The sad reality of our everyday lives is that our air isn't as good as it should be. Too many people have trouble breathing in their own homes due to the pollutants that get stuck in the air.
Whether you are a college student stuck in a room with little ventilation, in a city full of pollution, or live in a home with a lot of allergens, the air we have around us can be difficult to breathe in.
That's why air filters are so great. They improve the quality of air by removing all of the toxins. However, in order to continue having great air, you must be consistent with your air filter.
How Air Filters Work
Whether your air filter is built into your home's ventilation system or in your air purifier, they all work on the same science. These tools are meant to remove pollutants, toxic gas, germs, and airborne microorganisms from the air in your home.
By large particles, we mean anything that can fly through the air and end up causing harm to your lungs such as dust particles and pollen. Anything that makes it difficult to breathe is counted as unwanted particles and toxins.
What Are Air Filters Made Of?
The common air filter in your home is made from fiberglass and pleated paper. These materials are then glued together with a cardboard frame. The materials of an air filter may seem limited in their abilities. However, when they are put together, they are effective in maintaining clean indoor air.
Where are Air Filters Located?
The air filter is placed next to the furnace or in the handler of your HVAC system. Sometimes, you will find the air filter of your home in a return vent. Check all these places to find where the air filter in your home is located. Once you see the pleated paper used to make the air filter, you will know it is your air filter.
If you are looking for an air filter located in a standalone air purifier, refer to the manual of the purifier to locate where the filter is. Typically, there will be a part of the air purifier that you have to screw off to access the air filter. The filters of an air purifier are typically easy to remove and change out.
How Does it Work?
When the air filter is properly installed, it will be in an area where air flows in and out. The filter paper will catch pollutants and other unwanted airborne products. With the way the filter paper is made, it catches the debris in the air and won't let go, effectively removing it from the air you are breathing.
Over time, the filter will get dusty and covered with a layer of germs and debris. A single air filter doesn't last forever and it will have to be changed at some point.
How Often Should You Change Your Air Filters
You never want to leave a dirty air filter sitting for too long. Not only will your air no longer be cleaned because the filters have no more room to latch onto debris, but it can also worsen the air. Thick layers of product on the filters can lead to bits breaking off and returning to the air. That's pretty gross.
To make sure that you always have fresh air in your home, you must change your air filters regularly. There will be many factors that influence how frequently your air filters should be changed, as different factors influence how quickly pollution is introduced into your air.
The recommended time many air filters agree on is that you should change it every 30-60 days.
If you have the average home without any pets, you can get away with changing your air filters every 90 days or 3 months.
If you have a pet, change your air filter every 60 days or 2 months.
Finally, if anyone in your home suffers from allergies, you should change the filters sooner. Consider changing it every 45 days or 1.5 months.
Living in a city or a rural area will also determine how often you need to change your air filter. Cities have so much more pollution from all the cars and lack of trees around. This requires you to be extra mindful of the indoor air quality of your home. Rural living has more trees, which filter pollutants outside, allowing fewer pollutants to enter your home.
However, if you ever notice that your air filter is getting pretty dirty sooner than your recommended replacement time, you should take that as a sign to change your air filter. It should also be a sign to evaluate the different qualities of your household that might be making your air filters need to be replaced more frequently than you have expected.
Qualities That Affect How Frequently to Change Your Air Filter
Not only will your pets and allergies affect how frequently you need to change your air filter, but so will a number of other factors. To keep your household as healthy as possible, become familiar about the factors that will affect the indoor air quality of your home.
Number of People in the House
Did you know that a large amount of pollutants and other airborne particles come from the people at home? Dust particles are made up of dead skin cells mixed with various substances, and we are constantly bringing in pollutants from the outside, ranging from allergies to dirt.
When you walk in from outside, you are bringing in pollen, dirt, dust, microorganisms, and additional particles into your house. When there are more people in the house, more of these particles are brought inside and released into the air.
The air filter has to work harder when there are several people in your household and that means it will get filled up faster, needing to be changed more frequently. For every person added to your home, expect to have to replace the air filter in your home more and more frequently.
Size of the House
If you have a small house, there is only so much living space for airborne particles to go. The air filter will better be able to take care of the pollution in the building and make it clean with less effort.
However, larger houses require more work. Because there is more living space in the home, there is more air that must be constantly cleaned. More living space means more pollution in the air which leads to the air filter getting dirtier faster.
It also means that your filter is working more often to clean all the rooms in your home. Even if you are just one person, debris can come in from outside and get trapped in your home until it goes through the filter.
When you have a larger home, be prepared to have to change the air filter more frequently. This is especially true if you only have one air filter for your entire home.
Number of Pets in the House
Once again, the number of pets in the household will change how frequently you need to change the air filter.
Pets are always dirty. If you have a dog, you know how much dirt they can bring into the home. They go outside, roll around in the grass and dirt, and then track all of that inside the home. Dogs are known for bringing dirt, pollen, plant mold, grass, leaves, and more outdoor things into your home.
Cats, while cleaner, can bring stuff into your home as well. This can happen if you have an outside cat or when you take your cat outside for whatever reason. Even just taking your cat to the vet allows pollen and other outdoor pollutants to get trapped in their fur and bring it back into your house.
Then, both cats and dogs have pet dander that can cause breathing problems as well. Pet dander is similar to dandruff in humans, but it appears on the pet's skin and fur instead. Many people are allergic to pet dander and suffer from breathing problems as a result.
With all the particles that pets bring into the home, the air filter has to work so much harder to keep the air clean. It will get full of dander, dirt, pollen, and all the other pollutants that both pets and people bring into the house at a faster rate. That's why it is recommended that if you have a pet in your house, you should replace the air filter every 2 months.
Benefits of Changing Your Filter Regularly
Don't just think that you have to change your air filter regularly because it is what's recommended. There are so many benefits to making sure that your air filter is fresh and usable for your home. Maintaining your air filter makes healthier people in a healthier home.
Reduce Allergies
This is probably one of the more obvious benefits. When you change your air filter regularly and make sure that you always have an air filter that is working properly, it will remove allergens from the air.
As the air filter takes on the pollutants of the air, it will catch all the allergens in the air. Allergens include tree and other plant molds, pollen, pet dander, and outdoor rot. Those with allergies will not have to breathe these in if they are removed from the air.
With that, you won't have to suffer from as many allergies while inside your home. You will be able to breathe more easily. It's also very helpful if you have any guests over that normally suffer from allergies as well.
Keep those allergens outside the home when you practice proper air filter care and improve the indoor air quality of your home.
Tackle Asthma Symptoms
Asthma symptoms are rough on their own. In areas with worse air, these symptoms become a lot worse. Those with asthma can have asthma attacks triggered by outdoor and indoor pollutants. When your air isn't clean, you have a lot of indoor pollutants that can easily trigger an asthma attack.
When changing your air filter regularly and frequently, you end up with better air in your home. This is a huge help to everyone who suffers from asthma.
When you have asthma, the best thing is to breathe the best air quality possible. Breathing in clean air reduces the nasty symptoms you can experience when having respitory issues. Even if you don't have asthma, keep up with changing your air filter for everyone in your life that may have a condition like asthma. You never know which guest is going to need that fresh air.
Sleep Better
A large portion of the American population does not get enough or quality sleep. We are constantly hearing about ways to get better sleep from eating better to establishing a nighttime routine. However, there is a sleep factor that is often overlooked.
Having clear air is essential to getting a good night of sleep. Let's say that you haven't changed your air filter in the recommended time and you have dust and particle build-up.
When you sleep, you might feel that you can't get a proper breath of air and you might even feel stuffy. Through the night, you will be breathing in that bad air and your lungs will have to work harder to filter out the pollutants in the air.
With that extra work, your body is spending less time refueling itself and doing its nightly repair. You will then wake up not feeling as refreshed as you wished.
However, when you do keep up with your air filter, you won't have to deal with all of this. You will be able to breathe easier at night, your body won't be straining to repair itself because it has to spend more energy on your lungs, and you will wake up more refreshed.
Purified air is practically magic for all the good that it can do for our bodies. It is only right to keep up with our air filters so we can stress less and sleep more.
Improved Mental Focus
Once again, you might not think that pure air impacts your ability to focus, but it does. We need the right levels of oxygen to go to our brains for them to function properly.
For mental focus, we need the right levels of sleep, the right food, and the right air that we are breathing in. If we were to breathe in dust particles and pollen-filled air, we won't feel as good and won't be able to think as clearly. We'll be more focused on why you don't feel right and, if your air is particularly bad, why your brain is cloudy.
Having fresh air means that we will get more oxygen to our brains and less pollution. This means we can think more clearly and be able to make more sound decisions.
Clear air also helps your brain do all the processes that it needs to do every day. It's more than just focus. Having optimal brain functions includes the ability to make decisions and to improve memory. Having fresh air in your home ensures that your brain can perform all of its functions.
Cleaner Air
This is the most obvious benefit of frequently changing out your air filter. When you have a clean air filter, you have clean air! As we have said above, if you wait too long to change your air filter, the filter won't be able to pick up anything else from your air. The pollution and dust will get stuck in the air rather than in the filter.
To improve air quality in your home, you must change the filters. With new filters, all the pollutants in your air will get trapped and give you cleaner air. You will have the proper ventilation that you need so you can breathe well.
Reduce the Need for Repairs
Are you aware that if you neglect your air filters for too long, it can damage your air conditioning system?
When you forget to change your air filter or neglect to change it, the pollution and dust will continue to build up. Over time, this build-up will fall back into the interior of the air conditioner. This can result in a variety of problems, ranging from the interior pieces of your HVAC system to system overheating. In some cases, not changing your air filter can cause an air conditioner fire.
If any of those above situations occur, you will be faced with expensive repairs to fix the damage caused to your HVAC system. Want to avoid spending a lot of money to repair your HVAC system? All you have to do is keep up with changing out your air filters.
Consequences of Not Changing Your Filter Regularly
While there are benefits to changing your air filters regularly, also remember that there are heavy consequences if you forget to do so.
Higher Energy Bills
If you don't frequently change out your air filters, you will end up having higher energy bills. When there is a heavy build-up on the filters, the HVAC system has to work harder to run. Both your furnace and your air conditioning unit will have to work a lot harder to do the same tasks.
Working harder means that more energy is being used up which will reflect itself on your next energy bill. The increase in your energy bill can vary depending on how badly built up your air filter is and how long your HVAC system has been working extra hard.
Maintain a more tolerable energy bill by keeping up with your ait filters. A new air filter is a lot less expensive than a high energy bill.
Low Air Flow
When there is build-up in your air filters, how is the air supposed to properly flow through your home? If you think of your HVAC system as a cycle, the air in your home goes in through the air filter and out through your air conditioner or your heating system. When there is a build-up of dust in the filter, a part of that cycle gets blocked.
This break in the airflow cycle leads to poor ventilation and a lack of airflow. Not only will this lead to an increase of dust and debris in your home, but it will also make breathing harder as the air will become stale and tougher to breathe.
Proper ventilation is so important to have a healthy home with clear air. Keep your airflow in its proper cycle by frequently changing your air filters.
Health Concerns
We've already discussed how changing your air filters on a regular basis improves your breathing and overall health. It is safe to assume that the opposite is true when you neglect your air filter.
Allergies
If you have allergies, expect them to get much worse if you don't change your air filters. All those allergens are going to get trapped in the air and the only place they will have to go is in your lungs. This will make breathing hard.
Asthma
What is worse is the health problems those with asthma will face if their air filters are ignored. Asthma has so many triggers and many of them relate to the air quality around the person. If you have asthma and live in a home where the air filters are past due for replacement, you are putting yourself at risk for asthma attacks.
Getting Sick
Without pure air, you can get sick as you won't be able to think clearly and sleep well. Viruses and bacteria can float through the air as well as dust and pollen. Without them being trapped and removed by air filters, they are left all around you which can make you ill.
Being sick is never fun and then you have to spend more money on doctor appointments along with getting a new air filter. Don't go down that route and just keep up with changing out your air filters.
Dirty HVAC System
If you don't clean out your air filter, you will be left with a dirty HVAC system. The dust and other pollutants will fall back further into the HVAC system which can cause it to break down over time.
Sure, you can get your HVAC system professionally cleaned, but it will cost a lot of money. Getting your HVAC system cleaned can cost up to $1000. It's not worth it when all you need to avoid it is a new air filter that costs less than $30.
Dirty HVAC systems lead to more germs getting left in the air, more allergens getting breathed in, and a dirtier home from leftover dust and dirt. Keep your lungs, home, and HVAC system clean by replacing your air filters frequently.
Don't let your entire system fail because you forgot to replace the filters. Otherwise, you will be spending lots of money on HVAC maintenance for the possible malfunctions listed later.
Unit Malfunctions
Too much dust leads to too much heat which then leads to several possible unit malfunctions. The worst malfunction you can experience is your HVAC system overheating and catching fire.
Not only is this the worst malfunction, but it's also the most dangerous and most expensive. You will have to pay a lot of money for these costly repairs, such as replacing your HVAC system and anything else that was destroyed by the fire.
Furnace Failure
Several other unit malfunctions can happen if you neglect your HVAC system for too long. First, you can have a complete furnace failure. This is when different pieces of the system break down and your furnace can't run anymore. Fixing this malfunction can cost around $4000. That's a lot of money!
Stuck Coils
Your HVAC system can also suffer from a stuck evaporator coil. This happens when there is too much dust that gets in all the crevices of the coils and prevents them from being able to move. If left for too long can also cause a system failure. The repair services for stuck coils can cost just as much as fixing a furnace failure.
Weird Sounds
Hearing strange sounds coming from your air conditioner is a good indication that something is wrong with it. A loud whirring, shaking, or rumbling indicates that something is not working properly. A part could have come loose, broken, or become so dirty that it has become stuck.
Cracked Pieces
Several pieces in your HVAC system, cooling system, and heating can be broken if the machinery isn't properly taken care of. Broken pieces usually come from the machine overheating or tools getting stuck from being coated in dust and dirt.
When something is cracked, you will typically hear rattling or other noises mentioned above. You will have to spend a lot of money to hire a professional to determine which part of the machine is broken and then replace it. You might even need to pay a professional to get the inside of your air conditioner system properly cleaned.
Breathe in Allergens, Pollutants, Toxins, etc.
Our air filters do their best to keep us healthy by removing all the allergens and toxins from the air. How can it do this if the air filters become too dirty?
Breathing in all the gross things that our air filters usually filter out can make us sick. People don't sleep well in polluted air, and their brains don't work as clearly either. Breathing in allergens and toxins doesn't do us any good at all.
That's why it's so important that we breathe clean air, and the easiest way to do so is to replace our air filters on a regular basis.
Air filters are meant to capture particles we shouldn't be breathing in. Toxins that we could be breathing in if we don't change our air filters include carbon dioxide. We know how bad that is for our bodies, so we should do everything we can to avoid breathing these pollutants, dirt, and toxins into our lungs.
Brain Fog
As we have mentioned before, without proper airflow through our bodies, our brains don't work as they should. Cloudy and dirty air leads to a cloudy mind. When we breathe in all of the toxins in the air, we are also taking in less oxygen than we should.
Without this proper amount of oxygen, our brains won't be able to think as clearly or make decisions as fast. This is called brain fog. If you have ever felt that you couldn't think clearly, this is what brain fog feels like.
Breathing in pollution, especially too much dust and carbon dioxide, leads to a heavy amount of brain fog. It is never fun to deal with because it makes doing your daily tasks more difficult. You can also face mental health struggles from too much brain fog from memory loss to even depression.
Keep your mind sharp by breathing in clean air. Keep out carbon dioxide and other poisonous gases by making sure that your home's air filters are clean and replacing them often.
Sign Up For Airzey's Air Filter Subscription Program
What can you do when you try everything to remember to change your air filters and still forget? Are you destined to experience all these negative side effects of a dirty HVAC system and dirty air? Do you have to hire someone to replace your air filters for you?
Luckily for you, Airzey wants you to have fresh air and has striven to make it easier for you to have fresh air.
What Is AirZey?
Airzey provides premium products to help you improve your indoor air quality for inspired healthy living and work productivity. Airzey wants to make replacing air filters easier for homeowners everywhere. They believe in the power of clear air for the mind and body and want to provide everyone an equal chance to have that cleanliness in their home.
Airzey works through a subscription program. The air filter subscription program allows customers to sign up to receive new air filters as soon as their air conditioner needs one.
How Does it Work?
You can select the subscription model right from the product page of each filter size. It’s up to you the frequency you choose but we recommend every three months. That's the most amount of work that you will have to do throughout this entire process. Then, Airzey will notify you when it is time to replace the filters in your air conditioner.
At that point, you will receive a package containing your new air filters, just in time to replace them. You can go ahead and put new air filters in your HVAC system to ensure that you continue to breathe clean air.
Airzey Cares About Your Indoor Air Quality
Airzey values its customers. Making sure that you have an easy time getting the air filters that you need on time is of utmost importance. Our air filter subscription program is perfect for those who struggle to remember their air filter schedule, for those who have trouble going out and purchasing an air filter in the store, and for those who just want a bit more ease in their lives.
Get better indoor air today by signing up for the air filter subscription program. After you've completed the sign-up process, you won't even have to think about it. All the work is done for you so you can sit back and relax while having great indoor air quality.
Take care of yourself, your family, and your pets by maintaining clear air in your home. Using Airzey to keep up with your air filters is the best way to do so.
