What Size Should My Bathroom Ventilation Fan Be?

July 28, 2017

Everyday tasks like showering, bathing and shaving can put home-destructive humidity into the air in your Muldrow home. There’s good news still—a modest bathroom ventilation fan can protect you from warped wood, mold growth, damaged drywall and other problems associated with a humid bathroom.

Even if you have ventilation fans in your bathrooms, do you know if they’re the proper size? Are they as soft and energy efficient as they could be? Air Service Co. is here to answer your questions.

Today’s bathroom ventilation fans are small and smooth and they operate more quietly and efficiently than ever before. You’ll find a great range of choices, from average fans that will get the job done to fans with built-in heat lamps, motion sensors and heat-exchanger ventilation that helps prevent warmed air from leaking through your ventilation. While you can find a lot of bells and whistles to pick from, the most imperative characteristic of your fan is whether or not it’s full-sized enough to do its job.

Graded by the cubic feet per minute (CFM) of air they push, a bathroom ventilation fan should be able to exchange the air in a bathroom at least eight times an hour. With a typical 8-foot ceiling, your ventilation fan should have a CFM rating about the number of square feet in your bathroom. So, if your bathroom is 5 feet by 8 feet, a CFM rating of 40 would be satisfactory.

If you have a higher ceiling, the equation gets a little more complicated. You’ll want to multiply the width of the room by its height and length, divide it by 60 and multiply by 8. Or, to keep it easy, you can heed HGTV’s advice for bathrooms larger than 100 square feet – establish your CFM requirements by toting 50 CFM for every toilet; 50 CFM for each shower, bath and combo; and 100 CFM for each whirlpool.

If you’re not sure if your bathroom ventilation fan is the proper size, or you know it’s the occasion for a new one, give the experts at Air Service Co. at call at 918-212-8943. We’re here to help you make sure you have a ventilation fan that will work hard to care for your home and keep it comfortable.