEVOIT Core 300, it will use a whole lot more energy as it will never be good enough to purify all of the air.
On the flip side, you don’t want to get an air purifier that’s too powerful for your room. That will be overkill and will cause you to waste money both on the air purifier and on electricity.
Follow Your Air Purifier’s Best Practices
Another thing I recommend is following the best practices for using your air purifier.
To start, this means keeping it on as much as possible.
If you constantly switch the unit on and off, you will not only not get to experience the full benefits of the air purifier but the unit itself will never be able to fully purify the air in your room – causing it to work extra hard when it doesn’t need to.
Additionally, I recommend cleaning your air purifier every one to three months depending on use and changing the filter every year.
That way, your air purifier will work as intended and the fan won’t have to work extra hard to pull in the air if the filter is clogged up with dust and other harmful particles.
Lastly, stick to using the air purifier on its lower settings.
Find Models With Automatic Features
Another great way to increase your air purifier’s efficiency is to find a model that has an automatic air quality control feature.
This feature allows the air purifier to turn on and off as necessary depending on the current air quality in your room.
That way, even if your air purifier is technically on 24/7, it will only turn on when the air quality in the room drops below a certain level.
Not having an automatic mode means that you’ll manually have to control your air purifier, which can often lead to the unit purifying the air in your room when it’s already as clean as it can be.
Should I Unplug My Air Purifier to Save Electricity?
While unplugging your air purifier may save some electricity, it won’t do you that much good.
This is because air purifiers already operate at such low consumption rates that unplugging them will save you a couple of cents at most.
Remember, modern air purifiers are supposed to run 24/7, even when you’re not at home.
So, unplugging it when you leave the house isn’t how you’re supposed to use the air purifier.
Yes, if you’re leaving your home for a couple of days, it might be good to unplug the air purifier, but rest assured that these machines aren’t going to be the reasons for your electricity bills rising.
Do I Need an Air Purifier If I Have an Air Conditioner?
Even if you have an air conditioner, you need an air purifier. This is because air conditions just make the air in a room colder. They do this with a fan and advanced technology designed to cool the air.
An air purifier is designed to clean the air by running it through an advanced filtration system, which is either a HEPA filter or an active carbon filter.
Both of these filtration systems are designed to either deal with fine solid particles or eliminate any VOCs, gasses, and other harmful odors before they end up in your lungs.
What’s more, some air purifiers like the Dyson Pure Cool TP04 are designed to also be used as a fan, which can be quite useful considering most air conditioners don’t have this feature.
Conclusion
I was really worried that my air purifier would cause my electricity bill to skyrocket.
However, I quickly learned that these machines have really low power consumption by design.
So, even if you keep your air purifier on all day long, you won’t have to worry about ridiculously high electricity costs.
With that said, you can lower the costs of running an air purifier even more by following the best practices and choosing an efficient model.
That way, you get to save some money every month while ensuring that you breathe quality air every time you’re at home.