When the heat is here, we turn to our best fans to provide some much-needed relief. They circulate air around our homes and create a cooling breeze that can make summer days all the more enjoyable.
Investing in a good fan can mean the difference between sweaty, uncomfortable days and breezy, relaxed afternoons. Even if you have AC, there's a unique comfort that fans provide, and as we explained in our guide to fans vs air conditioners, it can actually be beneficial to make use of both.
Fan technology has advanced a lot in recent years, and they're now often combined with some of the best air purifiers to help circulate clean, healthy air around your indoor space. They can also track your air quality, humidify your room, and be converted into different fan types.
As H&G's home tech editor, myself and a team of experts have been testing and reviewing fans on hot days recently to compare, contrast and determine which ones are the best. Read on for our complete guide to the best fans to buy for the home, but our current favorite is easily the Shark FlexBreeze (you'll find out why below).
The quick list
At a glance, these are the six best fans we've ever tested. Scroll on for the full guide, or click the navigation links to take you to each product.
The best fan you can buy
Corded or cordless, tabletop or pedestal, indoors or outdoors. This portable fan is the best we've ever tested, offering strong airflow and unique features that set it apart from all others.
The best value tower fan
For a reasonable cost, this Levoit Classic tower fan does everything you'd need. It's powerful, quiet, and can adapt to your indoor temperature.
The best air purifying tower fan
The Dreo purifying tower fan makes use of two motors so that you can use the fan or air purifier by themselves (or together, of course). It's big, powerful, and uses one of the best appliance apps we've ever seen.
The best air purifying box fan
A small and stylish box fan that can purify your space without having to think about it. It doesn't oscillate, but its airflow is strong enough to circulate clean air around a standard-sized room.
The best multi-function fan for humidity
An incredibly comprehensive fan that can cool you, purify your air, and adjust humidity levels in your indoor space to avoid your skin from drying out.
The best smart, air purifying fan
It's expensive, but you'll struggle to find a fan that can purify your air this well while giving you such detailed information on your indoor air quality.
The best fans, tested and reviewed
You can trust Homes & Gardens. Our expert reviewers spend hours testing and comparing the latest products, helping you choose the best for you. Find out more about how we test.
The best fan
The Shark FlexBreeze is the best fan we've ever tested in quite a few ways. It's powerful and quiet, which is the aim when choosing the best fan, but it also comes with impressively thoughtful features that set it apart from others.
The FlexBreeze can be used indoors and outdoors, corded or cordless, and as a pedestal or tabletop fan – hence the 'Flex' in the name. It's a type of versatility that we're yet to see in any alternatives, and it works as well as you'd expect it to. You can simply press a latch and pull the fan out of the stand and it's instantly portable, with extendable legs to turn it into a tabletop or floor fan.
After testing the majority of the fans in this list, the FlexBreeze is the one I've continued to use at home. I enjoy being able to work in my garden on a hot day and have the fan next to me keeping me cool while I work. It's UV and weather-resistant too, so I don't have to worry about keeping it protected.
The battery can last up to 24 hours, and even at its lowest, quietest setting it provides a powerful and effective airflow. When you get to the higher fan speeds (which I rarely need), it's still impressively quiet.
This is easily the best fan in this list but it's also one of the cheapest – a testament to Shark not overpricing their products. Sure, it doesn't have air purification or app compatibility, but as a fan, it's perfect.
Read more in our full Shark FlexBreeze Fan review.
The best value fan
If you're looking for a basic but effective tower fan, the Levoit 36-Inch Classic is an easy choice. It's affordable while still having the strong cooling you'd expect from a decent tower fan.
The fan quickly cools you down and does so at a quiet volume. At the highest fan speeds and while oscillating it can reach the corners of the room, and at the lowest speed it's virtually silent while still providing a pleasant relief from the heat.
Auto mode adjusts fan speed depending on the room's temperature. You can also choose turbo mode (designed to be paired with AC) that'll oscillate the maximum airflow around the room, and sleep mode which stabilizes the temperature until you wake up.
There are different models available (one has five fan speeds and another has 12), but they all provide the same maximum and minimum airflow.
Read more in our full Levoit Classic 36-Inch Tower Fan review.
The best purifying tower fan
Unlike other air purifying fans, the Dreo MC710S uses two motors: one for the fan and one for the purifier. This means you can have one running without the other, which is a level of control that even Dyson's best purifying fans don't offer.
The Dreo Air Purifier Tower Fan is certainly a large appliance, taking more space than any of the others in this list. But this extra size comes with extra fan power, and this is instantly noticeable as soon as you start using it.
Even at the lowest fan speed it produces a strong breeze, and in the height of summer I haven't had to go above fan speed six. In fact, it's occasionally too powerful, as even turning the fan off and using just the purifier still leaves you with a healthy breeze.
The purifier works great though, and as the fan circulates air so well it makes it easy to capture particles from far parts of the room. The air purifier uses a True HEPA filter and prefilters so it can remove particles down to 0.3 microns in size – but it's worth noting this doesn't account for smoke particles (which are typically 0.1 microns in size).
Read more in our full Dreo Air Purifier Tower Fan MC710S review.
The best box fan
The smallest fan on this list, the Pure Fan from Blueair combines the company's air purification smarts with a more effective fan. This means you get both packaged in a Scandi-style cube that can be placed either on the floor or on a bedside table. Because of its design, it can't oscillate but promises a 90-degree range.
Customizable pre-filters allow you to add a subtle pop of color (dark gray, blue, light gray, pink, or yellow) beneath the outer casing, and a handle on top of the device means you can easily move it from room to room as needed. And if you like to keep things simple, the single-button controls might appeal.
Our testers enjoyed using the Blue Pure Fan Auto during hot and humid weather and found that it easily circulated air around a medium-sized room.
Read more in our full Blueair Blue Pure Fan Auto review.
The best multi-function fan
Not many fans are also able to purify and humidify an indoor space. That level of air quality control is usually left to more advanced HVAC systems.
But that's what the Dyson Purifier Humidify + Cool Formaldehyde can do, making the most out of a HEPA H13 filter and a one-gallon humidifier tank to remove harmful particles from the air and add humidity when needed.
Our tester found that the Dyson anticipated when the fan would dry out your skin and adjusted the humidity levels accordingly. It also uses some clever tech to maximize the filter's lifespan: utilizing evaporative humidity, the fan uses UV light to kill the bacteria in the humidifier reservoir.
The purifier works as well as all of Dyson's bests, capturing particles down to 0.1 microns. And just like Dyson's other purifying fans, you get comprehensive data tracking of your indoor air quality. But sadly this feature set does come at a cost - it's the most expensive option in this guide for a reason.
Read more in our full Dyson Purifier Humidify + Cool Formaldehyde review.
The best smart, air purifying fan
If you don't need humidity control in your home (like the above Dyson fan offers), this is a slightly more affordable alternative that can cool and purify your space while sharing a similar visual design.
Although it may cost a little less, this is still a very expensive appliance. It could be justified by how comprehensively it tracks data, as well as an air purifier that can capture pretty much any harmful particle in your indoor space.
The fan works great too, with strong airflow and whole-room coverage, but it isn't the quietest. As there's no option to use the fan or purifier exclusively they're both always running at the same time, which naturally produces a louder sound.
It is, in my view, more expensive than a purifying fan should be, but you'd struggle to find a fan more stylish than this. Even compared to Dyson's other fans, the TP09 has a longer body that looks sleek in any space. It's also the only fan I've ever tested that oscillates to 350 degrees to really cover the whole room.
Read more in our full Dyson Purifier Cool Formaldehyde TP09 review.
Best fan FAQs
Do fans cool a room?
The science of a traditional fan can be a head-scratcher, as the fact is that electric fans don't actually bring the temperature of a warm space down at all. So why do we feel cooler when running one?
The answer is more about airflow than it is about temperature. When air is blown over our skin it evaporates the moisture, and it's the moisture that retains the heat. The force of the air emitted by a fan helps us to feel less warm by creating this wind-chill effect.
In short, fans bring our own temperature down on hot days, but won't shift the level of heat in the room. The only way they can help a room feel closer is by circulating air so that it become less thick and stagnant.
Should a fan be used with AC?
If your house is fitted with AC you may be wondering whether it's worth also investing in an electric fan. It comes down to your priorities - running a fan tends to be cheaper in the long run than cranking your air conditioning up to full when a heatwave hits but, as stated above, fans don't actually make your home any cooler.
Having both on hand can be a good idea as you can decide at the moment whether turning on the AC is necessary, or if a simple fan can do the work. We've compared fans vs air conditioners to see how effectively the two can work individually or together.
You've reached the end of the page. Jump back up to the top or browse our guides of the best air purifiers, best cordless vacuums or best vacuums for pet hair.
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