Living in an era where clean air in urban areas is history has forced everyone to depend on air purifiers. However, since these devices usually work 24/7 in households, the noise they make is always considered before purchase. As such, are you wondering if the Honeywell air purifier you want to buy is a noisy one?
Most Honeywell air purifiers are known to offer a sound rating of 47dB. Thus, the sound that they make during operation is lower than that of your ordinary refrigerator. Although not completely silent, Honeywell air purifiers can only be said to be a little noisy.
Like the sound made from an ordinary refrigerator at work, the ambient noise of most air purifiers is low. If your air purifier is louder than that, this means that there is something wrong somewhere. Notwithstanding, this article would provide you with all the solutions you need to deal with a loud air purifier.
Are Air Purifiers Supposed To Be Loud?
The primary purpose of an air purifier is to clean the air in a room from all common contaminants. This entails that air purifiers are designed to take care of smoke, dust, mold, pollen, bacteria, and other allergens.
However, you wouldn’t be able to relax in your home if your air purifier sounded like a lawnmower. As such, noise is now one of the considerations taken into effect for any air purifier. However, this can only be an afterthought, as a manufacturer wouldn’t sacrifice efficiency for a lower decibel rating.
So, it can be said that all air purifiers make some noise while they work, some more than others. Nonetheless, the sound produced by air purifiers in operation depends on the type of air purifier.
Does this seem hard to bear? A comparison of the classes of air purifiers would give you an idea of their noise production features.
Classes Of Air Purifiers
Air purifiers can primarily be divided into passive and active air purifiers. Passive air purifiers draw in the unclean air, filter out the contaminants, and release the clean air. On the other hand, active air purifiers utilize electrostatic precipitation and ionization to remove pollutants from the air.
The passive air purifiers utilize either permanent or disposable filters for their operations. Contrastingly, active air purifiers utilize everything from ionization, activated carbon, ozone generation, and a plethora of other methods.
Generally, active air purifiers utilize various methods to attack pollutants aggressively.
The classification above offers a generalization on how all air purifiers work. It can also be said that active air purifiers are quiet devices, while passive ones are rather loud.
Of course, there would always be exceptions to every rule. Notwithstanding that, most passive air purifiers comprise fans and filters- the perfect noise-making combination. Active air purifiers release ions, UV light, electrostatic fields, and other methods to make for a much more quiet operation.
A good example of an active air purifier is the HEPA air purifier, while an example of an active air filter is the Ionic air purifier.
HEPA Air Purifiers
HEPA (High-Efficiency Particulate) filters are the building blocks of most air purifiers. Although they utilize the passive mode of operation, HEPA air purifiers usually consist of fans and HEPA filters. The fan drives air into the air purifier, while the HEPA filter removes contaminants from the air.
HEPA filters are known and well-acknowledged for their efficiency in removing contaminants from the air. A 99.97% efficiency on a 0.3-micron mesh size ensures very few contaminants escape the air purifier.
Nevertheless, HEPA filters utilize a fan, and most fans are not known to be quiet. The effects of this unique feature can be better felt when the fan’s speed is increased. The white noise that would emanate from the air purifier is not subtle at all.
Of course, manufacturers would all offer their various solutions for reducing the sound of their purifiers. This, however, doesn’t change the fact that HEPA air purifiers are the loudest air purifiers out there. So, if you purchase such an air purifier, you should be ready for the ambient noise from its operation.
Ionic Air Purifiers
Ionic air purifiers operate under the same principle as a basic active air purifier. The air purifier releases ions into the air, and these ions bond with particles in the air. After which, the now heavier particles fall to the ground and can be swept away with a vacuum cleaner.
Of course, you could point out Ionic air purifiers that utilize fans to push ions from the air purifier. However, such fans are no bigger than computer fans, and they are not much louder. So, you can say that these air purifiers operate very quietly.
So, if you own an active air purifier, it is not supposed to be loud. However, if you own a passive air purifier, you should expect some ambient noise while operating the air purifier. The sound’s loudness depends on the manufacturer and the specifications of the air purifier in question.
Reasons For A Loud Air Purifier
Although ambient noise is expected when operating a passive air purifier, there are times when it’s just too loud. These loud noises are either a result of the environment or a faulty component of the air purifier. Some of these reasons include:
The Air Filters Are Dirty
All passive air filters work with an air filter. These filters allow air to pass through while they hold back dirt, dust, pollen, and bacteria that pollute the air.
When these devices are used for a long time, their filters eventually get clogged up with dirt. This, in turn, would cause the air purifier to produce louder ambient noises while working.
Location Of The Air Purifier
Operating an air purifier in an empty room is a recipe for noise. This is especially evident when the room contains wooden floorboards and ceilings. While an air purifier’s operation releases ambient noise, operating it in an empty room causes that sound to be amplified.
The Fan’s Speed Is Too High
Turning up the fan’s speed within a passive air purifier causes the device to clean the air faster. However, this also results in an equivalent increase in the ambient noise of the air purifier.
The loudness of the air purifier would ultimately be dependent on the noise-dampening features that the manufacturer applied.
The Age Of The Air Purifier
New air purifiers are awash with highly efficient components, lowering their ambient noise. As they age, however, this ambient noise increases as components within the device start to fail or lose effectiveness.
Solutions For A Loud Air Purifier
If you have accepted that you would forever be stuck with a noisy air purifier, you should have a rethink. There are various ways that you could reduce the loudness of your air purifier, some of which include:
Washing The Air Filters
Since a dirty air filter could result in unsightly sounds, cleaning those air filters would solve the problem. Most air filters do not require much to clean them, as detergent and water would do.
Notwithstanding, reusable HEPA filters require running them under cold water, while the disposable ones require outright replacements.
Change The Location of the Air purifier
Placing the air purifier in a room with carpeted floors, a sofa, and other sound-absorbing materials would reduce its loudness. If the loudness is too much, you could entirely place the air purifier in a different room. This doesn’t affect its air-cleaning properties much.
Reduce The Speed Of The Fan
A reduced fan speed would also lead to a reduction in the loudness of an air purifier. The good part is that this does not affect the air-cleaning capabilities of that air purifier. Therefore, it would only take a longer time to clean a room.
Buy A New Air Purifier
Sometimes, your air purifier has just had enough. As long as it has served well past its warranty period, that air purifier is ripe for replacement.
How Noisy Is The Honeywell Air Purifier?
Although there are various Honeywell air purifiers, they mostly possess an average decibel rating of 47dB. This decibel rating represents the loudness of the air purifier at medium-speed settings. When the fan’s speed is turned up, it gets louder and could go as high as 70dB.
To get an idea of the noisiness of the Honeywell air purifier, you should compare them to relatable noise levels.
Comparing Air Purifiers With Other Sounds
In this comparison, I would be going from some of the lowest sounds out there to louder ones.
- Rustling leaves are at 10dB
- A whisper is at 20dB
- Regular refrigerators are at 50dB
- A Vacuum cleaner is at 80dB
- A lawnmower is at 90dB
With these sounds, you should be able to understand how noisy the Honeywell air purifier is.
Which Honeywell Air Purifier Is The Quietest?
Have you decided on going for the Honeywell air purifier? Then it would be logical to go for the best one out there.
Of course, many Honeywell variants are known for their efficiency, high CADR ratings, and affordability. However, when it comes to quietness, the Honeywell AirGenius 5 is the quietest, with a 45.2dB low fan speed.