Using an air purifier is a great way to ensure you’re breathing clean air inside your home, with its ability to remove allergens and contaminants out of the air as well as reduce the development of mold. Of course, we just implicitly trust that we actually need to use the air purifier, since most people we know don’t really use air quality sensors around the house. If you’d prefer to be more precisely informed about the air you’re breathing, you might be interested in the IKEA Vindstryka.
A dedicated air quality sensor, the device consists of an upright box with a large digital display that allows you to check the air quality with a quick glance. That way, you can be more judicious with your use of the air purifier, allowing you to switch it on only when it’s actually needed, instead of having to keep it running at all times.
The IKEA Vindstyrka consists of a rectangular box with an upright profile and a large display out front that displays basic air quality information within the immediate vicinity. Using an easy-to-read layout, it shows the numerical measurement of PM2.5 levels on top, with three color-coded bars beside it and arrows pointing at the current reading level. Arrows on the green bar means levels are low, while arrows on the orange, means its at an acceptable level. The red bar, though, indicates an unhealthy amount of PM2.5 in the air, which means you really need to turn up that air purifier.
Below the PM2.5 levels are two lines of readings, each one denoted by a descriptive icon: one for temperature and another for humidity. At the bottom, there’s a tVOC label with an arrow pointing right, which, we’re guessing, you can click to see the measurements of the prevailing pollution load for various gaseous pollutants.
The IKEA Vindstyrka is designed to wirelessly communicate with the outfit’s Dirigera smart home hub, allowing you to see the readings from the IKEA Home app. More than that, though, you can use the readings to automatically trigger other IKEA smart home devices. For instance, you can use the PM2.5 readings to automatically increase the air speed and filtration strength of the outfit’s Starkvind air purifier when it detects a spike in unhealthy air, all while lowering it once the air quality readings gets better, ensuring the air you’re breathing at home is always as healthy as possible.
By the way, the Dirigera is compatible with Matter, so you should be able to use the air quality monitor’s readings with smart home products from other Matter-compatible brands like Amazon, Google, and Apple. Of course, your actual use-case for the sensor will vary based on what kind of smart home products you use, but we can see this being extremely useful for folks who like to automate as many parts of their home as possible.
No pricing has been announced for the IKEA Vindstyrka. It’s slated to launch sometime in April, though, so it shouldn’t take long to see it show up in the outfit’s online and brick-and-mortar stores.
