Best air purifiers – improve indoor air quality with the best air filters

Investing in one of the best air purifiers on the market can be an invaluable addition to your home, helping to reduce and remove airborne particles like smoke, dust, pollen, and pet dander that can impact indoor air quality and the well-being of those with allergies or certain health conditions.

Many air purifiers can also tackle invisible airborne pollutants such as formaldehyde and other Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs) that can be released into our homes by things like new furniture, flooring, and upholstery materials, as well as some paints, artificial air fresheners, candles, and cleaning products.

No wonder that alongside the best dehumidifiers for extracting moisture from the home, air purifiers are one of this year's bestselling home appliances.

As such, the Ideal Home team has tried, tested, and reviewed some of the best air purifiers on the market to bring you our top recommendations, including options from Levoit, Meaco, Philips, and more. 

You'll also find plenty of buying advice below to help you find the best air purifier for your needs. We've broken down the impact CADR (Clean Air Delivery Rate), removal rate, filtration efficiency, energy consumption, and noise levels will have on your purchase to help you weigh up which air purifier is the right fit for you.

The quick list

Short on time? This quick list is an overview of the very best air purifiers. You'll find more information on each air purifier and why our testers recommend it if you keep on scrolling.

Best air purifiers 2024

Best air purifier overall

If you’re looking for a quiet and unfussy air purifier that will fit into smaller spaces, then the Blueair Blue 3210 is ideal. Perfect for bedrooms or a home office, the Scandi-style machine is super-easy to set up and use. Recommended for use in a room of around 17m2, the Blueair Blue 3210 will change the air in the space five times an hour, going down to about twice an hour in a room of 43m2.

The lower section of this cylindrical air purifier is wrapped in what the brand calls a fabric 'pre-filter', designed not only to look attractive but also to catch larger particles and extend the life of the primary filter inside. You can vacuum the fabric outer or pop it in the wash to clean it.

Setting up and using this air purifier during our review process couldn't have been easier. The pre-filter was already in place, and all we needed to do was keep the air purifier in Auto mode in order to see the positive effect. It made light work of eradicating polluting particles during testing, lighting up amber or red briefly before returning back to a steady blue, which indicates a good air quality reading.

Our tester, Smart Homes editor Caroline Preece says 'the Blueair Blue 3210 looks good, is incredibly quiet, user-friendly, and has impressive performance for its size and price point. As long as you don't mind the lack of timer or smart features, it's a great buy'.

Our full Blueair Blue 3210 air purifier review has more detail.

Most affordable

Small, lightweight, and relatively affordable, we think the Levoit Core 300 air purifier is a great option for smaller homes, and, thanks to its unobtrusive build and quiet 'sleep mode' we rank it alongside the Blueair Blue 3210 air purifier as one of the best air purifiers for the bedroom. 

Despite its relatively affordable price point, this model offers a pre-filter to capture large particles such as dust, lint, fibers, hair, and pet fur, a HEPA filter that traps fine dust, smoke particles, and allergens such as pollen and pet dander, and a carbon filter that works to neutralise smoke, fumes, VOCs, and household odours such as cooking smells and pet odours.

It's not quite as quiet as the Blueair Blue 3210 air purifier on its lowest setting, offering noise levels of 24dB compared to the Blueair Blue 3210's lowest 18dB setting, but it's still pretty quiet compared to other options. However, like the Blueair Blue 3210, those noise levels do get considerably higher as you move up the fan settings.

The Levoit Core 300 promises to filter a larger area – capable of cleaning a 20m2 space as opposed to the Blue 3210's 17m2 limit – however, in line with its lower price point, performance is also lower, with it struggling to match the Blueair Blue 3210 on CADR results. It also uses more energy, at 45W compared to the low 2-10W energy consumption of the Blueair Blue 3210. 

However, if you want a compact and portable air purifier without having to invest a big sum upfront, we think the Levoit Core 300 is a great unit to improve your home's air quality without breaking the bank.

Most powerful

A powerful air purifier that's designed to fix air quality in larger spaces, the Philips Series 3000i Connected air purifier promises to remove impurities in areas up to 104m2. If you're using it in a smaller room, then that translates to super-fast results, with the unit able to purify the air in a room of 20m2 in less than 6 minutes, thanks to an impressive CADR (Clean Air Delivery Rate) of 520 m3/hr. 

Our testers found the top control panel to be very user-friendly, with an auto mode that uses the built-in sensor to adjust filter speed accordingly, and a handy digital display on the top that gives you real-time information on air quality levels.

The drawback of the 3000i Connected is both its size – at 64cm tall and weighing 9kg it's a unit that isn't particularly portable, although thanks to its air cleaning capacity, we suppose it doesn't need to be, and it's stylish enough that it won't be an eyesore left out on display – and the price. This unit is an investment, but you do get powerful performance for your investment.

Our Smart Home Editor Caroline certainly found that it made quick work of purifying the air within her flat, 'The Philips Series 3000i Connected air purifier never turned red (to indicate pollutants) for more than a few seconds or minutes at a time, proving that it makes quick work of any airborne nasties'.

Our full Philips AC3033/30 Air Purifier Series 3000i review has more detail.

Wi-Fi compatible

The Meaco MeacoClean CA-HEPA 76x5 air purifier is a really great all-rounder which, despite not topping the other appliances on this list in areas like CADR, power consumption or quiet operation, performed solidly in our tests. 

While trialling this purifier, our reviewer Millie found it very simple to set up and use and quiet to run throughout the process. It helped to alleviate allergy symptoms after use, and it was satisfying to watch the numerical reading on this air purifier drop as the air got cleaner. 

The MeacoClean also offers Smart technology with an App you can download to operate the unit and monitor air quality on your phone, although you won't be able to integrate it with your Alexa, Google or HomeKit. 

It wins on a few practical points too, with a useful foldaway handle and a minimalistic control panel that isn't a headache to get working.

Our full MeacoClean CA-HEPA 76x5 WiFi Air Purifier review has more detail.

Good all-rounder

The Beko ATP6100I Air Purifier is a no-nonsense air purifier that's very straightforward to use. During testing, the feature that stood out most is the auto adjust, which automatically brings the power level up or down depending on the air quality reading in the room at that moment.

Named the 'Beko HygieneShield', this air purifier works to filter out the nasties in a room (up to 24m² large) with a system that contains a pre-filter, a HEPA 13 filter and a carbon filter. These combined filters banish dust, hair, pollen, and unwanted smells.

The area size isn't the most impressive out there, but the CADR (clean air delivery rate) of 204 m3/hr is a serious strong point with this air purifier. The interface is similarly pleasing and uses colours to indicate how clean the air is at any moment. If you set your air purifier to auto, then after an initial spurt of louder cleaning, then this model also works very quietly in the background, making this air purifier very easy to live with.

Best multifunctional air purifier

The Dyson Purifier Humidify+Cool HP09 Formaldehyde is Dyson's first purifying humidifying fan. And, as the name suggests, it also combats formaldehyde. As Dyson explains, 'formaldehyde is a polluting gas formed of carbon, hydrogen and oxygen that is commonly found in homes. Common sources of formaldehyde could be paint and varnishes, air fresheners, mattresses, furniture, household cleaners, carpets, particleboard and plywood, electronics, dryer sheets, nail polish remover, moth balls, toys, fireplaces and wood burning stoves'. Formaldehyde can be an irritant to those who are sensitive to it, just like dust, pollen, and other VOCs.

The Dyson Purifier Humidify+Cool Formaldehyde's ability to filter out formaldehyde is what sets it apart from the (slightly) cheaper Dyson Purifier Humidify+Cool Autoreact. Although both will set you back over £600. Ouch. 

So is the Dyson Purifier Humidify+Cool HP09 Formaldehyde worth it? If you have the cash to invest, then our hay-fever suffering reviewer certainly thought so. She tested this air purifier through pollen season, and reported a massive improvement in her symptoms. In fact, running the Formaldehyde did such an effective job at purifying out any pollen from the air within her home, that she regularly forgot to take her hayfever medication until she stepped outside the house and began to suffer once more.

And, although she considers herself App-averse, she also appreciated the Formaldehyde's Smart capabilities, particularly the insights on air quality that are available when you pair the appliance with a Smart device like a phone or tablet. The Formaldehyde doesn't have on-board controls, but if you're not an App fan then there's a remote that you can use to control the appliance. That said, our reviewer did note that setting up and using the App was the easiest experience she's had when using a Smart appliance, so you might want to give it a go and see.

The Formaldehyde has an auto mode, so you can simply leave it running and it will automatically adjust its own settings to maintain optimum air quality levels, plus a night mode that reduces the noise volume and dims the display for an undisturbed nights sleep. 

Beyond its impressive air purifying powers, it also offers a fan function and humidifying abilities. The UK's climate might make a dehumidifying function of more use than humidifying, but this extra functionality does mean the Formaldehyde offers a lot of bang for its buck and can improve your home's air quality in multiple ways, all year round. As it should for that hefty investment.

Beyond its prohibitive price tag, the Humidify+Cool Formaldehyde's main downsides are that it's big and heavy, and therefore not very portable or easy to store. However, being a Dyson product, those downsides are combatted by the Formaldehyde's stylish design. A lot of thought has been put into its sculptural form, meaning it delivers statement style as well as top-of-the-range functionality. As a consequence you likely won't be too mad at having to leave its focal-point design out on show for all to see.

Find all of the detail in our Dyson Purifier Humidify+Cool HP09 Formaldehyde review. 

Most stylish

The irony of an air purifier is that whilst they may help to remove air pollution from our personal environments, the plastics and other manmade materials used in their manufacture potentially contribute to overall environmental air pollution. briiv aims to reduce this problem by creating an air purifier with a difference. 

According to the brand, the body of the briiv air filter unit is made 'completely from bioplastics derived from Elephant Grass with a bespoke and toughened recyclable glass display zone'. This zero plastic air purifier also utilises natural filters which biodegrade when disposed of, as opposed to the more common HEPA filters which briiv says 'are made out of fibreglass and other microplastics' and can therefore contaminate the environment.

In briiv's design, the natural filters include Reindeer Lichen (the green moss-like material that takes centrestage within the briiv's glass dome design) which the brand says will extract 'PM10 sized particles like pollen and other allergens', on top of a layer of Coconut Coir which briiv says is 'taken from waste coconut product'. 'This dense mesh filtration fibre targets particles down to PM5 in size, including bacteria and mould', and a Silk Matrix Filter, which the brand says 'combines Activated Carbon bonded with a fine silk-based protein web to trap matter down to PM2.5, which includes harmful fine dust, VOC’s and large viruses'.

The natural filters are a welcome difference to most air purifiers, and it certainly creates a stylish focal point design. The overall look is more terrarium than air purifier and thanks to its USB charging point the filter can be powered by a power bank if you want to use it somewhere without an easily accessible plug – so it could easily take centrestage on a mantelpiece. 

This air filter also has Smart capabilities and can be connected to an App for remote operation. Sadly, in practice, we found the briiv's controls – both manual and App-based – a little fiddly and unresponsive.

However, our reviewer was very impressed by the briiv air filter's noise levels, finding its lowest fan setting particularly quiet. And, whilst it didn't have the power to immediately remove cooking smells from the kitchen whilst preparing food like more powerful machines, it did noticeably freshen up any room it was placed in. Although – especially considering the briiv's price point – we missed the absence of any air quality data to back up what our noses told us.

Overall, the design and zero-plastic build of the briiv air filter are highly commendable. In testing, we just found the design was a little let down by lack of ease of use, and a little less performance power than comparitive air purifiers. Plus, that high price tag makes the briiv quite the investment.

Our briiv Air Filter review has the full lowdown.

Air purifier + dehumidifier

If your home is prone to excess moisture and damp issues like mould and mildew, then although many air purifiers will help, a dehumidifier is going to be the best option for sucking excess moisture from the air. 

Thankfully you don't have to buy two separate products, with the MeacoDry Arete One dehumidifier and air purifier offering the best of both worlds. This multifunctional unit gets our vote for the best dehumidifier money can buy thanks to its generous water tank, high moisture extraction rate, easy-to-use design, and its air filtering capabilities with washable dust filter and HEPA filter.

There are 10, 12, 20 and 25 litre options available (these numbers denoting how much water can be extracted from the air per day), all offering air purifying functions on top of their dehumidifying powers.

The controls are easy to operate, with an LED display and large push buttons. The unit also has wheels, a retractable carry handle, and a cable tidy that makes it easy to move around the house and store neatly away when it's not in use. 

It is large, heavy, and perhaps not the prettiest to look at, but if you want versatility then we think this option offers a lot of bang for your buck.

Our full MeacoDry Arete One Dehumidifier & Air Purifier review has more detail.

Air purifier + humidifier

This small air purifier uses hypochlorous acid (HOCl), a naturally occurring molecule created using non-iodized salt, water, and electrolysis, to clean, deodorize, and humidify dry air.

On delivery, DH Lifelabs Aaira Mini air purifier needs the water tank filling and salt adding, but it's then ready to roll. Our reviewers found the control panel very easy to navigate, with clear labels for the power button and the three fan speeds. The unit lights up during the highest two fan speeds but is unilluminated during the ultra-quiet sleep mode. In this setting, this low-decibel air purifier delivers the quietest performance of all the air purifiers in our round-up making it a great option if you're easily disturbed by sound.

We aren't wholly sold on the air filter's looks – we found it slightly reminiscent of a goldfish tank on first appearance – but our reviewer, Jack, was particularly impressed by the purifier's impact on air humidity which helped to ease his respiratory problems, 'this air purifier definitely made a material difference in stopping my coughing fits and sinusitis. The air felt less congested and the HOCI that is dispersed gave the room an oceanic-like odour'.

Our full DH Lifelabs Aaira Mini air purifier review has more detail.

How to choose the best air purifier

It would be nice to think that we could all rely on good air quality as standard, however, with increasing levels of pollution both inside and out, many of us are turning to air purifiers to help counteract potentially harmful particulates in the air.

As biochemist and medical herbalist Dr Chris Etheridge says, ‘There’s mounting evidence that indoor pollution can pose more of a health threat than outdoor pollutants. Improving indoor air quality can be key to tackling conditions like asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD).’

But what should you be looking for when you shop for the best air purifier? To help decode the often confusing array of technical terms associated with air purifiers, we've enlisted the help of Lars Dunberger, Technology Development Manager at Blueair, a Swedish manufacturer that specialises in air quality products. First up, CADR.

Clean Air Delivery Rate (CADR)

'Clean Air Delivery Rate (CADR) is a measure of an air purifier's efficiency in cleaning the air in a particular room. CADR measures an air purifier’s effectiveness based on room space and the volume of clean air it produces per minute. This shows how well dust, pollen, and smoke, the three most common indoor air pollutants are removed from the air that you breathe', says Lars Dunberger.

'CADR is an industry-standard measure defined by the independent Association of Home Appliance Manufacturers (AHAM) in the U.S. Certified and verified by an independent laboratory, CADR provides consumers with a reliable way to compare the efficiency of different air purifiers'.

'A higher CADR rating means that the air purifier can clean the air faster, making it more efficient. An air purifier with a low CADR rating may not be as effective in removing pollutants from the air. CADR is a standardized measure that allows you to compare air purifiers of different sizes. The AHAM recommends a CADR rating of at least 2/3 of the room's area'.

Removal rate

'The amount of pollutants that the unit removes during a specified period of time is referred to as the unit’s removal rate (%). The removal rate is calculated by comparing the initial amount of pollutants with the amount of pollutants remaining after the specified period of time has passed. The higher the removal rate, the fewer particles remain', says Lars.

Filters

The more stages of filtration an air purifier offers, the better it will be at removing different-sized particles from the air. Below are the most common types to look out for.

Dust pre-filter – think of air filtration as sifting sand on a beach. You want to remove the large pebbles first with a big sieve before using a finer one. Otherwise, the fine filter gets clogged up.

HEPA filter – this catches smaller dust, pollens, other allergens, and even bacteria, which can help if you suffer from things like pet allergies or hayfever.

Electrostatic filtration – this charges small particles so that they stick more easily to the filters.

Active carbon filter – these are excellent for filtering out microscopic particles from the air, like traffic fumes, cigarette smoke, and Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs) that carry unpleasant smells. They can even remove viruses from the air.

Energy consumption and efficiency

'Naturally, air purifiers with a higher CADR, intended for use in larger areas, will have a higher power consumption than air purifiers for smaller areas. For this reason, the power consumption should always be compared to the CADR performance of the unit. A common way to compare the power consumption of different air purifiers is to look at or calculate the CADR/Watt measurement. The higher CADR/W, the better the efficiency'.

Noise levels

'Noise from air purifiers generally comes from the fan or motor and the air pressure through the filter. When specifying an air purifier’s noise level, an A-weighted decibel value, or dB(A), is commonly used. “A-weighted” means that the measurement compensates for the ear’s inability to perceive all acoustic frequencies in the same way.

However, 'It should be mentioned that the dB(A) value alone does not provide enough information in order to determine how “noisy” an air purifier is', says Lars, 'the characteristics of noise, tone and how the individual subjectively perceives the noise also weigh in'.

If you're sensitive to noise then look for the model with the lowest dB rating. Most air purifiers also offer different settings, with some offering a quieter night-time mode. Others offer an auto-mode that remains quiet unless pollution levels rise and it needs to scrub the air more, rather than the appliance running continuously.

Air purifier deals

Although there are affordable air purifiers to be found, investing in one of the best air purifiers on the market doesn't usually come cheap.

The best way to save money on improving indoor air quality is to shop when air purifier deals are in full swing. The biggest discounts are often found during a few key times of the year, in particular during Black Friday and Cyber Monday air purifier deals at the end of November.

Amazon Prime Day air purifier deals – which based on last year tend to fall in July and October – are also another opportunity to save money, usually offering discounts on air purifier brands with Amazon storefronts, such as Blueair and Levoit.

FAQs

How we tested the best air purifiers

You'll find full details of the Ideal Home review process on our how we test page.

Our team of reviewers tested a host of the best air purifiers on the market to compile this guide. We compared assembly and set-up, ease of use, CADR (Clean Air Delivery Rate), removal rate, filtration efficiency, energy consumption, and noise levels.

If there are any products we haven't managed to test in person, or the product didn't achieve over 4 out of 5 stars, then they won't have an Ideal Home Approved badge. However, you can rest assured we've done thorough research on their technical specifications and read multiple happy – and not-so-happy – customer reviews to narrow down our suggestions to only the best-in-class.