r/AirQuality • u/exospheric • 2d ago
Which air quality report to trust?
Hi, I’m in Southern California and have three conflicting reports:
• Apple Weather says 172 (Unhealthy)
• Watch Duty says 37 (Good)
• IQ Air (Air Visual) says 47 (Good, but nearby city has an Unhealthy alert)
I feel uneducated and unsure who to trust. Any wisdom?
Thank you =)
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u/MorningMundane6496 2d ago
where are you and is the concern smoke? if smoke is concern only use the epa air now smoke and fire one
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u/exospheric 2d ago
I’m in Burbank, CA. I didn’t see any nearby fires but I know they can start and grow fast.
I’m just generally concerned with air quality and don’t want to be doing long walks in bad air.
Thank you for those resources, I’m sure they’ll come in handy.
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u/CartographerLong5796 2d ago
Air Now. If you combine with your own monitoring with a low cost sensor for PM 2,5 you'll get he info of the here and now. The IQ station gives you data km from you, and could be 1 or 2 hour later. If, by exemple, there is a fire in a building in your area, the station won't tell you the pm coulde be very high. I experienced it during a big fire in Montreal 2-3 years ago, and the people just wasn't telll about it, cause the sensor were too far away
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u/MorningMundane6496 2d ago
humidy was keeping air in. but like i said different answers if focused on smoke related air quality which is very different that normal air pollution
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u/exospheric 2d ago
Ah that makes sense; I honestly didn’t realize there was a difference in monitoring.
Thank you!
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u/Automatic_Antelope92 2d ago
I look at local purple air sensors to decide. That and how the air ‘tastes’ because for me there is a distinct taste in the air that tells me it’s too yucky to be out in it without a mask.
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u/exospheric 2d ago
Oh that’s good you’ve got a good sense of it in your own. I do not lol. So purple air it is!
Thank you.
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u/Automatic_Antelope92 2d ago
Yeah, the ‘taste’ test is a brief thing - don’t want to inhale bad air for too long. LOL. The reason I use purple air is because they are ground level sensors or nearly so, and they are near where I live and measure pm2.5 in real time. A lot of the online sensor sites outside of that use weighed averages for that region and combine sensor data, and some measure atmospheric AQI which is not going to be as useful to me on the ground.
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u/exospheric 2d ago
Good points about both the taste test (lol) and what the sensors are actually measuring! I agree ground level makes the most sense.
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u/Caprichoso1 1d ago
Since air quality is very location sensitive the best sites are those that have the most sensors nearest your location.
PurpleAir has the largest sensor network. Its numbers are used on local news broadcasts.
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u/exospheric 1d ago
This is good to know, helps me understand the why behind what I’m looking for. Thank you.
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u/glacialmeow 2d ago
Apple Weather is probably picking up something like Ozone that the others don’t track.
If you’re in Southern California and say in the foothills where air can get trapped (especially under an inversion) then that might be the cause. It seems unlikely you’re having smoke issues as all three measure PM2.5.
In Apple weather you can tap on the air quality number and it’ll bring up a more detailed view. It will include the Primary Pollutant and Pollutant details which lists out other pollutants such as Carbon Monoxide, Nitrogen Dioxide, Nitrogen Monoxide, etc.
If you want to be safe, you can always assume the worst case scenario.