After 40+ Sauna Reviews, This is the Best Hybrid Combo Sauna

Most people don’t realize how different hybrid saunas perform in the real world until they sit in one. I’ve tested over 40 saunas in the last seven years, and the Heavenly Heat combo is the first hybrid that actually works the way people expect. A true infrared plus traditional setup that runs both heat systems at the same time. That’s the real separator.

In this video we break down what a true combo sauna is, why most brands can’t do it, and why this unit hits harder in cold climates, garages, and basements where infrared alone usually struggles. Hybrid is the move if you want faster heat-up times, far infrared saturation while the cabin climbs, and the hottest output you can get without going full commercial.

If you want to see testing clips, setup, heat-up comparisons, or community feedback, check out the Certified Sauna Facebook group. Tons of real-world use cases in there.

Read the transcript >

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Transcript

I wish I would have known this before I got my combo sauna or used another brand because there is a distinct difference that separates them. I’m Matt. I’ve tested over 40 saunas in the last 7 years. The real-world performance of saunas is often very different from the marketing. My goal today is simple. If you’re looking for a combo unit, a hybrid unit, something that has infrared and traditional like the Heavenly Heat combo, especially for Black Friday, you should know how it actually performs and whether or not it fits your space and goals.

When I first started, I wasted money on saunas that looked great online, but they just didn’t perform in person. I don’t want anyone else making these same mistakes. Let’s get into it. You’ve tested a ton of saunas on the channel. Not a lot of them are combo saunas though, and it seems like it’s kind of a difficult kind of threshold to get past. There’s issues with power constraints. There’s issues with moisture control if it’s like a combo sauna that’s like not dry electric.

Recently, I think you tested one out that you were pretty impressed with, but there were some reasons why and I didn’t actually expect it because I thought it was going to be heat coverage. I thought it was going to be build quality. I was surprised to see what actually stood out to you. First of all, how many combo saunas have you done and can you kind of like talk about what is a combo sauna for the people that don’t understand?

It’s the style of sauna that I’ve had the least amount of experience with because there’s not a lot of people that make them. Typically, most companies are either infrared and or traditional, not infrared and traditional. That gives you the combo hybrid approach. There’s not very many companies that build one particular model that has both types of heat offered. A lot of times, these are limited to outdoor offerings. Sauna sheds, custom sauna builds, so it’s rare that you come across options from the factory. We see people modifying saunas and putting traditional sauna heaters and infrared or doing conversions, but this style of sauna is very different than most people are used to, myself included.

Why do you think that there’s not a lot of options for the combo on the market? Do you think it’s a lack of understanding of how cool these things are or what do you think? Why do more companies not make these kind of saunas? I really don’t know. It kind of solves half the argument for there’s these two camps where everyone says infrared is crap and you got to have traditional sauna because that’s where the Finnish sauna research comes from.

It kind of makes sense to me for every company to make a hybrid combo because then if people want that or they’re hung up on that, they can just purchase a product that has both and it’s right from the factory and there’s no more arguing. It’s problem solved. They’re kind of expensive. There’s a couple hurdles to get over making the high heat components work with the controller and stuff like that and that’s what you mentioned in the very beginning.

It is the controller and the system that I’ve found that really sets these things apart because you might have a great hybrid combo unit, but if you can’t use traditional and infrared heat at the same time, then you really just have a traditional sauna or an infrared sauna. It’s not really a combo. It’s not a hybrid. Some of the companies out there that make these things have separate power supplies, separate controllers, and you can only run one or the other.

Do you think that they have to do it in some of these instances? A lot of this stuff is developing very quickly. I’ve seen in the last year saunas make a, I don’t want to say a giant leap forward, but as far as quality standards and stuff like that across the board, I’ve seen a lot of sauna companies start to innovate. I’ve seen them start to really increase on build quality, on heater coverage, on the things that everybody really would like to see in the saunas.

My question is, why is it that a ton of companies end up splitting that down the middle? Is it because, is that too much power to run through one system? I mean, it can’t be too much power to run through one system because the Heavenly Heat Combo Unit does it. I don’t know. To be honest with you, I can’t answer for them. There’s some technical things that you have to work through in order to have both systems work as an integrated single system. Most of that being, you need dual thermostats so that one system will not kick off just because the other one is raising the temperature in the sauna.

One of the things that’s hard about that is to get, I mean, it could be easily solved with a circuit board though and an integrated system that monitors and measures and adjusts for that. I would think the sauna companies probably see that as complicated, maybe don’t want to do it. I really don’t know. No. And that’s what I always wondered, what I see, they seem obvious, I guess, because I’ve had the opportunity to be around so many saunas because of you. And so I think the innovations or the small changes that companies have been making over the past year, for me, I’m looking at it like, well, it’s about time.

You know what I mean? I wonder if it’s, I guess I wonder if it’s an inevitable thing that’ll happen that more saunas that are the combo units will eventually follow this trend of what Heavenly Heat has done where they’re like, you know what, these people are wanting this combo unit because they probably want really high hitting heat. And you can’t really achieve that, especially if it’s dry electric or it’s, you know, infrared, if they’re getting that like 180, 190, you can’t really achieve that on its own with just one or the other.

Correct? Well, you can with a traditional, probably not dry electric, you’re going to struggle over 185, but if you use a finished wet sauna, you start bringing in lolly, humidity, moisture, you can get it hotter. But a lot of that comes down to the design of those. I mean, you have to have a large enough heat generator per cubic foot, you know, in order for that to work. It’s not difficult. It’s just sizing everything correctly, making sure you have power to run, you know, an 8KW, you know, traditional sauna heater or something like that.

And then not making the cabin too big. The diehard Finnish folks will, you know, swear that you need an upper bench or something that elevates you to basically put you in the realm of where the heat accumulation is, which is up higher. Can’t disagree with that. It’s, you know, it’s like gravity basically. But I really don’t know the answers to all these things. I can just tell you what my experience has been from, you know, trying them, checking them out, seeing what’s available. There’s a lot of great companies out there, but not a lot of these.

So let’s focus on the Heavenly Heat Combo unit because it doesn’t really seem like there’s much of a competitor in that space. It seems like this is the only one on the market that actually accomplishes what people are looking for, which is a true dual heater setup of two different styles at the same time. There’s some other brands on the market, I mean, just a handful that make stuff like this. One of them would be Finleo. I like Finleo products. They’re manufactured by the same plant that makes other brands of saunas that we love and use all the time.

The trouble with that is whether I like the design or like the look of it or whatever, it’s got separate heat controllers that don’t allow you to use them together. So when you go to do your sauna session in a Finleo, you have to choose that day. Do I want a traditional sauna session or do I want infrared? So you can’t power both on at the same time. That’s disabled in those units. It doesn’t make any sense to me. I wouldn’t buy a combo unit if I couldn’t run the combo.

So yeah, I mean, so the Heavenly Heat Hybrid, I mean, they primarily make infrared saunas and I love the fact that they’ve integrated traditional sauna heater for the people that want that, especially in an outdoor setting where it’s cold, like right now it’s snowing outside, that’s going to outperform any strictly infrared outdoor sauna on the market because you have the infrared saturation for the body, but you also have the traditional sauna heater to increase the cabin temperature because the temperature swing is so drastic from the ambient.

It’s 22 degrees today when I woke up. So to get a sauna to 180, that’s one heck of a temperature swing. So having ample, ample, ample power on tap is probably going to beat a single heat system every single time. So when they’re looking at combo units, it seems like the people that are going to struggle with like heat up time, like you just mentioned, if they are going to put it in a basement that is not, it’s not going to get warm, if they’re going to put it in a garage and they live up north and it’s not a heated garage, it seems like this is a prime candidate for the people that are going to have that massive temperature swing.

They know they’re going to need that heat up time and they don’t want to wait. It doesn’t matter if it’s a heavenly heat eco, even the best sauna in the smallest cabin space with the most heater coverage in those drastic temperature swings, it just having infrared on its own, it’s going to, what you’re saying is it might struggle in those spaces just because of just how far it has to bring up the temperature to get it to where you can actually sweat. Yeah, there’s three candidates that are a definite buy for a hybrid combo unit.

Number one, a person who is doubting themselves on whether or not they want to go infrared or traditional, buy a hybrid combo because you get both. You’ll never have to worry about it again. Number two, somebody who wants to put an infrared sauna outside but lives in a cold climate like this. I mean, we’re looking at snow in the mountains off screen. You can kind of see a reflection in that glass back there, but you know, somebody who wants an outdoor infrared sauna, but is worried that their climate is just so cold that it won’t perform, get a hybrid combo because you have a lot more heat on tap.

And then the third would be exactly what you said, garage or cold basement, unheated basement. You can put an infrared down there, but it’s going to take a long time to preheat. If you have the power availability in the space, you put a hybrid down there, you’re going to drastically reduce that because you’re able to overcome those temperature swings of the ambient much, much faster. It’s Black Friday month. So there’s a ton of sales going on. Are either of those songs that you mentioned on sale, do you have any like discount codes? Do you have anything to, what I’m asking Matt is if you, do you have some savings for

The people? Yeah, there is this month, as long as they stay in stock. I don’t know if these are still in stock, you’d have to check. You can use coupon code justice for a discount. The exact amount, I don’t know, because it depends on the size of the model. The bigger ones, you get a bigger discount, but I think it’s somewhere between like 600 to $1,200 off. That’s a discount on top of the Black Friday pricing. They’re doing free shipping and whatever else they offer, but you can look in the Facebook group. We have updated stuff in there all the time and there’s a ton of questions and answers on combo hybrids in the Facebook group also, because some people are like, well, if traditional sauna really provides dah, dah, dah, dah, heat, why not just do a traditional and ditch the infrared?

Well, part of the reason for that is because by doing both, even because a traditional sauna takes a really long time to heat up most of the time by itself for you to do an actual real finished sauna session. With both, you’re able to, while the sauna is not at complete temperature because you have the infrared, if you still get into it before it’s preheated, you have the far infrared saturation while the cabin temperature is building. So the intensity of the heat of running both is really what’s making a difference for these folks where this is the best fit. So if you have questions about that, you can see examples in the Certified Sauna Community on Facebook. You can post in the comments. We do follow-up videos. You can see pictures and videos from us unboxing and putting this thing together, checking it out, seeing the differences.

But you do have to run 240 in order to power all this stuff. I mean, but if they’re going to buy a multi-person sauna anyways, the majority of a multi, like anything 2.5 and up, they’re going to need a beefier power supply anyways, right? Yeah. I mean, these are big saunas, number one. Number two, you’re getting all the heat that’s available in the industry. There’s no other saunas on the market that have more heat than these. So if you’re looking for the absolute hottest sauna that still has infrared in it, this is it.