Airmega 400S Clean Smart Air

The Airmega 400S  is a luxury air filter, a sci-fi lounge monolith with touch-sensitive controls and a ring of colored light that turns with the air quality. High-end in fit, finish and capacity, it’s also very online, with Internet-of-Things features and a stat-tracking app. Its $600 only, yay.

The Great

• Excellent room coverage – perfect choice for larger spaces
• Great coverage also for asthma and allergy sufferers, who need extra air changes per hour
• HEPA filter technology for maximum particle removal
• Carbon filter removes 99% of harmful VOCs from the indoor air
• Real-Time Pollution Sensor – LED colored ring makes it very easy to identify air quality offenders at a quick glance

The Not

• Issues reported with WiFi connectivity – sometimes difficult to pair up
• No castors, so there may be mobility issues for some people
• Limited choice of colors and no customization options

The Conclusion

The Airmega 400S can keep the air clean in up to a whopping 1,560 square feet of living space, so it’s well worth its considerable price tag. The device has a built-in real-time air-quality sensor, as well as a sophisticated dual-filter setup that allows it to keep both particles and odors at bay. You can control the air purifier via a sleek smartphone app or Amazon Alexa. The Airmega 400S is available in graphite or white.

First Off How Well Will It Work

Setting up this side-table-sized (23 x 15 x 15 inches) air purifier takes a total of 10 minutes and mostly involves peeling off a bunch of protective plastic and removing the wrapping from the unit’s two Max2 filters. Because this model also has wireless capabilities, it has a dedicated app that lets you set up air purifying schedules, check the air quality outside, and control the Airmega while you’re away from home. As with other connected smart home devices, this part of the setup process involves downloading following a handful of on-screen instructions in the app to connect the 400S to your Wi-Fi network.

While we didn’t have a fancy lab or equipment that could accurately measure particulate or VOC levels, I did subject the 400S to as many real world tests as we could dream up. We cooked, we lit candles and matches, we even emptied the contents of dirt and dust-filled Roomba near the air purifier. As the doting owners of a 110-pound, perpetually shedding golden retriever named Benjamin-Mattdamon Affleck, I also subjected the Airmega to the dander wonderland that is our home.

Results, terrific. It would pass any EPA clean air test if the EPA was still around. It’s dead quiet, too, especially at the lowest settings. There is not the slightest buzz of vibration. Washing and replacing filters is very easy. It messages you when they need a bath.  It’s about the size of a desktop mini-fridge, significantly larger than most consumer air filters, with three HEPA filters and the promise of full-house coverage. 1,560 square feet, they claim, which would make it competitive on a price-per-square-foot basis with less expensive models.

What Makes This So Smart

The Airmega 400s features 3 such ‘smart’ modes – auto, eco and sleep.  Let’s take a look at each.

Smart Auto Mode

If you decide to engage the auto mode feature the unit uses a sensor to detect how much pollutants are in your indoor air and then adjusts the fan speed accordingly.There are 4 fan speed settings on the Airmega 400s – sleep, low, medium and high. As a rule of thumb, the more pollutants are detected, the faster the fan will operate.When the sensor recognises that the indoor air quality has improved it will switch back down to a lower fan speed.

Smart Eco Mode

If the unit is in smart mode and the sensor has detected good air quality for a period of 10 minutes, the machine will automatically shut down the fan.This helps to save on your energy consumption, and in turn saves you money on your electricity bills, as it means you’re not running the air purifier when it’s not necessary.The fans will automatically start back up again should the sensor detect any pollution later.

Smart Sleep Mode

In sleep mode the unit will reduce its noise and power consumption if the sensor detects the room has been dark and the air clean for a period of 3 minutes. Like the eco mode, this feature is good both for the environment and your bank balance! It’s also handy if you plan to use the air purifier in your bedroom at night as it helps to minimise disturbance and let’s you get a better nights sleep.

In recognition of the fact that so many of us like to use our phones for day-to-day tasks, Coway have developed a smartphone app (IOS and Android) which lets owners of the Airmega 400s control many aspects of their air purifier remotely.For example, you can set the fan speed and sleep timer, see the status of the filters, and access the different smart mode controls.

You can also receive indoor air quality reports and real-time updates on outdoor air quality and pollution levels for your particular hometown straight to your phone . This lets you track the health of the air inside a room over a period of a few days or weeks, and is useful for identifying trends and the times when the air quality is at its best and worst. The Airmega 400s air purifier can also be paired with Amazon Alexa

The Final Thought

I’m extremely dubious about the utility and wisdom of an IoT air filter. But if you know you need an air filter, and you need one that’s attractive, quiet and very high-capacity, where a $300 Honeywell (or HEPA filters duct-taped to a box fan) would just be unacceptably loud, trashy or ugly, then I have and air purifier Id like to show you. I will say that in testing this for a review it is one of the few products I reviewed myself into buying. What? I like clean air and smart toys.