SwitchBot’s Standing Circulator Fan is worth fighting for

I can’t remember the last time I was excited about a fan. Normally, I just buy whatever Vornado or Dreo model fits my budget, but that was before I started testing the battery-powered standing circulator fan from Switchbot.

As the name indicates, the Switchbot fan is a 3D circulator – which is a fancy way of saying that it can tilt up, down, left and right to deliver a decent amount of air around a room. Despite all the plastic it looks fine, is relatively quiet, runs for hours on battery, has an integrated nightlight, converts from desktop to standing fan in seconds, and works on its own or as part of a smart home. There’s a lot to like here.

Over the past month, I’ve been testing the Standing Circulator Fan in various scenarios at temperatures up to 34°C (93°F) and I have to say, I’m impressed. It’s so versatile, quiet, and portable that my whole family is fighting over who gets to use it. It’s not cheap at $129.99 (although it’s currently discounted by less than $100), but you’ll be hard-pressed to find a more capable fan for a lower price.

Like many people, I still associate Switchbot with those button-pushing robots. But that’s a disservice to a company that’s branched into everything from robovacs to doorbells and smart locks. The Standing Circulator Fan is the latest smart home device in a growing portfolio that now includes Nanoleaf’s lighting gear.

The fan head quickly attaches to a battery-powered base to create a desktop fan. You can also screw one or two vertical sections into the middle to create a standing fan up to 100 cm (39.4 in) tall. Assembly takes seconds.

Turning it on produces a respectable amount of airflow for a relatively small unit – 9.15 cubic meters per minute (about 323 cfm), a wind speed of 6.1 m/s (about 20 ft/s), and an airflow distance of 27 meters (about 89 feet), according to the spec sheet – and it can oscillate 90 degrees horizontally and 100 degrees vertically. This makes it a medium-duty fan that’s suitable for a bedroom or home office, but it will struggle to circulate air in a large living room.

It is very quiet due to its DC brushless motor and fan blade design. Standing about a meter away, I measured 50dB when running at maximum speed, and a whisper-quiet 28dB on the barely audible “Baby” preset, which is what I typically use at night.

The fan can be controlled from the app, via touch controls built into the base, or with the included remote control that magnetically attaches to the back of the fan. It can also be voice-controlled via Alexa, Google Assistant, and Siri when paired with one of Switchbot’s Matter-compatible hubs. Unfortunately, Matter only lets you turn it on and off, not adjust any settings, but it’s still useful for automation and scheduled events. “Hey Siri, turn on the standing fan,” is something I’ve been repeating multiple times every week.

One reason the Switchbot fan is so attractive is its USB-C rechargeable battery. This makes this standing, artful fan usable anywhere, no AC outlet required (but you can always leave it plugged in). It helped keep me cool on an outdoor terrace, for example, on a particularly hot, windless day.

The battery lasted 1 hour 45 minutes with maximum use of each feature. This means that the night light was set to bright and the light was set to low while the fan was rotating at its full speed. Battery life can be dramatically increased by dialing things back. In my testing, it easily lasted overnight when set to baby mode and Switchbot claims up to four days of continuous use when the rechargeable base is plugged into a standard 10,000mAh USB-C power bank.

I have a few $55 Vornado 533 fans in the bedrooms in my house of five. They’re less than half the list price of this SwitchBot, but make more noise despite producing nearly the same airflow. Everyone loves the sweeping 3D air patterns produced by the extremely portable Switchbot. This means more than a few fights over who gets to use it, especially on hot nights.

For the past few weeks the fan has found a home under my bed, where it creates an oscillating airflow upward to distribute the CO₂ plume created by me and my wife. It keeps us cool and helps mosquitoes figure out where we are. My wife is a mosquito magnet, and until now we have avoided breaking the net that would otherwise hang over our bed.

Switchbot’s Standing Circulator Fan lists for $129.99, but is regularly on sale for less than $100. It lacks the heavy-duty air circulation like the $149.99 Dreo PolyFan 704S, but it packs a punch for its size in a very portable, quiet, and highly adaptable battery-powered unit that can be integrated into a wide range of smart homes.

All photos by Thomas Ricker/The Verge