Venta Airwasher Review

There aren’t very many products that we talk about on Steamy Kitchen that I can claim are “life changing.” The appliances in my kitchen are all great tools, but none have such a profound impact on our well-being than the Venta Airwasher, a humidifier and air purifier machine in one.

We just moved our family from humid Florida to desert Nevada a few months ago — we moved here to be closer to our family, my parents live here and my brother also moved at the same time. Our move has been so easy, except for one big thing. We’re not used to the dry, desert air, especially in the winter with the heater on.

Venta gave us a large Airwasher for an honest review, and we placed the unit downstairs near the kitchen/family area, where we spent most of our time. Within days, we noticed a big difference. The large Airwasher puts nearly 2 gallons of moisture in the air. Here’s what we noticed:

• Skin: my face, hands and lips feel better. I no longer have to moisturize my skin three times a day. I used to have to carry lip balm in my pocket, obsessively slathering on a layer. No more! My skin is still dry, but nowhere near the levels it used to be.
• Breathing: this one is hard to quantify – I know we’re breathing easier. It feels better, the air is less harsh.
• Smells: since we placed the Venta Airwasher near the kitchen, we’ve noticed that the cooking smells go away much faster, especially frying meats. Our new house needs a kitchen remodel (this Spring!) and the appliances are very old. The exhaust hood doesn’t work at all, so before we got the Airwasher, cooking smells would linger for hours, even overnight.

We’re a big dog family – between our dogs and my brother’s dogs, we gather quite the collection of dog hair every time we vacuum and sweep.

Scott’s job is vacuuming – I think we collect enough to knit a sweater every week. The big white horse dog is Fluffy. He’s a Great Pyranese who sheds a lot.

The Venta Airwasher “cleans” the air with its cold water evaporation technology, trapping allergens and pet dander. With the Airwasher, we’re sneezing less and even 4 dogs don’t flare up Scott’s allergies. We’re also noticing better skin on the dogs – when we first moved here, our Florida dogs were scratching and itching nonstop, their skin was flaking and dry.

My youngest, Nathan, has always had respiratory issues since he was born, and the Nevada climate does not suit him, especially at night when sleeping. We purchased 2 more Venta Airwashers – one to place near the boys’ bedroom upstairs and the other for our bedroom.

More dogs! These two cuties belong to a neighbor. We love them too!

Nathan has been sleeping better, no more coughing or wheezing. We could really notice the change in the morning. Before, Nathan would wake up with a sore throat (from all the coughing at night) and just had a hard time getting up. Now, he’s up bright and early, having gotten a good night’s sleep.

Here are more thoughts and some of the cons of the Venta Airwasher:

• It’s a big unit, requiring floor space. Even the smallest Airwasher is too big to place on a dresser.
• Difficult to refill. Many humidifiers have a removable water tank that you can bring to the sink to refill. With the Airwasher, you have to lift the lid off, lift out the paper drum membrane, find a place to put the wet, dripping drum, carry the unit to the sink to refill, then carefully, without spilling, return the unit, replace the drum, replace the lid, turn it back on. You could just carry the base unit with the drum inside, but it just makes it heavier to carry. The smallest unit in our bedroom doesn’t fit under the faucet in our bathroom, so we have to lug it to the kitchen sink.
• While the Venta Airwasher claims no need spend money to buy filters, a water treatment additive is highly recommended to run the machine as efficiently as possible. It will run you about $60 per year, the same price as filters for a regular humidifier.
• Expensive, but worth it. There are three sizes, the largest (covers 800 s.f.) is $352 on Amazon with free shipping (or $399 direct from Venta), and the smallest is $207 on Amazon ($219 direct from Venta)

Things that also matter:

• Made in Germany
• Purifies as well as humidifies – it’s an air cleaner!
• Every 10-14 days, when we completely empty any remaining water in the Airwasher – we’ll see all the particles that the Airwasher has cleaned out – sometimes, our water is yellow! That was from the weeks that our flowering trees and shrubs outside were dropping their leaves and flowers. I was amazed how well the Airwasher worked, and shocked to see how much of that pollen and flower was in our house.
• Comes in both gray and white
• You can also add essential oils to the Venta Airwasher, Venta sells them $19.99 for a set of 3 on Amazon. A capful will fragrance a room for a couple of hours. It’s a nice touch once in a while to use, but could get very expensive if used all the time. Venta only recommends using their oil blend that they’ve tested – meaning, if you choose to use another brand, it would void the warranty.

About Venta Airwasher

Learn more about Venta on their website.

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Venta Airwasher Giveaway

Venta provided a unit for an honest review and another for a giveaway. We are giving away one Venta Airwasher LW15.