We will spend more than half of our time staying at home. This period is far longer than the time we spend outside. We may think that: the air at home must be cleaner than the air outside. However, on the contrary , researches have shown that the air at home are five times more polluted than the air outside. 

That’s why nowadays different kinds of household products about air quality are very popular. We can found unaccountable type of products about air quality, which kind of product is the one we need? It’s easy to confuse about the Air purifier and humidifier. What’s the different between them, and how they can do.

Don’t worry. This article’s topic is Air purifier vs humidifier, we will share some information about `these two kinds of products and help you understand the different between them and choose the proper one according to your demand.

The functions of air purifiers we can find in the market are different because the brands and prices are various. Different companies apply different technology in their products.

In general, there are some manual functions that all the air purifiers will have.

You can read our previous article about the benefit of air purifier:

Overall Guidance of Air Purifier ：Benefits of Air Purifier

Eliminate particles including dust, sand, dander, pollen, and others, which can then cause allergic diseases, eye diseases, and skin diseases.

Microorganisms can have a bad influence on our body. Take mites and aphids as examples. Mites can lead to diseases of our skin. Aphids and other harmful bacteria can cause respiratory organ diseases.

influenza virus, mold, bacteria contained in air condition units can cause high fever, diarrhea, pneumonia, and other diseases.

Vehicles, industry, cigarettes are the main causes of headaches, soreness, dizziness, and other disorders to people.

formaldehyde, benzene, ammonia, sulfur, carbon monoxide and other harmful chemicals can lead to cancers if living in an environment with chemical substances for a long time.

Although the types and functions of air purifiers in the market are different. Tracing back to the root, we can find mainly three kinds of air purifiers according to the working principle: Basic and HEPA Filters, activated purification class (without filter), and air purifier with passive and active purification.

The main principle of this type of air purifier is that the air is pumped into the machine by the fan, and filtered through the built-in filter. In such doing, dust, odor, toxic gas and bacteria can be got rid of.

Filters are divided into dust collection filters, formaldehyde filters, deodorization filters, HEPA filters, etc... Among them, HEPA is a little bit more expensive than other kinds of filters. 

But more money you pay for it can bring you greater efficiency in filtering particles. Other than that, HEPA can decompose toxic gases and sterilization. Air purification with a filter needs us to clean or replace its filter regularly. Otherwise, you may need to face the secondary pollution caused by the harmful substance absorbed by the HEPA filter.

The quality of the fan and filter of these products determines the efficiency of air purification, the location of the machine and the layout of the room will also make a difference to the purification.

The greatest difference between the Basic air purifier and activated purifier is that the activated air purifier has no restrictions on fans and filters. 

Activated purifiers do not passively wait for the indoor air to be pumped into the purifier for filtration. Besides, it can release the factor with purification and sterilization function into the air.

The fundamental difference between the principle of active air purifier and passive air purification is that the active air purifier gets rid of the restrictions of the fan and filter, not passively waiting for the indoor air to be pumped into the purifier for filtration and purification, but effectively and actively releasing the purification and sterilization factor into the air. 

For the characteristics of the air, the factors will be diffused to reach all corners of the room, achieving 100% purification.

At present, the main technologies of purification and sterilization factors on the market include silver ion technology, negative ion technology, low-temperature plasma technology, photocatalyst technology, and plasma cluster ion technology.

The Humidifier can turn the water into the mist and spread them into the air, increasing the air humidity.

In addition to being used to raise the humidity level in a room for human comfort, humidifiers have several proven benefits.
Suppress flu and another virus
Prevents dryness of the nose and throat
Prevents dust and other house dust from spreading
Prevents static electricity generation

Following the improvement of people's living standards, air conditioning is widely used, leading to low air humidity, which can cause air conditioning diseases such as skin tightness, dry lips, and tongue, cough, and wind. Therefore, it is not too much to say that the humidifier is the majority of households necessary appliances

The principle of a cold evaporative humidifier is that let the water-soaked cartridge and power the wind wheel to vaporize the water in the cartridge.

This humidifier has two major advantages.

Because of the internal cartridge, this kind of humidifier can remove the calcium and magnesium ions in the water and various impurities, unlike the ultrasonic humidifier will bring the impurities in the water to the air, and even leave "white powder" on the surface of the furniture. For people with respiratory sensitivities, there is almost no risk. This is also the closest way to natural evaporation humidification.

Even humidification. The evaporative humidifier can provide relatively uniform diffusion to the whole room.
At the same time, because the evaporative humidifier does not use heating. Electricity is used only for fan operation, so it is relatively power-saving.

Cold evaporative humidifiers also have two major disadvantages.

Humidification air volume is usually relatively small. That’s why it often has a more limited effect when humidifying large spacious rooms.

Due to the presence of filters, it will be more prone to breed bacteria than several other types of humidifiers, and there is a potential risk of spreading into the air. Therefore, it is highly recommended that they should be cleaned or even disinfected once a week. Besides, if you choose this type of humidifier, we recommend using tap water, the residual chlorine in the water can play a role in inhibiting germs.

An ultrasonic humidifier is a system that makes particles of water and blows them into the air by ultrasonic vibration. It has a simple structure, mainly consisting of a water tank and a vibrating device, with very low cost and low power consumption.

The disadvantages of ultrasonic humidifiers are also very obvious.

First of all, the ultrasonic wave will diffuse the mineral content of the water into the air through vibration. The room furniture floor is easy to attach a layer of white powder. And the human body will also breathe these substances into the respiratory tract, although not harmful, if there are sensitive people at home, there are certain hidden dangers;

Second, indoor humidification is not even enough. As the ultrasonic-generated water mist particles are relatively large, the fan within the machine is difficult to spread to a farther distance.

Finally, and most importantly. During the cleaning of the humidifier, Many people will find a layer of slippery substance in the water tank that is the so-called bacterial film layer. If you do not clean the machine timely. It’s likely to cause the breeding of the bacteria. If the bacteria spread into the air, it can cause pneumonia.

As the name implies, a Warm mist humidifier humidifies the air through the electric heating. It is also commonly known as "boiling water humidification".

Among all these types of humidifiers, a warm mist humidifier is the one that is fastest and cleanest.

Since the electric heating device heats water to boiling and turns it into steam, the humidifier has been cleaned at the same time.

Compared with the ultrasonic humidifier, the Warm mist humidifier will not spread impurities into the air, there is no "white powder" potential.

Because the steam humidifier has an electric heating device, the power consumption is relatively large.

All the purchases must be based on personal demand. Both Air purifiers and humidifiers are used for the improvement of air quality. But they have their limitation respectively.

If there are people who are sensitive about the floating substance, it would be better for you to avoid the cool mist humidifier. The mineral in the water will turn into a white powder, spreading into the air. Of course, you can use pure water to take place of the tap water, such doing cost you more
money.

Unless you can make sure to clean the humidifier regularly. Otherwise, we advise you not to choose the humidifier.

Ultrasonic humidifiers do not need to heat the water. That means that the water tank is a breeding ground for the bacteria. As we mentioned above, such a condition can cause pneumonia, especially in the place where newborns and the elderly life.

This problem is also found in the evaporative humidifier. The filter screen makes this kind of humidifier more suitable for bacterial breeding than other types. This means that you need to clean the machine at least once a week.

Finally, If there is arthritis at your home, you should be careful. High humidity would cause more serious pain to arthritis just like the rainy weather.

When it comes to the air purifier, there are no that many potential risks to our health. There is only one point we need to pay attention to Cleaning the output of the air purifier. You have better clean the output every half a month regularly. In such doing, the service life of the device can be extended. Also, you can save more money on maintenance.

Through this article, we introduced both humidifiers and air purifiers and different types of each machine. 

Other than that, we listed some conditions that you may face, helping you to choose the device which would no bring you potential health problems.

If you have other questions, please feel free to contact us through E-mail, we will reply as soon as possible.
Thanks for your reading.