Info: 1 Air Purifier; Includes 'Arctic Trail' Prefilter
Blueair's compact air purifier for small spaces. The BLUE Pure 411 machines are solid, entry-level air purifier with low ongoing costs, designed to address most people's needs for improving the air quality in small spaces, whether you keep them in a single room or move it around.
S&H included to most locations in Canada.
Info: 1 Air Purifier; Includes 'Arctic Trail' Prefilter
Blueair's compact air purifier for small spaces. The BLUE Pure 411 machines are solid, entry-level air purifier with low ongoing costs, designed to address most people's needs for improving the air quality in small spaces, whether you keep them in a single room or move it around.
S&H included to most locations in Canada.
Product Notes:
Blueair's Blue Pure 411 series has been produced in three models: two manual versions (the original 411, the 411+, which had improved clean air performance specifications, but is no longer in production), and this 411 Auto, which features a built-in air quality sensor (and accompanying LED indicator) and is able to alter its speed to suit changing conditions automatically.
Related Products: Replacement main filters for the entire Blue Pure 411 Series are available, as are the 411 Auto Prefilters for use with this machine. The stretchy prefilters for the 411+ model are also available separately.
More Clean Air - Less Energy - Less Noise
All the 411 models use very little energy and are appropriate for use in small rooms up to about 185 square feet (17 sq. metres). (We also provide a fairly wide selection of Blueair air purifiers more suitable for larger spaces.)
Unless you live or work in a huge open space or have severe allergies or asthma, you may not need to spend hundreds more for the initial machine and ongoing filter costs to purify the air in your individual rooms or working spaces when the Blue Pure 411 Auto can be more than adequate for your needs.
Even if you live in a large home, you may not need a large, expensive air purifier with lots of features when each of the individual rooms you actually spend time in are much less than 200 square feet (which might be a square room with 14 foot walls, e.g., or a rectangular one with 11 x 18 ft. walls)? The 411s are officially rated to be able to dramatically reduce the pollutants and odors in rooms up to 190 sq. ft. (for the 411 Auto), for a fraction of the cost of some of their competitors.
Wirecutter Pick
That's why Wirecutter picked the original Pure 411 as a top budget pick one year and continued to recommend its successor model the 411+, noting it performs well for a small-space purifier, it's much cheaper to own and operate (and more attractive!) than comparable models, and is exceptionally energy efficient.
Nature of Air Filtration in Blue Models
Like its tremendously popular bigger brother, the BLUE Pure 211+, the BLUE Pure 411 Auto uses three stages of mechanical filtration – a fabric filter on the outside to trap larger particles such as dust; a particle filter in the middle to capture much smaller contaminants like pollen, mold, or bacteria; and an activated carbon sheet inside that to reduce light household odors or smoke – supplemented with electrostatic technology (it incorporates a small ionic Particle Charging Chamber to charge the particles in the incoming air to make them far more likely to stay adhered to the filter's walls, but without releasing any ozone into the room).
Blueair's HEPASilent particle filters and combination filters are like regular HEPA filters in being able to trap 99.97% of airborne particles down to the .3 micron level, plus they can also remove 99% of germs like bacteria and viruses at the much smaller .1 micron level, while operating more quietly and consuming less energy and providing several more air exchanges per hour than many alternative brands of air purifiers which use denser filters.
Prefilters
The colour of the bottom of these units is determined by the fabric prefilter which stretches over the mesh grill covering the main filter. The 411 Auto comes initially with a grey-coloured one ('Arctic Trail'), and there are several others in its series of prefilters, in tweed patterns, which include a narrow lengthwise pocket with a Velcro enclosure to tuck the cord into. These prefilters are designed to last indefinitely, without needing replacing: simply vacuum them every couple weeks or so when you see them accumulating a lot of dust or hair, etc., and they can also be machine washed.
Easy to Use
The 411s are all extremely simple to operate: just press the big button on top once to turn it on to the lowest speed (when it's almost too quiet to hear, unless you're right on top of it); then again to go on Medium speed; or a third time to go on High; and one more time to turn it off. As you do so, there will be one, two, or three semi-circles of white light appearing in the middle of the button indicating the speed level, with LED lights which will dim to only 10% of the original level seven seconds after the button was pressed. After about six months, that button will also first glow orange and then red to indicate when it is time to change the main filter.
Portable
At a little under 17 inches high and 8 inches in diameter, the 411s are small enough and certainly light enough (only a few pounds!) to move from room to room. You could rotate them from room to room in a home or apartment, running them on high speed during the day, and then return them to your bedroom to run on medium or low speed at night, if you prefer a lower noise level then.
Improvements in 411 Auto Model
The 411 Auto model goes back to the original Blue series style of not having a metal frame in its base, but adds an Air Quality Indicator (AQI) to continuously monitor the levels of fine particles in the room and display it on a three colour scale (Blue, Orange, and Red, for Good, Moderate, and Polluted), either as a cue for the user to turn the fan speed on higher or lower if the machine is being used on manual mode, or to have the machine switch on faster or slower on its own, if it's on the default 'Auto' setting (which is activated by just one touch of the button on top).
411 AUTO Technical Specifications
- Room Size: 17 square metres (190 square feet) (based on 8ft/2.4m ceiling)
- CADR:
- for Dust: 181 m3 per hour (107 cfm)
- for Pollen: 163 m3 per hour (96 cfm)
- for Smoke: 210 m3 per hour (123 cfm)
- Airflow rate: 60 - 200 m3/hr (35-120 cfm)
- Air changes per hour within the rated space: 5
- Dimensions (H x W x D): 425 x 200 x 200 mm (17 x 7.8 x 7.8 inches)
- Product weight: 1.7 kg (3.75 lbs)
- Energy consumption: 2 to 10 watts (depending on fan speed)
- Sound level: 18-48 dB(A) (depending on fan speed)*
- Filter replacement indicator: Yes
- Speed control options: AUTO-1-2-3 (Low, Medium, High)
- Casters/Wheels: No
- Air outlet: Top
- Air inlet: 360° around bottom 2/3rds of unit
- Average filter service life: 6 months (possibly longer (up to a year), depending on air quality in area of use)
- Warranty: manufacturer's 1 year limited warranty, which can be extended to two if promptly registered with Blueair
* CADR = Clean Air Delivery Rate; cfm = cubic feet (of processed air) per minute. These certified ratings as stated are based on U.S. version models (120VAC, 60Hz) using a Particle+Carbon Filter on the top speed.
No ozone emission. Energy star certified. Quiet Mark awarded: whisper quiet on low speed (17 dB).
For further information, please download the Blueair Blue 411+ User Manual [PDF] or the 411 Auto User Manual [PDF], which includes instructions on how to install, clean, or replace the pre-filters or air quality sensors.