Dyson Pure Cool Link tower review – the emperor of tower fans

When it comes to Dyson fans, most consumers go through a three step process. The first is surprise that this strange looking hoop on a stand is actually a fan. The second is seeing and hearing it in action, and deciding they’d very much like one of these in their home. The third is looking at the price and having a rethink.

Retailing for a whopping £450, the Dyson Pure Cool Link tower is around four to eight times as expensive as pretty much any other fan on the market. As you’d expect, there’s a lot more to it than it appears, but whether you think it’s worth the extra money is very much a personal choice.

The Dyson Pure Cool Link doesn’t look like any fan you’ve seen before. In a metallic deep blue, the tower fan makes a bold statement, and it doubles down on this with its unconventional looks. There’s no blades, and no air grilles – the main design feature is the hole in the middle, supported by a cylinder at the bottom, which is where the fan is hidden. It looks pleasingly space-age and very stylish in a modern kind of way. It’s not something that will match every home decor, but considering most tower fans put function over form, it’s certainly a pleasing break from the norm.

Now, for £450 you’d expect a little more than just getting cool air blasted in your face from a pretty device, and Dyson offers considerably more from the Pure Cool Link than just greater comfort in hot weather, with the Pure part of the name referring to its air-filtering capabilities.

The fan includes filters to purify your air and generally make your environment that bit more pleasant to hang out in. In practice this consists of the same kind of HEPA filter you’ll find in many vacuum cleaners, it undoubtedly cleans the air of dust and allergens, though whether you actually need this in the average UK home is arguable. You know your own personal health issues and home but if you’re not sure then you probably don’t. What isn’t arguable is that to get the full benefits you’ll need to replace the filter every 6 months, at a cost of £50 a filter.

Cleverly, you can see the progress of your air-filtering on the accompanying smartphone app, which also doubles up as a secondary remote. The bundled one is small, and would be easily lost, if it weren’t for the fact it magnetically clips to the top of the fan. For minimalism, Dyson has also kept the physical buttons on the fan itself to a hard-to-reach power button, so if you lose the remote and don’t set up the app, you’re pretty limited in what you can do.

Performance

The unusual design isn’t just for show, though, as I saw a wider arc of air distribution from the Dyson than from similarly-sized tower fans. The Dyson Pure Cool Link managing to distribute 77 degrees beyond the centre, where others dropped out in the 60-70 mark. This does mean a slightly lower power in the centre of the fan, but it’s definitely a sacrifice worth making.

At full blast right seated next to the fan, the wind speed hit 4.7m/s, dropping to 0.8m/s two metres away. These are good scores in their own right, when compared to the competition, but this was backed up by being one of the quietest fans we’ve seen. That doesn’t exactly mean it’s whisper quiet, hitting 70.5db up close on the highest setting, but dropping to 51.9 two metres away. In night-time mode, it’s whisper quiet, recording just 44.5db next to the device and barely audible just two metres away, although obviously it loses some of its cooling power.

Conclusion

There’s nothing bad you can say about the Dyson Pure Cool Link, and if money is no object, then it’s a good buy (though you can buy portable air conditioners for less). That said, £450 is a huge amount for a fan, and if the appearance and air filtering aren’t key to you, it simply doesn’t offer enough over its rivals to justify the huge price hike. Still, if you’re looking for a truly striking fan then the Dyson Pure Cool Link is much more than just a pretty face. Check out ourBest tower fans 2016 for some less expensive, award-winning alternatives.