Humidifier Buying Guide

Tabletop and console (floor model) humidifiers are categorized as warm mist, cool mist, or dual mist (capable of producing both). In our ratings, they range in price from a little under $20 to $800.

Consumer Reports doesn’t test whole-house humidifiers at this time. “If your home is heated by a forced-air system, though, it is an excellent option,” says Misha Kollontai, who leads humidifier testing at CR. Whole-house units are plumbed into your water supply and send humidified air into the ducts from your furnace. They usually require professional installation.

“These systems are designed so that all of the heated air blown throughout the home has a comfortable humidity,” Kollontai says. “They require maintenance much less often than portable units.”

To determine the humidifier size you need, first measure the square footage of the room where it will be used. The humidifiers in our ratings are organized by the room size or area they’re intended for, from personal humidifiers that can humidify up to 25 square feet to consoles for 1,000 square feet or more. 

For small and midsized rooms, tabletop humidifiers are the least expensive option, but their small tanks require frequent refills. For large spaces, console models are best because they generate lots of moist air. They also have larger water tanks, so they need fewer refills. But because of their size and weight when they’re full, they can be awkward to maneuver.

Think about where it will go. You may be tempted to sidestep the legwork of figuring out the right humidifier for your room size and simply get the biggest humidifier available. Please resist that temptation. If you get a humidifier that’s too big for a room, you’ll wind up with too much moisture in the air, and that can breed dust mites and mold, and trigger allergic reactions to them, according to the Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America. Get the humidifier with the moisture output for what you need.

Ease of use matters, too. Whether it’s a tabletop model or a floor model, you want a humidifier that’s easy to move. With evaporative humidifiers, make sure the wick is simple—and economical—to replace. How often you have to replace it varies by model and how much you run the humidifier. Look for user-friendly controls and clearly visible displays of the humidity level and settings. You can see how user-friendly the humidifiers in our tests are by checking a model’s convenience rating.

A humidistat helps. Almost half of the humidifiers in our ratings, mostly models meant for larger rooms, have a humidistat that shuts off the unit when it reaches a set humidity level. We note which models have a humidistat in the full view of our ratings, as well as how accurate those humidistats are. If your humidifier doesn’t have a humidistat, buy an inexpensive digital hygrometer to monitor your room’s humidity levels; prices start under $10.

Consider how much cleaning is required. Some humidifiers are easier to clean than others, so check the convenience score for each model in our humidifier ratings to see what you’re willing to live with when choosing a model. In most cases, you’ll need to drain, rinse, and dry the humidifier daily; follow the manufacturer’s instructions for routine cleaning.

“If a humidifier isn’t properly cleaned, microorganisms can grow in the tank, become airborne, and possibly be the cause of respiratory problems,” says Ashita Kapoor, associate director of product safety at CR. Always clean your humidifier before its first use and at the start of the humidifier season as well, Kapoor recommends.

In Consumer Reports’ humidifier lab, we evaluate models on six criteria: moisture output, convenience, noise, energy efficiency, humidistat accuracy, and hard-water output.

Our moisture output tests are conducted in a chamber set to 70° F and 30 percent relative humidity, an industry standard for testing humidifiers. Manufacturers typically claim that their humidifiers are intended for a specific room size or area, so we measure a humidifier’s moisture output and calculate how well it does in the specified area.

We also gauge how convenient a humidifier is to use. Our testers assess how easy it is to set up and operate, as well as how easy it is to clean, which is important because you’ll need to empty the tank daily and clean the humidifier regularly to prevent bacteria from developing. We measure the sound (in decibels) that a humidifier generates when it’s running at its highest speed. Some are louder than others, and if you use a humidifier in your bedroom, you’ll want to steer clear of noisy models that could disturb your sleep.

Testers calculate the amount of energy each model uses to emit a gallon of water into the air. Our humidistat accuracy test measures how well each humidifier reaches and maintains a set humidity level.

Finally, we test a humidifier’s moisture output when hard water is used. We conduct this test because the dissolved minerals in hard water can clog the humidifier, which decreases its moisture output.