Ikea Sensible Air Purifier: CADR, Price, Release Date

It was only a matter of time. I have covered air purifiers for WIRED for a long time, and Ikea’s absence in the market was becoming more and more noticeable. The brand’s lag was particularly felt last year, when the air purifier market exploded into wildfire and coronavirus hell. Suddenly everyone wanted cleaner air inside.

As the saying goes: better late than never. The Ikea Förnuftig is on sale in the US today (the overseas market got it earlier this year), and no, although it has a funny name and we are today April 1, it’s no April Fool’s joke. The Förnuftig costs $ 55 and you can choose your case color, as long as you choose black or white. The woven grid on both models is gray. The fabric swaddle design of the Förnuftig is reminiscent of other smart home products from Ikea, like the 2019 Sonos Symfonisk speakers.

Most air purifiers look pretty obnoxious – like the kind of weird plastic machine you’ll find in the school gym’s storage room when skipping class. But the Förnuftig looks neat, and since it’s about 12 by 18 inches, it doesn’t take up much space. It’s very thin at 4.5 inches deep, and if you want you can ditch the floor stand and mount it horizontally or vertically on a wall. Very few other air purifiers can be mounted on a wall.

The Förnuftig has a Clean Air Flow (CADR) of 130 cubic meters per hour, which makes it what I call a ‘room air purifier’. CADR is an industry standard measure of how efficiently a device can filter the air in a room in one hour. Without getting bored with the details, this rating means that the Förnuftig is a good choice for small rooms like bedrooms or small home offices. If you are buying a device for a larger room, I suggest choosing one of the larger living room air purifiers from our guide to air purifiers.