Why Is My Dehumidifier Blowing Hot Air? (Find Out Now!)

A dehumidifier is supposed to make the inside of your home a more comfortable space. On those days when the air feels heavy and sticky, you’ll be glad to have a dehumidifier on hand.

After having a dehumidifier in your home for a while though, you may notice that it’s blowing out hot air. It’s fair to wonder if that’s a normal occurrence.

It is normal for your dehumidifier to be blowing out hot air as it heats the exhaust air after removing the moisture from it. The hot exhaust air turns other water droplets into steam, making it easier for the dehumidifier to effectively remove moisture from the air. The heat is generated by the compressor.

Find out more about how your dehumidifier should work by checking out the information featured in this article. After reading this, you should be able to keep track of your dehumidifier better.

A dehumidifier is probably not the first appliance you think of when coming up with something that can improve your home. Still, that doesn’t change the fact that a dehumidifier can be very helpful in the right circumstances.

Dehumidifiers work by reducing the humidity level inside an enclosed space. They can also be used to keep the humidity at that ideal level. As it turns out, controlling the humidity in that way can prove beneficial.

According to the University of Rochester Medical Center, dehumidifiers are best used in households hosting very old or very young residents. Allergens can live in rugs, carpets, and other nooks and crannies of your home and cause breathing problems once released. Even if those allergens are released into the air, the dehumidifier can remove them.

In addition to the health benefits, dehumidifiers also make your home more comfortable. We all know how difficult it is to deal with the sticky air that emerges from time to time. Dehumidifiers can spare us from that kind of discomfort.

Once installed and activated, the dehumidifier starts working by first sucking in the moist air in a given room. The electric fan found inside the dehumidifier is responsible for drawing in the air, notes Explain That Stuff.

The collected air is then passed through some cold pipes cooled by some refrigerant. The air passing through the pipes is cooled down significantly and the moisture it once contained turns into water droplets. Those water droplets then fall into a bucket or collection tray.

The now moisture-free air then passes through a compressor unit so that it can warm up again. It will then exit through another grille found on the dehumidifier and blow into the room. Like we said earlier, the warm air blowing into your room is a feature of a dehumidifier, not a bug.

That process will keep going as long as the dehumidifier is turned on. If the bucket is full, a plastic float in there will trip a switch that turns off the electric fan. You will have to remove the water from the bucket or tray before you can use the dehumidifier properly again.

Now that we’ve established that dehumidifiers producing warm air is perfectly normal, let’s try to set some expectations. The dehumidifier is not supposed to act like some kind of furnace that warms up your home on winter days.

The difference between room temperature and the temperature of the air coming from the dehumidifier should be marginal at best. We’re talking a difference of about 10 degrees Fahrenheit or 15 degrees at most. A temperature discrepancy higher than that could indicate that something is indeed wrong with your dehumidifier.

Dehumidifiers are supposed to gradually remove the moisture hanging in the air as they work continuously. It’s harder to pull that off when the air inside a given room is consistently humid.

Just like any other household appliance, dehumidifiers can be overworked too. At some point, they won’t be able to remove the moisture as effectively if they’re asked to work endlessly. It’s also possible that you simply forgot to turn the dehumidifier off and some of its components are now running hot.

There’s a simple solution here: Turn off the dehumidifier and allow it to cool down completely. This could take a while but it’s the only way to ensure that your dehumidifier will run like normal again. If you want to make things easier for the dehumidifier, you can also try changing the airflow inside the room.

A full bucket or collection tray will usually trigger an automatic shutdown of the electric fan in any dehumidifier. That’s not the case with all units though. The fans in some malfunctioning dehumidifiers may keep going even after the bucket or collection tray has been filled.

The air drawn into the unit may not be cooled down properly before it’s warmed up again. As a result, the air blown back into the room is hotter than it should be. Resolve this issue by turning off the dehumidifier, cleaning the unit, and then running it again.

We noted earlier that refrigerant is used to cool down the air sucked in by the dehumidifier. So, what happens if the refrigerant is leaking out of the unit? That means the warm air absorbed by the unit is no longer cooling down.

Instead of being cooled down before being warmed up, the air just gets hotter as it runs through the dehumidifier. You’ll notice all that warm air blowing into your home pretty quickly.

Turning off the dehumidifier is a temporary fix for this problem. In all likelihood, you’ll have to call a professional to patch up the leak.

Related Questions

Why Is the Dehumidifier Producing Cold Air?

On certain occasions, your dehumidifier may act more like an air conditioner and produce cold air instead of warm air. That is not something that should happen and it’s an indicator that something is seriously wrong with the unit.The likely culprit in this scenario is a faulty compressor unit. Remember, the compressor unit is the component responsible for warming up the air after it passes through the cold pipes. With the compressor unit out of commission, the cold air is free to exit out of the dehumidifier untouched.Compressor units gradually age and break so this type of issue is not exactly unique. The best way to fix this problem is to replace the compressor unit.

Why Is Water Leaking from the Dehumidifier?

Dehumidifiers may spring water leaks from time to time. More often than not, these leaks are related in some way to the bucket or collection tray.Broken or misplaced buckets won’t be able to catch all the water droplets from the air. It’s also possible that the drain tube leading to the collection tray is blocked and will have to be cleared first. A broken float switch can also lead to the collection tray overflowing and spilling water.

Why Is the Dehumidifier So Loud?

Loose mounting brackets and screws can lead to certain components of the dehumidifier vibrating as it works. Open up your dehumidifier and make sure that all the brackets and screws are tightened properly. After doing so, the dehumidifier should be humming quietly again.