Airthings View Plus review

The Airthings View Plus is the most complete air-quality monitor we recommend, and its headline trick is one no rival here can match: it measures radon. On top of that it tracks PM2.5, CO2, VOCs, humidity, temperature, and even air pressure, all logged to a clean app. The verdict: if you want one device watching everything — or radon specifically — nothing else comes close, provided you'll pay premium money for it.

What it measures

The View Plus covers the full spread of household air quality in a single unit. For particles it reads PM2.5, the fine particulate that matters most for deciding when to run a purifier. For gases it tracks CO2 — the best gauge of ventilation and stuffiness — plus VOCs for off-gassing and cooking. It rounds that out with humidity, temperature, and barometric pressure.

The standout is radon, a colorless, odorless radioactive gas that seeps up from soil and pools in basements and lower floors. No other mainstream consumer monitor in our lineup includes a radon sensor, so if that gas is a known concern where you live, the View Plus effectively makes the buying decision for you. It's the one device that turns a normally invisible, test-kit-only problem into a continuous reading.

Accuracy and the app

Airthings' app is the payoff for the price. It logs every metric over time, so instead of a bare instant number you get trends — you can watch CO2 climb in a closed bedroom overnight, or radon settle into a weekly pattern. That history is where a monitor like this earns its keep, because slow-moving gases like radon only make sense as a trend, not a snapshot.

Power is handled by six AA batteries that last roughly two years, which is a genuinely practical touch: you can place the unit anywhere — a basement corner, a nursery shelf — without hunting for an outlet or trailing a cable. It connects over Wi-Fi to sync readings, and the whole setup is designed to sit quietly and log for months on end.

Living with it

This is a set-and-forget device, and that suits its mission. With two-year batteries and wireless syncing, you place it once and let it build a picture of your home's air. The display shows key readings at a glance, while the app holds the detail and the history. There's no fussy maintenance and nothing to refill.

The one thing to be honest about is price. At roughly $250 to $300 it's a premium purchase, several times the cost of a basic PM2.5 monitor. You're paying for breadth — especially radon — not for a better particle reading alone.