TechRadar Verdict
Pros
- +
Very effective
- +
Intuitive app
- +
Highly customizable
- +
Alexa supported
Cons
- -
Expensive
- -
Not easy to move around
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Topics such as air quality, the spread of bacteria and respiratory health have become pillars of our conversations these days. However, we somehow manage to miss looking after our homes in these very aspects. With a lot more of our time being spent indoors for the foreseeable future, indoor air quality deserves more attention. The new Dyson Pure Humidify+Cool aims to solve all of these problems at once — purify the air, increase the humidity levels and cool the room.
Dyson has somewhat of a reputation as being the Apple of personal appliances, offering high-end engineering marvels that address the daily needs of users. If you live around any city in India, you probably already know the sad state of how bad the pollution levels can get during this time of the year. It’s also an established fact at this point that the indoors are not much better either. Thankfully, you can at least control that.
Air purifiers have pretty much become an essential appliance to have at home in this age. If your budget permits, the Dyson Pure Humidify+Cool is perhaps the most versatile solution one can own. Its air purification capabilities are unmatched, is well-designed to be a part of any home, has the power to circulate air through an entire room and also maintain humidity levels. Yes, it is expensive; but it will last you for a while and brings features that are only going to get more important with time.
Price in India
Launched during the festive reason, the Dyson Pure Humidify+Cool price in India is Rs 55,900. That is on par with the other offerings such as the Pure Hot+Cool, if your preferences lie with heating options during the winter months.
Design
As with every other air purifier from the company, the Dyson Pure Humidify+Cool’s design will stand out, irrespective of where you place it. If your decor is particularly minimal, it might even seem a little too futuristic for a product that is “just an air purifier”.
It has three distinct sections, with the top half being the iconic loop with outlets for the airflow. Unlike previous models, it’s just the flaps of the openings that move this time instead of the entire base for more efficient operating. The top of the loop is magnetic and can be used to attach the remote.
Next up is the actual air filtration unit. The outer shell is a perforated metal sheet that wraps around the inner filters. Pushing the buttons on the sides pops it open, revealing the HEPA filters and the inner evaporator. This implementation makes the unit very easy to clean or replace when the time comes.
At the bottom is the large water storage tank from where the water is evaporated into vapour and spread across the room. It’s easy to remove via a similar dual eject button mechanism to refill it with water. The weight distribution is such that even when completely filled, the slightly offset handlebar balance the gallon tank without tipping. It’s all very intuitive and well-thought-out and can be figured out without going through the instructions.
When combined, we get a pretty well-built kit of engineering that looks iconic. Though, it also gets fairly heavy, tipping the scales at over 8kgs, making it difficult to lug around from one corner of the room to other. I placed it on a stand with wheels to make the job easier.
Experience
While the name and construction clearly highlight the three core functions of the machine, everything works together seamlessly on the Dyson Pure Humidify+Cool.
A common question that was asked was “what is the need for a humidifier? Aren’t dehumidifiers supposed to be better?” Indoor air humidity levels are almost always lower than the outdoors. This actually creates an environment where viruses can thrive and multiply - definitely something we’d all want to avoid this year (It won’t help against Covid-19, in case you’re wondering). Even a small change in the amount of moisture has a big impact on the overall capability of viruses to spread.
Furthermore, winters in many parts of India also bring an onslaught of extremely dry weather. Think about all those mornings when your skin felt itchy and your lips chapped. Those are byproducts of low moisture as well. Having a humidifier in such times will also help avoid those to an extent. I used mine every night while sleeping and sporadically throughout the day, and the differences were actually discernible.
It takes the water from the attached tank, runs it through ultraviolet light to kill the bacteria, softens the water and then sends it to the evaporate to dissipate the moisture. You don’t really have to worry about all of this for the most part.
When the humidifier function is on, the air also inherently gets a little cooler. It won’t replace your AC or even a nifty little table fan, but for those who do not need a lot of wind blowing onto them, it should suffice. The direct stream of air will not be felt beyond a certain distance, but the lower temperatures will.
Last but not least, the Dyson Pure Humidify+Cool is also a very capable air purifier. It uses a combination of HEPA and carbon filters to capture particles and gases and circulates clean air throughout the room. The efficiency is claimed to be around 99.97% for matter as small as 0.3 microns, which is about as good as a household purifier can achieve.
Of course, there’s no easy way to verify these claims, but the machine does have a display which shows these stats in real-time, and cycles between the AQI, fan speed, humidity target, as well as concentrations of PM2.5, PM10, VOC and NO2.
Everything else
The Dyson Link app is one of the best-designed and most intuitive apps I’ve seen.
The air quality readings seemed pretty accurate and responsive, being able to register changes in the environment within seconds. Bringing a lit cigarette or incense stick will quickly show a spike. All of these metrics can also be viewed in the Dyson app, along with detailed guides on what each mode does, best practices, and vital stats such as the health of the filters. It can also be used to remotely control the machine, set timers or even targets.
Dyson also talks about how conventional air purifier effectiveness metrics such as a CADR (clean air delivery rate) test show little resemblance to real-world efficacy. Instead, it proposes a POLAR test which takes into consideration how big most rooms are today, what sort of environment it will be within and where the purifier will be placed.
All of this does seem to translate to a more superior experience, as the Dyson Pure Humidify+Cool can easily take care of even large rooms’ pollution levels with ease - be it the fumes during cooking or the smell of burning leaves coming from the window, it can handle it all! Just want the clean air without the cold breeze? There’s an option for that too where the air is diffused behind through the back of the machine. Every tiny detail seems to be thought out.
It’s also pretty easy to clean and maintain. Every few weeks, you’ll have to conduct a deep cleanse of the evaporator, steps for which will be mentioned in the app when the time comes. It basically involves adding some citric acid to the water tank and then letting it do its thing for about an hour, after which you’ll be good to go. In my month and a half of usage, I am yet to be notified about a filter cleanse, but your mileage may vary based on the intensity of usage and the hardness of the water.
Verdict
The Dyson Pure Humidify+Cool is undoubtedly a premium product at Rs 55,900. However, considering everything it offers at once, spanning cleaner air, better hygiene, an easy-to-use product, cooling, a smart app, and some of the most advanced technologies, the price starts making sense. Accounting for the fact that getting individual products for all of these functions would anyway put you in the same ballpark, and the deal gets sweeter. Dyson also offers a two-year warranty with all purchases, free virtual demos and troubleshooting and great after-sales support too, rounding everything up.
