Is your house too dry? In the North, winter weather is very dry outside as well as heated houses on the inside. In warmer areas, air conditioning can dry out a house or apartment.
Of course, those living in desert environments tout the benefits of dry air (it’s not the heat it’s the humidity!) but humidity below 30 percent can be harmful to health and the building. Dry itchy skin is one harmful result, another is breathing problems.
Frequent sore throats and/or bloody noses may indicate that the air in your home is too dry. Increased instances of static shocks, as well as issues with splitting wooden floorboards/furniture and chipping paint may also be the result of very dry air.
I picked up this LEVOIT Humidifiers for Bedroom Large Room Home, Smart Wifi Alexa Control, 6L Top Fill Cool Mist for Baby and Plants, Essential Oil Diffuser, Customized Humidity, Night Light, Timer, Ultra Quiet, Gray after having great success with a pair of their air filters.
This humidifier has a nice large reservoir and great smart features such as a humidity read-out, automatic monitoring of the humidity and a control app for your phone.
When we first hooked it up we could actually see the air conditioning suck the humidity out of the room and then the humidifier kick in to keep the humidity up to a more comfortable level.
The Levoit humidifier above provides cool mist only. If you want an option of warm or cool mist, choose the one below. It doesn’t have the “smart” feature but it does have a remote control. In actual practice, most will simply turn on the automatic humidity level setting and leave it running all season as long at extra humidity is needed.
With the smart humidity sensor, Auto Mode adjusts mist levels to keep your room feeling comfortable. You can also customize your ideal humidity percentage. If the water tank runs out, the humidifier will automatically shut off. These humidifiers are filterless so there is no filter to purchase.
Warm mist humidifiers are better for reducing bacteria and germs, and can achieve higher levels of moisture saturation. They can also be used with some medicated products for improved cough relief.
Since warm mist humidifiers operate without an internal fan, they tend to be quieter than their cool mist counterparts. On the down side, warm mist humidifiers might require more energy.
Good housekeeping