The Dyson Air Purifier at Costco {Hot + Cool HP04} is Not as Good as Expected

The HP04 Dyson Pure Hot + Cool air purifier is being sold at my local Costco.  The Dyson is one of multiple air purifiers available in the warehouse and it costs three times more than the least expensive option.

I was curious why the Dyson was so expensive and what performance upgrades it offered over cheaper models so I dug into the details, specifications and customer reviews.

After doing all of the research, my takeaway is that you get more style than performance with the Dyson and it is not a product that I would ever buy.

Key Features

There is a lot going on with the Dyson so let’s take a look at the most important functions.

• Air Purifier
• Cooling Fan
• Warming Heater

The unit can be controlled either from the remote control, through the Dyson Link app on your smartphone or by voice when connected to an Alexa.

The unit can oscillate up to 350 degrees and has 10 speed settings for the fan.  The physical dimensions of the product are 8 x 8 x 30 inches and it has a weight of 12.5 pounds.  The Dyson is covered by a two year warranty.

The unit has a front panel display that you can toggle through to see real time updates of various pollutants such as particulates, VOCs and nitrous oxides.

Performance

I want to buy an air purifier for my house so this is the most important feature for me, especially at this price point.  My initial thoughts were, “This is a Dyson so it must have amazing performance.”  It turns out that my initial thoughts were very, very wrong.

I found some sales literature for this unit that said, “We design our purifying heater + fans to go beyond test chamber conditions and focus on real home conditions…”

What they mean by “go beyond test chamber conditions” is that they do not consider the industry standards to be that important and so their units are not designed to exceed industry standards for air purification.

What they mean by “focus on real home conditions” is that they will clean the air in your home “well enough” and provide other features such as a fan and heater to keep you comfortable.

These points are demonstrated in the video below from the Canadian news outlet CBC.  The news outlet demonstrated that a simple, homemade air purifier cleaned air better than the Dyson.  When the CBC interviewed a Dyson engineer he basically confirms the results and essentially says that Dyson does not focus on industry standards but more on the home user experience.

What is a CADR?

The metric that the CBC cares about, and the Dyson does poorly on, is the CADR.  The acronym CADR stands for “Clean Air Delivery Rate” and is a measure of how fast an air purifier cleans the air in a room.  The higher the CADR the faster an air purifier cleans the air.

The CADR is measured against three contaminants; Smoke, Dust, Pollen. It is extremely useful figure to know the CADR of an air purifier as it is a guide for how effective it will be in different sized rooms.

The independent third party (AHAM) that maintains the CADR standard says that, in general, you want a purifier with a CADR value that is at least two thirds the area of a room.  That is, if you have a room that has an area of 120 square feet then you want an air purifier with a CADR value of at least 80.

This is similar issue as found with the Shark Air Purifier 4.

The problem with the Dyson is that the CADR is extremely low and is not even disclosed on any of the packaging, company literature, etc.

Dyson has repeatedly said that this industry standard is irrelevant but here is an excellent article detailing the flaws in Dyson’s logic.

The Dyson Does Purify Air

Putting the debate aside about whether how fast a unit cleans the air is important or not, the Dyson does come with both a HEPA and charcoal filter that are highly effective at removing particulates and organic compounds from the air.

What surprised me about the unit was that it does not contain a UV bulb to help eliminate airborne viruses like you get with the much cheaper Homedics air purifier at Costco.

Cooling Ability

Another selling point for the Dyson is that is a bladeless fan with “Air Multiplier Technology” to keep you cool.  So, basically it is a super high tech fan.

But is it any good?

Well, apparently the Dyson works well as a fan but does is not as good as a $15 fan from Walmart.  The Dyson is louder than the cheap fan and moves less air.  You can watch the video demonstration below.

Is it a Good Warming Heater?

You can set the Dyson to maintain any temperature you desire up to about 98F and it will warm the room to that temperature and then maintain the target temperature.

Everything I have read and watched about this unit indicates that it is an exceptional heater.

The one complaint about the heater I consistently saw was that you can only adjust the temperature with the remote and not the Dyson Link app.  This is not a flaw in design as current safety standards do not permit portable heaters to be controlled by apps.

Costco Value

The Dyson Pure Hot + Cool HP04 has a base price of $549 at Costco.

Home Depot has the same model listed on their website for $649.

This means you will save $100 (15%) when you buy the Dyson at Costco instead of Home Depot.

Personally, I am going to skip the Dyson and will probably buy the much less expensive Winix AM80 instead.