# IKEA Alpstuga air quality sensor

15 Hacker News commenters recommended IKEA Alpstuga air quality sensor and 3 criticized it, November 2025 to November 2026. It was recommended in 5 of 13 months. It meets the Hacker Approved badge rule.

**Verdict:** A cheap CO2 and PM2.5 monitor that people find good for spotting ventilation trends. Critics say its CO2 sensor is indirect and drifts, so the absolute values are unreliable.

## Why people recommend it

- Low price for CO2 and PM2.5 (5 comments): "Teardowns confirm that ikea has been able to put a great quality sensor for such a low price." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47437495)) "Ikea makes a reasonably priced CO2 and 2.5 micrometer particle air quality monitor." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46635005)) "Ikea now makes the most affordable PM2.5+CO2 sensor, at $35 a no-brainer" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48785083))
- Good enough for ventilation trends (2 comments): "the sensor is fine to get a general feeling of the CO2 trends" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46646103)) "it's well good enough to see if the room is ventilated enough" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48783504))
- Teardowns show a good sensor (2 comments): "Teardowns confirm that ikea has been able to put a great quality sensor for such a low price." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47437495)) "You can also get the IKEA one which uses a good sensor" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48784224))
- Reported as fairly accurate (2 comments): "in my experience it’s much more accurate than that" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48784039)) "I found from dhh that are quite accurate." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50221657))

## What people warn about

- Thermal conductivity sensor, indirect CO2 method (3 comments): "it uses a thermal conductivity sensor, which is a very indirect method of measuring CO2" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48783965)) "It is a thermal conductivity sensor, which is a very indirect way of measuring CO2" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48783992)) "I would avoid the Ikea ALPSTUGA, it uses a thermal conductivity sensor" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48783879))
- Drifts, so values are unreliable (2 comments): "So the trend will be correct and the values will not be." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48785584)) "it continuously drifts, so it's not like you can use a particular offset." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48784057))

## Where to get it

- [See price on Amazon](https://www.amazon.com/s?k=IKEA+ALPSTUGA+air+quality+sensor&tag=hackerapprove-20) (affiliate link)
- [Official site](https://www.ikea.com/us/en/cat/products-products/)

## Cite as

Hacker Approved, "IKEA Alpstuga air quality sensor", https://hackerapproved.com/p/ikea-alpstuga-air-quality-sensor/ (counts from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026).