Will a Dehumidifier Help Cool Down my Room?

A portable dehumidifier is an invaluable appliance that helps reduce moisture and mold in your home. But can a dehumidifier help cool down your room as well? Do dehumidifiers create cool? A dehumidifier will not lower the temperature of your room, but it can make you feel cooler. *Because they don’t affect actual room temperature, you shouldn’t use a dehumidifier in place of a portable air conditioner—you simply won’t get the same effect. Do dehumidifiers create heat? It’s normal for portable air dehumidifiers to discharge some heat. This happens for two reasons:

• Dehumidifiers produce a small amount of heat while running their compressor, much like other household appliances do when they’re in operation. This heat, however, is usually barely noticeable.

• Dehumidifiers blow out hot air as part of the moisture removal process.

1. A fan brings humid air into the dehumidifier.
2. The humid air comes in contact with cooled coils within the dehumidifier. These coils extract moisture from the air.
3. Moisture collects on the coils and then drips into a reservoir inside the dehumidifier.
4. The newly dried air is then run through the condenser and rewarmed before being exhausted back into the room.

It’s not the heat, it’s the humidity While it does produce some heat, a smart dehumidifier can actually make you feel cooler because it lowers the relative humidity level of your room. Relative humidity (RH) is a measure of how much water vapor is in the air compared to the maximum amount of water vapor the air can hold.  

If you’ve ever been in a high-humidity environment, you know how muggy and uncomfortable it can feel. This is because when you’re in a humid space, sweat on your skin can’t evaporate as efficiently, essentially trapping heat within your body. The air is simply too saturated with water already to evaporate the moisture on your skin, leaving you sweaty and sticky instead of feeling any relief. This means that when you’re in an area with a lower RH, moisture on your skin is better able to evaporate. Energy Star Dehumidifiers can keep you cool and comfortable by lowering the RH of your spaces, thereby helping to regulate your body temperature.

The bottom line

Running your dehumidifier can help you feel cooler. However, this is because it lowers your room’s relative humidity level, not because it changes the room temperature.

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