TCL - Breeva A3 246 Sq. Ft. Smart True HEPA Air Purifier - Black

A ton of value for the money! This is the least expensive smart/WiFi HEPA air purifier with 5 levels of protection and app monitoring I could find and I am incredibly impressed with this! It has automatic air fan speed that adjusts based on the particulate matter in the air. During a construction renovation I heard the fan kick on and I checked the app and it detected high levels of particulate matter and automatically worked hard to clean the air! Another time I was using Febreeze in the room and the air purifier did-not like it, detecting VOC’s and the fan speed kicked on to high! I am a fan of this air purifier!! Note- the SQ ft rating is a little misleading. It does not mean it won’t work in a space larger than 250 sq ft for example, it just illustrates how much square footage it can clean so many times per hour. You can easily use this in a 1000+ sq ft space.

I have had air purification systems in my sleeping quarters for the majority of my life, and I just started using one that is perfect for my needs – the TCL Breeva A3. At just under 8.5 lbs., the TCL Breeva A3 has all of the design and specification features that one could need or want in an air purifier. It is fairly small for the power it provides and the work that it does, and its circular shape allows it to take in bad air through a 360-degree intake and diffuse it back into the room in a similar fashion. The control buttons are simple and placed as an LED panel on the top of the unit. All of these features are also easily controlled through the TCL Breeva A3 app. This model, Breeva A3, is equipped to clean air in 12 minutes for rooms up to 246 sq. ft. and it eliminates 99.97 percent of all harmful particles in the air while doing so. This does not mean that the location of the air purifier must be in a room 246 sq. ft. or under, it just means that in that size room it can clean the air five times in an hour. It also works very well in rooms up to almost 600 sq. ft. The quality is not only in the design but in its working filter – which is the heart of the product and what makes this air purifier better at eliminating germs and virus more than others on the market. The Breeva Shield Plus 5- stage filtration system includes a pre-filter, a True HEPA (H13), an activated carbon filter, anion technology, and UV-C - a high power disinfection system. The air purifier not only absorbs smoke, odors from cooking, and cleaning product odors, but also eradicates exceptionally fine particles that other filters too often miss. The 5-stage filter eliminates bacteria and viruses and is designed with an Auto Shield mode (TCL patented) that detects air quality and adjust the fan speed to keep the air pure. The features on this unit are simple, exactly what is needed for a fully functioning and efficient air purifier, and many. The control panel has an ON/OFF, Wi-Fi indicator, Timer, Filter indicator, Air Quality indicator with three distinct color levels for good, fair, and bad air. It is equipped with TCL’s patented “breevaShield” that can be toggled on or off to eliminate bacteria viruses. There is a Child Lock and an Ambient Light that is subtle and great for nights. With the app, various adjustments can be made, including the intensity of the ambient light, dimming, or turning off the light behind the control panel, setting the mode of the unit, setting the timer, etc. The unit also has a sleep mode that never gets over twenty-six decibels loud – it is an incredibly quiet unit. The app continuously tells what the air quality is in the room that the unit is sitting in and that is always visible and active on the app when the unit is turned on. Being cylindrical adds to the sleekness of the design. It fits well in the corner of any room or just as easily along a wall. It is amazingly easy to maintain, and the filter icon will tell you when the filter needs replacing. Accessing the filter is quick and requires no tools. The filter is removed and replaced from the bottom of the unit. Setup for the Breeze A3 is also extremely easy to do. The very first thing that one needs to do before plugging the unit into electricity and turning it on is to remove the filter from the bottom, remove the plastic from the filter, and replace the filter back into the unit. After turning the air purifier on, it paired instantly and allowed me to connect to the Wi-Fi in seconds. The app then began a firmware update and it stalled at 50%. Even though I have a higher speed internet, being sure my internet was stable seemed to be the key to completing the firmware update. The product worked beautifully and continues to do so. I really like the brevaShield feature, especially in the times that we are living in now. The timer is another notable feature, and it can be set in either 1H, 2H, 4H, or 8Hr increments. I also really like the look of the ambient light ring. The app is built well too and allows me to adjust and fine tune features, control the unit, set the timer, and the mode. I especially like the ability to visually see what the air quality is in the room the unit is working in, and to see it in real time. This is an exceptionally good air purifier that has a small footprint and all the features that you need for smaller rooms. I highly recommend the TCL Breeze A-3 if you need an air purifier, and I definitely give it five out of five stars. Maybe you have not thought about actually needing an air purifier, but after looking at this one, you might decide it is perfect for you too.

The design, to me, resembles an hour-glass – so it is a tad different from the normal cylindrical shape of my other purifiers and I found the shape and black color a nice change from other units. It is easy to use, and it seems to do a good job of cleaning the air. It is very quiet in sleep mode so much so that I replaced a different manufacturers unit in our bedroom with this one. You could have it next to your head and not hear it, but not sure how much air it is moving/cleaning. I did find the low speed gave out a rather low “hum” for lack of a better word. It disappeared when running medium or high speeds where I could just hear the air moving, like an old circulating fan would make. I tried removing/re-installing the filter but that didn’t seem to help. Also, while the app is easy to navigate, I could not find a way to set up a schedule – which was dis-appointing since this is a smart unit and I can access anywhere from my phone. So overall I would recommend but that hum on low speed is annoying but may be an issue with just my machine. As far as setup I just used the QR code provided in the provided full manual. It took me to site to install the app. The machine connects to Wi-Fi using 2.4Ghz. Normally this means your phone must be on the same band to finish the install/connection – but I had my phone on 5Ghz to see if it would install – and it did! This is how all devices should work. After installation of app there was a firmware update which took a few minutes to complete. The app is easy to navigate, and I like that the filter estimate is in hours not percentage (starts at 2160 hours)– gives a better indicator if the life of the filter – but I don’t know if fan speed impacts it though – lower speed running less air = more hours to replacement? But as I stated there appears to be no way to setup a schedule for device. The units controls are pretty standard for these devices these days with On/Off, Wi-fi indicator, Mode (speed), Timer (1/2/4/8 hours), Filter reset, Air Quality (white = excellent, yellow = medium and red -= poor – in the app you can see particulate count and history as well) breevaShield turns anion/UV-C function on/off) Child Lock and Ambient light (an LED light that runs around the middle of the device – kind of like a night light – could be good for child or dorm room – brightness can be controlled from app). It’s a nice size (9 x 9 x 19 in) and is light enough to easily move from room-to-room or change the filter. One of the issues I have had with using prior air purifiers is – how do you know if it is working - cleaning the air? Upon plugging this unit in I set it to auto and it registered white which is in the excellent range, and it basically stayed there for a couple days of running. As I have done with other units, I fried some foods which seems to fill the air with pollutants and is a good way to test. The unit went yellow quickly and took a couple of hours to go back to white. Unit is rated for 246 ft. The living room we have the unit in is around 300 ft with 12-foot ceilings – and is open to the kitchen. Manual suggests vacuuming the filter every few weeks and dusting off the unit with a dry rag. To change filter is easy – just flip unit over and unscrew base. Having a child lock is a great idea as my grandsons like to play with the lights. 1-year warranty I have tested 4 other air purifiers from different manufacturers, and I would put this number 2 on my favorites list. Also only 2 of the others have function to setup schedule.

Good bedroom purifier. I looked for a while and decided that a hepafilter purifier is pretty much the same concept regardless the price point. I wanted something simple, modern and something that wouldn’t stick out like a sore thumb. This TCL unit is perfect. Got it on the desk of the day for $99 so literally couldn’t beat it. I’ve used dyson filters before but I wasn’t impressed for the price point on those. TCL has very decent unit, this purifier looks great and I love the integrated light.

I have several different brands of air purifiers in my house. I have 2 dogs, a bird and live in an area where we get lots of wildfire smoke, so all my air purifiers get a good testing in my house. I took the opportunity to test the TCL Breeva A3 in my home alongside both cheaper and much more expensive air purifiers and here’s what I thought. Looks and Style: I like the hourglass look of the Breeva A3. In the middle of the unit lies a ring of light that is used as the nightlight on the unit and definitely adds some class and style to the unit. The black finish and the ability to turn off all the lights is also great. The unit is small enough to fit in most spaces without being a nuisance. Functionality: You can totally use the TCL Breeva A3 as a dumb device without using any of it’s Smart functions, but you get some really neat control over the unit when you load the TCL Home app on your smart phone and connect the unit to WiFi. You’ll get options to adjust the brightness of the nightlight or completely turn it off and you’ll get a sleep timer function. I don’t believe any of these are available through the front panel. I would definitely load the smart phone app and tinker around with it. I primarily use the TCL on the Auto function with the UV sanitization on and it seems to work very well on this setting, only adjusting the fan speed when it detects an issue with the air quality. I do have an issue with how the filter needs to be loaded into the unit. In order to load a replacement filter into the unit, you have to turn the unit over and unlatch the bottom cover. This is different from most other units that don’t need to be turned completely over to access the filter. The filter is easy to replace and I had no issues inserting it into the unit or latching the cover. Performance and Noise: There are 4 levels on this unit, Auto, and 3 additional speeds. On Auto the unit stays mostly quiet unless it detects a degradation in air quality. On the first 2 settings the unit is relatively quiet, but on the max speed setting it does produce a significant amount of noise, which might be very nice for people that sleep with white noise in their bedroom. There is also an ultra-quiet sleep mode which I believe puts the fan on an even lower setting than the low setting on the panel. There is a bit of vibration due to how the fan is oriented in the unit, but the soft feet seem to absorb these vibrations well and I have no issues with the unit moving while on the floor. This unit states it’s good enough to clean a room up to 246 sq ft and I believe that’s probably correct based on how much air it moves on the high setting. TCL advertises the unit as having 5 stage filtration. It has a pre-filter, carbon filter, HEPA filter and uses UV-C and “anion” to destroy the DNA of airborne viruses, etc. Of course I can’t test if any of these features really work, so I have to trust the engineers and testing done by 3rd parties for these kinds of claims. Overall: I really like this unit. It’s low profile, looks good and seems to function well. Filters are all in one in design and are easy enough to replace. I couldn’t find replacement filters online yet, so I’m unsure of the cost of a replacement unit, but the manual states that you should replace them every 6 months or depending on usage.