Evap40 4-Gallon Evaporative Humidifier, Adjustable Humidistat, 3 Speed Settings, Coverage up to 1,000 sqft, 4-Gallon Output (24 Hrs), Dual Tank, Perfect for Home, Bedroom, and Large Spaces

If you want a good reliable humidifier for your space this is the one to buy. I wanted an evaporative humidifier for a number of reasons: they don't produce a residue like the ultrasonic humidifiers and cool/warm mist humidifiers can. They won't over-humidify a space like the other types can -- air will only take on as much humidity as it can hold, and evaporation slows the closer the air gets its potential saturation level. And to ensure that over-humidification doesn't happen this humidifier also features a humidistat that will switch the unit off if the humidity exceeds the level where you set it. I bought my Vornado three years ago because it's such a simple design. The top fan unit, 2 water supply jugs, the reservoir pan, and wicks. Nothing fancy at all, just like the best evaporative humidifiers I've used in the past. As far as I'm concerned the simpler the design the less chance of something breaking. At the lowest two fan speeds the unit makes hardly any noise. Even the highest fan speed I don't think it is overly loud -- I sleep fine with it running in my bedroom. My recommendations for this humidifier: Purchase a humidity meter to monitor the levels in the room so you can better dial-in the Vornado's humidistat to your preference. Use distilled water. You don't have to, the humidifier works fine with regular tap water. But in the long run distilled water will give much better and consistent results. Have at least one if not two new wick sets sitting in reserve. That way when you have to replace them you can do so right away, then order another replacement. To combat/prevent bacterial growth -- use copper. Don't waste money on additives to combat bacteria. Copper works great as an antimicrobial and keeps bacterial growth in check (that is, zero). Preferably copper mesh (usually available through garden stores), but pennies will work fine (wash them clean before using them). The problem with pennies is, over time, the copper plating will get 'used up' and then it'll be the zinc core exposed to the water (this took about a year when I first used them). Zinc is supposedly antimicrobial as well, but I didn't want to chance it, and copper-less pennies look disgusting :) . I have a six-inch strip of copper mesh in each water jug. I have never had issues with bacterial growth in the jugs nor in the reservoir nor on the wicks while using copper as an antimicrobial. Regularly clean your Vornado, including vacuuming off any accumulated dust. Be especially diligent if you use only tap water and not distilled water because limescale will accumulate in the pan and on the outer surfaces of the water jugs. I run mine 24/7, except when its humidistat setting shuts it down or while cleaning the unit. The humidistat is sort of finicky, it's not really "exact" so much as the best way to set it is if the room is too humid, turn the humidistat until the unit powers down, then wait. I realized I had to finesse the setting over a period of days, fiddling between shutting down and turning on, until I got it set just right. Once I did get it dialed in I never had to worry about it again. I recommend purchasing a humidity monitor if you really want to watch those levels. For those first three years I used tap water, which works fine. However my tap water has a high mineral content, which means the evaporative wicks harden with limescale rather quickly -- as in a matter of days. At first I was rotating wicks once a week -- I'd have one pair of wicks working, then swap it out and soak the wick in vinegar water to disperse the minerals, rinse it out, then swap it back in the following week while I de-scaled the second wick pair. Problem is, over time, the wicks deteriorate from the vinegar soak cycles. As in they start falling apart. They re-mineralize quicker the older they get. And the ability to control mineralization continues to deteriorate over time. I purchased new wicks every three months just to keep up with the deterioration. I finally decided to switch to distilled water. The humidifier uses about 2 gallons of water a day so purchasing distilled water off-the-shelf is not an option, that's too expensive. I purchased a home distiller and distill 2 gallons of water a day. I also purchased an empty 2.5 gallon jug to have 2 gallons of distilled water ready for when one of the Vornado jugs empties. I fill the Vornado jug, then distill more water into the 2.5 gallon jug. Sure, it's a little extra work, but the benefits outweigh the inconvenience. One month after the switch to distilled water the humidifier wicks have remained supple, they are not mineralizing at all. To be honest I'm not sure when I'm going to have to replace the wicks, I've been running the same filter set for a month and they're doing great. I'm sure, over time, I'll figure it out. Already I can see I'm on track to saving a lot of $$ not having to replace two pairs of wicks every three months. Home-distilled water is a lot cheaper than purchasing it off-the-shelf. It is definitely worth the added cost to purchase a small home distiller. I know my distiller will pay for itself in less than a year compared to what I was paying for replacement wicks and vinegar. I am on my second Vornado EVAP40. The first one died after three years of constant use. The power-cord wire corroded with oxidation inside the unit which increased the resistance on the AC wire until it cooked its insulation and the unit quit working. I contacted Vornado customer service and explained the situation. I sent them the pictures they requested. Vornado honored their 5-year warranty and sent me a brand-new unit. Vornado is amazing and stands by their product, I have nothing but good things to say about them, their customer service, and this humidifier. If my unit had been out of warranty I would have purchased another one anyhow because it is that good compared to all the other humidifiers I've tried over the years.

I am in love with this humidifier! I have lived in dry climates for the past 20 years, both in Colorado and Arizona. I have tried many different humidifiers and they all had problems: they were hard to clean, made dust over everything, didn't accurately control the humidity in the air. This Vornado is the best of the best! I highly recommend it for the following reasons: 1) It keeps my home, and especially my bedroom just the right humidity. It is easy to adjust. At night, I close the door and set it to just humidify my bedroom. In the day, I open the door and turn the fan on high to humidify the rest of my 950 sq. ft. apartment. It does a fine job! I have humidistats in each room to verify the humidity level. Plus, I can tell because my home is more comfortable and no static electricity. 2) It is so quiet! I really don't understand those who say otherwise. I sleep like a baby with it running right next to my bed. 3) It takes tap water. No expense of constantly buying distilled water. 4) No dust! This is a huge plus for me! It is so clean! 5) It is easy to clean. No small crevices and crannies where mold could grow like other humidifiers. Clean, flat lines. So well-designed. 6) It is easy to fill and when full lasts 5-7 days. Again, great design! I am a 73-year-old woman, and I can fill and carry each jug by myself. The jugs are designed to fill and load easily with no spillage and no mess. It is worth every penny. I have never been happier with a humidifier, and I can tell a difference in my dry eyes, sinuses, and skin. Thank you, Vornado, for making such an excellent product.

This is working well for my living room/downstairs and loft area. It is around 500-600 sq feet. We also have high ceilings. I use a seperate humifiers for each bedroom. We heat our whole home with wood and it gets very dry inside. This is keeping our humidity around 40-42%. Last year without this humidifier we were around 29 or lower. We keep in on medium fan highest humidity level and it runs constantly. It does make some sound on medium but its easy to get used to. The high setting is very loud. I am sure it would make our humidity go lower on high, but because its in our main living area.. it would be too loud to hear the tv or just annoying to listen to! Occasionally it does make a sound as the water is filling the inside. That is easy to get used to as well and not disturbing. Very easy to clean and fill. I clean weekly per the instructions (bleach and water) and soak the wicks in 1 cup vinegar to 1 gallon of water for a half hour,rinse clean. The wicks lasts about 1 month this is with running 24/7. I just use tap water but I do not have hard water. I am happy with my purchase.

I have owned the Vornado Evap40 humidifier for about 3 years now. I initially was looking for a humidifier to try to make a dent in the super dry air of a Colorado winter and all I was finding were kinky 1 gallon or Goliath 10 gallon models and the Vornado seemed to fit my needs perfectly. It holds 4 gallons of water giving about 4 days of constant running, and the footprint isn’t massive. The Vornado does a great job of evaporating water into the air. It’s nothing fancy, it has two large filters that act as huge water wicks and a fan to pull air through them and blow the evaporated water into the air. Since it isn’t heating the water or anything it can be used for summer and winter. It makes a constant noise, like a desk fan, but I don’t find it too loud and it has three settings, the middle one you can barely hear but for a very dry winter you will want it on full. The two water tanks are pretty cleverly designed, no caps or valves. You fill them and then tip them into the machine, just read the instructions and they flow well. It can make large gurgling noises as the water glugs out so maybe for a bedroom it might annoy a very very light sleeper but I have it in my living room. The good thing is you can fill just one tank if you are feeling lazy or whatever and still get multiple days of humidification. After 3 years of non-stop 24/7 running on high my unit finally started to fail. The motor made a squeaking sound and it wasn’t working right. The humidifier comes with a 5 year warranty, I filled out one online form, sent one picture to Vornado of the unit with its cord cut to show that I had disabled the broken unit, and they shipped me a new unit that got to me in like 3 days. Literally no questions asked warranty service, no proof of purchase or anything asked, very very easy, I’d definitely buy more Vornado products just based on that.

This review contains an original and a revised posting. The original rating was 4. The revised rating is 1. The original post: These things work pretty well, but they run through more filters than a chain smoker, and replacement filters are absurdly expensive. Pros: it works, disassembles nicely for cleaning, comes with two huge holding tanks, has a stylish contemporary look. Cons: must run on high speed for good evaporative output, high speed is disturbingly loud, you'll need lots of filters unless you have pure water and nobody has pure water unless they distill it, expensive filters. Disclosure: I just bought my second unit. It seems essentially unchanged from the old unit. Haven't hooked it up yet. Hope it's quieter. The old unit is still running but threatens to die every day. It's given 5+ yrs of service, but even when new was too loud for bedroom use. The revised post: 2/27/24 The old unit finally died (the motor), so I unboxed the new unit. It looked much like the old one so I expected no problems operating it. I filled both tanks with water and inverted the first. As you may know, when the tank is inverted water flows into the holding tray until it is about half full, then the water stops. On my old unit the water flowed in with a familiar "glub glug" sound, but on this new unit the sound was missing. Instead, the water rushed into the holding tray. And rushed, and rushed, and ... rushed some more. Until it came streaming over the top of the holding tray. And then it just kept on coming. As I looked on incredulously it spilled in seconds onto my bookcase, down its sides, down its front and back and onto the floor. I snatched off the tank and examined it. It seemed absolutely normal. No holes, no malformations, no sign of mistreatment. I refilled it and tried it on the opposite side of the unit. Only to flood the floor again. By now the corner of my office was a swamp. I moved everything to the garage and repeated the experience two more times, successfully flooding my work bench and everything in its vicinity. I felt compelled to get to the bottom of the mystery. I discovered that one tank works perfectly, when loaded onto either side of the unit, and it even has the old familiar "glug, glug" sound effect as it feeds in the water. The other tank, however, is a complete disaster. It forcefully flushes its contents into the holding tray until the tray fills and then it keeps flushing, forcing water over the top edges of the open holding tray, creating an absolute disaster of a mess. I'll make a video of the flooding process and post it in case anyone thinks I'm making up any part of this deplorable story.

I’m enjoying this little humidifier. I have a an open concept downstairs, 4 rooms, no doors. I needed to raise the humidity in the living room from 21% because I have a piano and the wood goes wonky in the dry air. In 24 hours on high it ran through about 3 gallons and I was able to get the humidity up to my target 30-35% at 65F with an outside temp of 20-35F. It’s pretty loud on high, especially when you’re trying to play piano. I found medium fan speed was the best for me so it kicks on, bumps the humidity up a bit, and then turns off so I can enjoy playing the piano. But low is pretty quiet as well. It’s pretty powerful seeing as the humidity is constantly escaping to the other room but I doubt I could get my room to above 40% unless it was running on high all the time. I was worried about the 2 gallon water tanks, but it’s super easy to flip them into the humidifier with no spills. Probably not the humidifier for you if you can’t carry 2 gallons because it’s not really possible to fill with a pitcher. It’s so simple compared to other humidifiers that I imagine this will function for a long time.

As a manual humidifier it works well. While it's not ideal at all if you need to move it regularly (it's easy to slosh water out and the plastic appears to be on the thin side) it does raise the humidity to whatever level I want, if I control it manually. The humidistat does not work well at all. It cuts on when the humidity is lower than desired, and doesn't cut off until it's higher than desired. Following the manual, I've adjusted it a number of times with the same results. It's not cut on when the humidity was 15% lower than desired, and it's not cut off when the humidity was 10% above where it was needed... I could see 5% off but not 10-15%. (I have a hygrometer in the same room so I can watch the levels, and even if that was wrong I can feel it getting too humid before it shuts off). It's not a huge problem since I'm in the room regularly, but but I wouldn't trust it at all in a music room or room with sensitive plants or animals. To me filling it seems fine, it's a little awkward the first time worrying about how it drops water into the unit, but I had no issues there. I've had a time or two one of the two tanks did not want to empty. The other tank emptied but the full tank had to be jostled around to get it to do anything. Noise wise the fan is very quiet on the low setting, and for a a couple rooms I can set it in a less noise sensitive area. It's loud on high, but if that was needed I'd think that was an indication a larger unit was needed. It does make a loud gurgling noise which is annoying at night if I notice it.

The Vornado Evap40 is a great humidifier. I went with evaporative type to avoid mist dust. With a large open floorpan, smaller humidifiers just did not work well. I purchased this about a year ago and used it last winter until spring then restarted this fall/winter. It runs 24/7 on either low or medium, aiming to keep indoor humidity about 45 percent with seperate humidistat. I replace the wicks monthly and use tap water, which is replaced daily. Cleaning is a breeze, I add a dilute vinegar solution to sit for 15 minutes or so, quick scrub then rinse. This is a great change from trying to remove scale buildup when cleaning warm mist humidifiers, which I did for years. I would estimate the humidifier uses about 3 gallons per day, although it could put out more on high speed. Not needed in my situation. Although there is some noise, it's white noise on low and medium. High, which is never used, gets noisy. If TV or music is on I don't notice the humidifier sound. I highly recommend.