Blueair Blue Pure 211+ Auto review

The Blueair Blue Pure 211+ Auto is a beast of an air purifier that features an inconspicuous appearance, but offers one of the best performances we’ve seen. With a sleek boxy exterior and elegant skirt, it looks less like a machine meant to cycle the air in your room and more like a futuristic robot. But, its ability to suck the pollutants out of a room makes it a must-have for those looking for a quality device. That’s why it’s the best air purifier we’ve tested. 

As you will see in our Blueair Blue Pure 211+ Auto review, this machine delivers on every aspect, from performance to ease of use. It's not an entirely faultless design — particularly if you intend to use it at night, but the overall experience is second to none. 

Blueair Blue Pure 211+ Auto review: Price and availability

For $339, you get this mid-grade Blueair air purifier, falling between the tiny Pure 411 Auto and the massive HealthProtect 7470. It’s not as easy to carry around as its smaller sibling, weighing in at 12 and a half pounds. It’s also not as flashy as the HealthProtect, missing the LCD screen and app connectivity, but it does combine the best of both; an attractive design that also happens to work well.

You can purchase the Blueair Blue Pure 211+ Auto directly from Blueair, or you can also find it at Amazon, Best Buy and Bed, Bath and Beyond. It’s widely available. 

Blueair Blue Pure 211+ Auto review: Design

Aesthetically, the Blueair Blue Pure 211+ Auto takes a lot of inspiration from the Pure 411 Auto model. With a circular, psychedelic pattern on top, you might catch yourself accidentally staring or grabbing at the tiny perforated holes. On its lower half, you’ll find a cloth skirt that doubles as a pre-filter. 

This comes in a multitude of colors including grey, pink, blue, and green, so you can give this air purifier some character if you want. With its overall sturdy, box-like design, you’ll find that the Blueair Blue Pure 211+ Auto blends into almost any home. It doesn’t look cheap or goofy thanks to a plastic matte finish on the exterior, which can’t be said about every other air purifier we tested.

It’s a fairly bulky air purifier, being over 20 inches tall with a cube-like design. Yet, the control panel on top is as simple as can be, with one button to cycle through the fan speeds. It also has an auto setting that will automatically adjust the fan speed depending on the particles it senses in the air. The device will also tell you when the filter needs to be replaced when the main light turns red.

Blueair Blue Pure 211+ Auto Review: Ease of use

Out of the box, this air purifier is incredibly simple to set up. You’ll need to take the top of the device off which contains the fan — this requires pressing a button on each side to unlock. You’ll then need to take the plastic off the filters inside, which look like something you’d use on a space station. The HEPASilent filters, which include a carbon layer, cost $69 to replace, though there’s a lot more to them than just a stringy piece of plastic. 

This air purifier also has a small latch on the back that can be opened — this contains the sensors which detect the air quality. There’s no glaring reason to have to take it apart unless it gets filled with dust or animal hair, which seems unlikely.  

The Blueair Blue Pure 211+ Auto comes with a thick manual filled with information about the device, as well as details on how it should be set up. We had no problem turning the device on, but understanding its functionality required a deep dive into the manual. When plugged in, it will start out on auto mode and cycle through three colors, blue, yellow, and red, as it detects the quality of air in the room. A blue light indicates that the air quality is fine, whereas red means it’s working overtime to clean the air and orange is somewhere in the middle. For example, if you start cooking and smoke builds up in the room, the light will turn red and the auto mode will kick in and increase the fan speed.

Blueair Blue Pure 211+ Auto Review: Performance

Three fan speeds can be toggled by pressing the button on top of the device, going from lowest to highest. There’s also a night mode last in rotation, that turns the front light off and has the fan running more softly. If you miss the speed you were aiming for, you’ll have to cycle through the rest of them in order to get back. The button itself is very sensitive, so even if you just lightly tap it with your finger (or a pet feels the need to jump up top), the button will activate. We did find the night mode to be a  bit too weak, barely registering as a fan with little output. Still, the controls are easy to use once you get a grasp on them since there’s only one button to press. 

In terms of noise, this air purifier was a little hit and miss. At the lowest speed, it barely registered, but at full speed, it was on the louder end of the spectrum, clocking 35.6 decibels at the lowest setting and 60.8 decibels at the highest. Still, it wasn't overly noisy.

But is this air purifier good at cleaning the air? With the largest suggested room size of any air purifier we tested, totaling 550 square feet, the Pure 211+ Auto is the most capable of the bunch. Only the Honeywell HPA300 came close in efficiency. The Blueair Blue Pure 211+ Auto received a CADR of 353, 347, and 380 respectively for smoke, dust and pollen — performing impressively in all three categories.

It also requires a reasonable amount of electricity to achieve this performance, using only 0.159 kWh over the course of 24 hours on auto mode. This equals around 50 cents a day considering the average cost of energy. Seeing those lights change color and hearing it fluctuate in power is definitely worth the price.

Blueair Blue Pure 211+ Auto review: Verdict

The Blueair Blue Pure 211+ Auto is one of the best air purifiers out there. It costs slightly less than the Honeywell HPA300, but still manages to outperform in nearly every field. It couldn’t be more simple to operate and it looks great too, plus it doesn’t require much energy to run. It’s rare to find an air purifier that works so efficiently and yet wouldn’t look out of place in a modern home. 

This air purifier would suit the largest of rooms thanks to its extremely high CADR. Ultimately, if you have the money to splurge or a large space that needs to be maintained, then we highly recommend picking this up.