Russell Hobbs RHDH1101G review: Can this tiny dehumidifier deal with the damp?

There’s definitely room in the market for a product like the Russell Hobbs RHDH1101G, as not everybody needs a chunky 20l dehumidifier occupying a corner of their home all winter long. Maybe you just need something to clear the moisture from a kitchen or back bedroom, or something that can fix a damp utility room or caravan. That’s where the RHDH1101G comes in: a micro-sized dehumidifier designed to remove up to 750ml per day from smaller spaces.

Cleverly, it doubles as a compact air purifier too. I take a look to see how this compact, 2-in-1 dehumidifier works.

Russell Hobbs RHDH1101G review: What do you get for the money?

This Russell Hobbs dehumidifier retails at £90. It’s a small unit, available in matt black or dark grey, with a tiny 218 x 200mm footprint and standing just 315mm high. It’s designed to dehumidify rooms of up to 20m2 in size, with a 750ml daily capacity and a 1l tank. To put that into perspective, large dehumidifiers are designed to collect between 10l and 25l per day, and usually have a 2l to 5l tank. Still, it’s just under 2.8kg in weight, so very easy to carry, and incorporates a replaceable HEPA air filter.

Russell Hobbs RHDH1101G review: What features does it have?

The RHDH1101G is about as basic as dehumidifiers get. By default, it functions as a manual air purifier with low, medium and high fan speeds, selected through glowing touch controls on the panel that hangs over the central air outlet. When you tap the dehumidifier button, it starts dehumidifying and doesn’t stop until you manually turn it off. There’s no humidity display, humidity sensor, automatic mode or laundry mode. What the RHDH1101G does have is an auto cut-off, which kicks in if the dehumidifier is left on for long periods of time, and an auto-defrost feature to make sure water doesn’t freeze on the condensing elements.

On the plus side, it looks surprisingly stylish, with cool blue LED indicators next to the touch controls and another one illuminating the central drum while the unit is turned on.

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Russell Hobbs RHDH1101G review: How well does it work?

It’s reasonably effective as an air purifier. In our usual test of spraying deodorant into a small room, it cleared the air from an unsafe peak PM2.5 level of 263 to a safe 25 in 152 seconds. That’s actually better than Russell Hobbs’ own RHAP1001B air purifier.

Don’t expect too much from it as a dehumidifier, though. I had low expectations in the living room I usually use for testing, so I wasn’t surprised when the best it could do in a two hour period was reduce the humidity from 71% to 68%. In the small bedroom where I normally test compact dehumidifiers, it managed to reduce the humidity from 71% to 64% over the same two hour period. That’s not bad, but a long way behind the De’Longhi Tascuigo AriaDry Multi, which saw an 18% reduction in similar conditions.

Basically, it’s OK for reducing humidity in a small space that’s not too damp, but it doesn’t really have the drying power for anything more. To be fair, Russell Hobbs doesn’t make any claims to the contrary. The 750ml per day target is probably about right given that after I’d left it running for three hours, the RHDH1101G had still extracted less than 100ml of water.

Russell Hobbs RHDH1101G review: What could be improved?

Given that it’s not a hugely powerful dehumidifier, the RHDH1101G is fairly noisy. I measured 39.1dB on its lowest fan setting and 45.2dB on its highest. At least power consumption is low. I measured it at 31.6W on the low fan setting with the dehumidifier switched on and 40.7W on the high fan setting. You wouldn’t want to leave the Tasciugo AriaDry Multi on all day when it consumes between 200 and 226W, but the RHDH1101G could just be left to run for hours without adding too much to your electricity bill.

Russell Hobbs RHDH1101G review: Should you buy it?

The RHDH1101G almost fills a niche for a compact, low-power dehumidifier that can work in smaller spaces, and it’s just about got enough drying power to keep on top of damp and mould in a small room. All the same, it’s only just got enough oomph to handle that job, and just won’t cope in any larger space.

Other affordable models, like the VonHaus Dehumidifier 12l, still don’t take up much space and will work faster in small spaces and more effectively in bigger ones. Unless size is an absolute priority, I’d recommend one of those instead.