↓Skip to main content
  1. Reviews/

What is the use of an Air Purifier? Benefits explained.

2 mins·
Product Review Utility
Table of Contents

A review of the Levoit Core 300S.

What’s an air purifier? #

Air Purifier with a bottle for scale

A white cylinder that captiously draws in air through a filter system. The filters trap particles like dust, mould spores, pollen and smoke. Resulting in cleaner air.

How do we use it? #

It sits in the middle of the apartment. That is, between the kitchen and the rest of the place. We have the machine running in automatic mode, which means that when the air is clean, the machine is quiet and just sits there. But when my wife starts cooking without oil again and creates a bunch of smoke in the kitchen, then the air purifier will kick into overdrive and start whirling loudly, doing it’s best to get that burnt smell out of the air ASAP.

And that is really our main use of the thing. To get unpleasant smells out of the air (mostly from cooking, but also smells coming in from the hallway.) Previously we had used incense to cover up the smells or opened two windows to get the air flowing. That worked OK, but the purifier does it faster, better and automatically.

Costs #

This particular machine does a fine job at cleaning the air in a 75m2 place. Don’t let them upsell you into a bigger machine.

The costs come out to three factors:

  1. Initial cost of the machine: 125€ new, but we got it used for 30€. I would not have paid full price for a new one.
  2. Regular costs of replacing the filter: 17€ every 6-8 months.
  3. Regular energy costs: Not measured1.

Maintenance #

With time dust will collect around the air intake holes and on the filter. Just vacuum the outer shell and the filter. Don’t vacuum the sensor though. No dust will collect on it and vacuuming it created this weird sound for me2.

Conclusion #

Do you need one: No. But some people would benefit from having an air purifier. E.g. if you have a sensitive nose or cook a lot.

I don’t care about the marginal health benefits. For me the utility lies in removing unwanted smells from the air. That, to me, along with the convenient experience makes the machine worth it.

  1. The machine draws 15W at peak operation. What that averages out to and if there is a draw on standby would have to be measured. ↩︎

  2. I could fix that by blowing into the sensor hard. ↩︎