A humidifier is a complete game-changer if you live in a dry, low humid environment. But have you ever noticed a white mist coming off your machine? If yes, then you are probably using hard water for your humidifying needs.
What’s more, hard water even leaves mineral deposits in your room humidifier. So what is the solution?
Well, you can always switch to using distilled water for your existing humidifier. But if that is not possible or you are yet to purchase your humidifier, we have reviewed five of the best humidifiers for hard water in the following article.
- Is White Dust from Humidifiers Harmful?
- What Is The Best Type of Humidifier for Hard Water?
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5 Humidifiers That Handle Hard Water & Don’t Leave White Dust
- 1. Honeywell Cool Moisture Humidifier – Best Overall Humidifier for Hard Water
- 2. Vornado Evap40 – Best Low-Maintenance Humidifier
- 3. Honeywell Top Fill Cool Mist – Ultra-Quiet Humidifier
- 4. Aprilaire 500 Furnace Humidifier – Best for Large Coverage Area
- 5. Vicks Starry Night – Best Multi-Functional Humidifier
- How Do I Prevent White Dust in My Humidifier?
- Conclusion
>>> I know about humidifiers for hard water already, jump me straight to the reviews <<<
Is White Dust from Humidifiers Harmful?
If you use hard water or tap water to humidify your room, you will face a common white dust issue from your humidifier.
The mineral disperses in the mist in your whole house and dries on top of your furniture. This leaves visible, white deposits on different surfaces, especially if you use an ultrasonic humidifier.
But the question remains, is it harmful?
Well, the white dust does not pose any significant concern for healthy individuals. The most they have to do is to keep vacuuming and dusting their furniture to prevent buildups.
However, the dust can get quite problematic for immune-compromised people with respiratory issues or infants. The combination of calcium, magnesium, and other minerals can exacerbate allergies, asthma, and other sinus-related conditions.
Besides this, a few researchers have found a connection between infant lung injury to white dust from humidifiers.
What Is The Best Type of Humidifier for Hard Water?
With a large variety of humidifiers in the market, it is challenging to find one that works best with hard water. Although there are multiple types of vaporizers that work well with distilled water, only a specific evaporative cool mist humidifier will take out the minerals from hard water.
We have highlighted the difference between different humidifiers below to help you understand why we picked this humidifier for hard water.
Evaporative Vs. Ultrasonic
Evaporative humidifiers use wicking filters in their machine to trap about 99.9% of minerals and bacteria from the water. Then, they use a powerful fan to blow the cool mist in your room.
Meanwhile, ultrasonic humidifiers use vibration to vaporize the water and blow it into the room. Since they do not use filters, ultrasonic humidifiers work well with distilled water. However, you can also use demineralization cartridges to remove some of the mineral content from the hard water.
Cool Mist Vs. Warm Mist
When it comes to cool mist and warm mist humidifiers, the primary factor that affects our choice is the clean-up. Since hard water leaves white deposits in the machine, they require frequent clean-up to prevent any buildups.
Warm mist humidifiers include an extra heating element, which makes it difficult to clean them. In contrast, cool mist models have a simple mode of operation and consume less energy overall.
5 Humidifiers That Handle Hard Water & Don’t Leave White Dust
1. Honeywell Cool Moisture Humidifier – Best Overall Humidifier for Hard Water
Honeywell has an incredible reputation for manufacturing high-quality products, and the Honeywell Cool Moisture Humidifier is no different.
The cool-mist evaporative humidifier has an almost one-gallon tank (0.8) to support 18-hours of use on low settings for medium-sized rooms. It gives off cool moisture using a wicking filter in a dry climate, ensuring that your room never over-humidifies.
This Honeywell humidifier has two speeds and has a wicking filter that captures minerals from the water. This is the main aspect that helps prevent white dust when you live in an area with hard water. As a result, you get pure, clean air with humidity between 40 to 60% in your home, allowing your family to breathe and sleep easily.
If all this was not enough, the Honeywell Cool Moisture Humidifier is relatively easy to maintain and clean as well. The removable tank features a wide mouth to help you clean it thoroughly. As for the filters, you can find the Honeywell replacement filters with antimicrobial coating here.
PROS:
- Low-noise operation, 30% quieter than others
- Easy-to-clean
- Removes minerals from the water and prevents white dust
- Compact, sleek design
- 0.8 tank capacity
CONS:
- Frequent filter replacement
2. Vornado Evap40 – Best Low-Maintenance Humidifier
Vornado Evap40 is a four-gallon evaporative, cool mist humidifier that sucks dry air in and uses two humidifying filters to add moisture to your room. It includes a patent Vornado Vortex Action that blows the cool, moist air to up to 1000 square feet area.
With its large tank, you can get 24-hours of continuous use, even on a high setting. Besides this, you can adjust the fan speed, low, medium, or high, and the humidity level according to your preference.
However, the Vornado Evap40 can also adjust these settings automatically to maintain adequate humidity in your room. What’s more, the humidifier is easy to clean and maintain, owing to its leak-proof and spill-proof water tanks.
PROS:
- Two wick filters
- Four-gallon capacity
- Easy-to-clean removable tank
- Large 1000 square feet coverage area
- Adjustable settings
CONS:
- Expensive
- Bulky
3. Honeywell Top Fill Cool Mist – Ultra-Quiet Humidifier
Honeywell Top Fill Cool Mist works efficiently to add cool moisture to the dry air in your home.
The compact humidifier has two speed settings, high and low, to adjust your rooms’ humidity level. Apart from this, you get a 1.25-gallon tank that can run for up to 36 hours on a low setting and provide humidity for medium to large rooms.
You can even keep an eye out for the water level from the built-in illuminated water window.
This model also uses a wicking filter to remove 99.9% of allergens and minerals from hard water.
PROS:
- Removes 99.9% of bacteria and minerals
- 36-hours run-time at low
- Large tank capacity
- Illuminated water window
- Easy-to-clean
CONS:
- Frequent filter replacement
- Noisy operation at high settings
4. Aprilaire 500 Furnace Humidifier – Best for Large Coverage Area
If you want to invest in one humidifier for your whole house, then the Aprilaire 500 Furnace Humidifier is ideal for your needs. It offers about 3000 square feet of coverage area, using a 12-gallon tank for all-day use.
Besides this, the humidifier has dual sensors to adjust the moisture level depending on your home’s temperature and indoor humidity. You even get a convenient digital control to monitor humidity percentage, water panel level, servicing alerts, and the working of the machine.
What’s more, you just need to set the large Aprilaire Humidifier and forget about any settings to get an optimal humidity level between 35 to 45% in your home.
PROS:
- Automatic settings via dual sensors
- Convenient digital panel
- Massive coverage area
- Maintains optimum humidity in your home
CONS:
- Requires professional installation
- Expensive
5. Vicks Starry Night – Best Multi-Functional Humidifier
Vicks Starry Night is a compact, evaporative humidifier that includes a fun starry night light projection, making it perfect for kids’ bedrooms.
It features a substantial one-gallon tank, which can run for 24-hours on low-settings, and includes Protect antimicrobial wicking filters to remove 95% of bacteria and mold from the humid air. Moreover, if you use hard water, the humidifier traps the minerals and doesn’t leave white dust in the room too.
The humidifier is suitable for medium-sized rooms and can be used with therapeutic Vicks VapoPads to soothe your allergies, cough, and congestion.
PROS:
- Translucent tank for maintaining the water level
- Fun starry night projection
- Works with VapoPads for congestion relief
- Quiet performance
CONS:
- Leakage
- Requires frequent filter replacement (check availability & filter price)
How Do I Prevent White Dust in My Humidifier?
If you use tap water or hard water in a humidifier, you will find white dust on its insides. The minerals present in the water disperse and create this white dust.
This dust can be a problem for people with low immunity and infants. To prevent white dust, always make sure you use distilled water. Distilled water will not have minerals or chemicals and will not create this problem.
Conclusion
If you use hard water for your humidifiers and do not want to deal with white dust at the same time, you need to invest in an evaporative cool mist humidifier for your home.
Rather than cleaning the mineral deposits from your furniture constantly or risk worsening your health problems, these humidifiers will remove all the minerals before adding humidity to your room.
Check out our TOP 5 humidifiers for hard water in the article to help you find the best one for your needs. Even though all of them offer superior qualities, we recommend the Honeywell Cool Moisture for the best performance in a medium-sized room.
