If you're shopping for an air purifier but want to keep your spending in check, you don't have to settle on a model that struggles to actually perform. With the air purifier market so competitive, you'll find the best affordable air purifiers have a high enough clean air delivery rate (CADR) to clear dust and allergens in larger spaces, offer niceties like Wi-Fi connectivity, and run quietly, all without costing an arm and a leg. If you plan to use an air purifier in larger rooms, prioritize a clean-air delivery rate of more than 350 m³/hr (206 CFM) to ensure it moves enough air per hour to effectively remove airborne pollutants. In smaller rooms, you'll want to prioritize low noise performance, somewhere in the region of 57 dBA or quieter, to ensure comfortable and efficient operation even at higher fan speeds.
If you're unsure whether an air purifier will be a good fit for your space, you can also check out our new room size calculator and plug in your room's dimensions.
We've tested over 50 models, and these are our recommendations for the best budget and cheap air purifiers. We put each unit through the same rigorous tests to deliver clear, repeatable results, and we also consider price and availability when making our recommendations. If you want a broader overview of the product landscape, check out our recommendations for the best air purifiers, the best air purifiers for pets, and the best HEPA filter air purifiers.
We buy and independently test air purifiers with no manufacturer samples, sponsorships, or pre-approved talking points. Each unit goes through the same standardized test bench, and the results are validated by multiple teams before being published on our website, so you can accurately compare them side by side.
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Best Budget Air Purifier
Pets8.2Bedroom8.4Particle Filtration Rate8.1Measured PM1.0 CADR439 m³/hr (258 CFM)Noise @ Highest Fan Speed60.7dBARecommended Room Size @ Max Fan Speed37.5 m² (404 ft²)Low-Noise Particle Filtration Rate7.6Measured PM1.0 CADR207 m³/hr (122 CFM)See all our test resultsRecommended Room Size17.7 m² (190 ft²)The Winix 5530 is the best budget air purifier we've tested and a stellar choice for those who prioritize strong air-cleaning performance at an affordable price. At its highest fan speed, its clean air delivery rate (CADR) is high enough for an average-sized living room or larger kitchens and dining areas, though it's also loud enough to be an active disturbance in this configuration. Thankfully, we also found that it delivers better performance than many alternatives at a lower, quieter fan speed. At its second of five fan speeds, it's quite hard to hear and still capable of clearing the air of common allergens in the average bedroom or home office. Its feature set is also pretty robust for this price bracket, with Wi-Fi connectivity that lets you run the unit from your smartphone while you're away from home. You also won't have to babysit the unit if your home's air quality suddenly takes a dive, thanks to the onboard particle sensor that lets the unit adjust fan speed based on ambient particle levels.
This unit has a fairly conventional multi-stage filtration system consisting of a mesh pre-filter, a primary filter for dealing with fine dust, pollen, and pet dander, and an activated carbon pellet filter to deal with odors, though the latter doesn't contain enough carbon media to have a massive impact on odor-causing volatile organic compounds (VOCs) from things like paint fumes. There's also a bipolar ionization system that's meant to break down fine airborne pollutants. This system produces ozone, a respiratory irritant, though in lower quantities than typical ionizers. If you'd rather avoid the potential health risks altogether, you can turn it off. Better yet, air filtration performance is great even when the system isn't running, which is how we tested our unit.
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Best Cheap Air Purifier
Pets7.1Bedroom8.1Particle Filtration Rate6.5Measured PM1.0 CADR196 m³/hr (115 CFM)Noise @ Highest Fan Speed56.0dBARecommended Room Size @ Max Fan Speed16.7 m² (180 ft²)Low-Noise Particle Filtration Rate5.9Measured PM1.0 CADR106 m³/hr (62 CFM)See all our test resultsRecommended Room Size9.0 m² (97 ft²)The Dreo Air Purifier 338S is far from the highest-performing air purifier on the market, but for those looking to spend as little as possible and want something highly compact, it's a great option. It takes up much less space than the Winix 5530, making it a good choice for smaller rooms that don't require a ton of airflow, like nurseries and home offices; this unit is small enough to fit on a nightstand or dresser. It also runs very quietly, with even its highest fan speed being quiet enough to be masked by outdoor noise from an open window, though performance drops considerably when running at quieter speeds.
As you might expect from something this small and cheap, there are a couple of compromises compared to bigger, pricier models. It'll have a hard time in anything larger than modestly sized living areas, and it'll take far more time to remove the same amount of pollutants in an equivalently sized room compared to the Winix. This model does have Wi-Fi connectivity, so you can make adjustments using its smartphone app on your way home from work or right from your bed. There's also an air quality sensor that allows it to adjust its fan speed based on current particle levels, minimizing the need for hands-on interaction.
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Best Budget DIY Air Purifier
Pets7.3Bedroom5.2Particle Filtration Rate8.4Measured PM1.0 CADR485 m³/hr (286 CFM)Noise @ Highest Fan Speed60.3dBARecommended Room Size @ Max Fan Speed41.4 m² (446 ft²)Low-Noise Particle Filtration Rate8.1Measured PM1.0 CADR270 m³/hr (159 CFM)See all our test resultsRecommended Room Size23.0 m² (248 ft²)If you want the best possible air-cleaning performance for the money and aren't afraid to get your hands a little dirty, building a DIY Corsi-Rosenthal Box with a single filter is an idea worth considering. Putting one together requires little more than a single MERV 13 furnace filter, a 20" box fan, and a few strips of duct tape; our own test unit was built from the material list in this guide. While filter prices can fluctuate, the total cost of one of these units should be under $100. Compared to regular domestic models in that price range, its performance is simply unbeatable. In an equivalently sized room, we found it reduced airborne contaminants to the same level more than twice as fast as the cheaper Dreo Air Purifier 338S. As a result, it's a great fit for larger living areas and open-concept apartments. Once the filter has reached the end of its lifespan, which is typically somewhere around three to six months, you'll effectively need to rebuild the unit all over again, which can be tedious; thankfully, if you buy a four-pack of furnace filters, you can keep the unit running for well over a year without having to buy any additional materials.
There are a few downsides: a 20-inch box fan also makes a lot of noise, which is likely to be disruptive in areas where you'd prefer peace and quiet, like a nursery or bedroom. It could also prove a disturbance for more noise-sensitive pets; some variations of this design utilize multiple PC cooling fans instead of a single large box fan to cut down on noise and power consumption. If you require more coverage, you can also build a four-sided Corsi-Rosenthal Box, which offers more than twice the CADR due to its larger filter area, albeit at the cost of a much bigger footprint and higher operating costs, since you'll need to replace four filters periodically instead of just one.
Notable Mentions
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Coway Airmega Mighty AP-1512HH:
The Coway Airmega Mighty AP-1512HH is a mid-range air purifier with a built-in ionizer you can turn on or off, and a built-in particle sensor that automatically adjusts fan speed based on current air quality. That said, it falls slightly short of the Winix 5530 in terms of particle filtration performance.
See our review -
PuroAir 240:
The PuroAir 240 is a compact air purifier. Compared to the similarly compact Dreo Air Purifier 338S, it lags further behind in terms of clean air delivery rate, and runs louder at its lowest fan speed, though this trend reverses at both units' maximum fan speeds.
See our review -
Winix C610:
The Winix C610 is a compact, budget-friendly air purifier with a slightly smaller overall footprint than the Winix 5530 and an otherwise similar feature set. That said, it's noticeably louder at higher settings, and its max CADR is slightly lower.
See our review -
Winix C710:
The Winix C710 is a Costco-exclusive variant of the Winix C610 mentioned just above, though it also features a display that shows current PM2.5 levels, and is bundled with an extra replacement filter. It's a good alternative to the Winix 5530 thanks to its smaller size, but it's also much louder, particularly at its highest fan speed.
See our review -
Levoit Core 200S:
The Levoit Core 200S is a cheap, compact air purifier that's marginally more compact than the Dreo Air Purifier 338S. However, it also runs louder at its lowest fan speed and will be slower to improve air quality to the same level within an equivalently sized room. Unlike the Dreo, it also lacks an air quality sensor.
See our review -
Levoit Vital 200S:
The Levoit Vital 200S is a good alternative to the Winix 5530, with the Levoit being noticeably quieter at its highest fan speed. That said, it lags behind in terms of clean air delivery rate and has a slightly bulkier design.
See our review
Recent Updates
Sep 30, 2026:
We've replaced the Levoit Core 200S with the Dreo Air Purifier 338S as the 'Best Cheap Air Purifier' pick due to the latter's superior overall performance and comparable price point. We also added the Levoit Core 200S, Levoit Vital 200S, and Winix C710 to the Notable Mentions section of the article.
Jul 30, 2026:
We've replaced the Winix C610 with the Winix 5530 as the 'Best Budget Air Purifier' pick due to its superior overall performance. We've also added the Winix C610 to the Notable Mentions section of the article.
All Reviews
The recommendations above are among the best budget air purifiers. We factor in price, visitor feedback, and availability.
That said, there's no single best option that will suit everybody; your needs will depend on your exact budget, the size of your living space, your tolerance for operating noise, and whether you like having a device with convenience features like Wi-Fi connectivity. If you'd like to choose for yourself, here's the list of all the air purifiers we've tested with an MSRP below $200 USD.
