Breathe cleaner air indoors, thanks to uHoo

By Bruce Brown May 10, 2016

uhoo indoor air quality detector uh2 — uHoo indoor air quality detector Image used with permission by copyright holder

It’s a pretty sure bet you have smoke detectors in your home, and possibly carbon monoxide (CO) and ozone detectors, too. But there are many other hazardous substances that could be in the air that none of those three detectors will notice. When most of us talk about air quality, we’re thinking about the air outside. As it turns out, though, inside our homes the threat can be even greater than outside. uHoo is an indoor air quality detector that claims to be able to analyze, monitor, and send real-time alerts for a wide range of dangerous substances. It’s available today for pre-order on Indiegogo.

uHoo has separate sensors, rather than just a one-size-fits-all sensor, for carbon dioxide (CO2), carbon monoxide, ozone, air pressure, volatile organic compounds (like those in paint and home cleaning products), temperature, dust, and humidity. When you set it up, it reads your air and delivers a report via Wi-Fi to the cloud which then passes it on to an associated free iOS or Android smartphone app. Because the apps stores the information in the cloud you can monitor readings over time.

You could just put one uHoo in a central location in your home or business. The smartphone app can manage the data from multiple uHoo sensors. It’s also easy to imagine that, especially if the initial levels of one or more substances were bothersome, you might want sensor units for several areas, especially bedrooms, kitchens, and garages. Also, if you have relatives anywhere in the world you can equip them with uHoo detectors for their homes and monitor their air quality from a single smartphone. Businesses, especially those with multiple locations, can keep track of their air quality with the app, as well.

It’s important to realize that the uHoo detector doesn’t do anything about bad air, just as a smoke detector doesn’t put out a fire. Remedying air quality problems calls for different solutions depending on the problem. But provided it works as promised, what the uHoo does do is detect airborne substances, many of which are odorless, that you would never otherwise know were there.

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Digital Trends Contributing Editor Bruce Brown is a member of the Smart Homes and Commerce teams. Bruce uses smart devices…

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