Before You Buy a Portable Sauna – Please Watch This!

Portable saunas can be a great way to start sauna therapy — but only if you choose the right one and set it up correctly. In this video, I go over the biggest mistakes I see people make when buying and using portable saunas, plus the models that actually deliver results.

We’ll talk about build quality, safety, EMF exposure, VOCs, heater coverage, seating position, and how to get the best sweat possible — whether you’re looking at sauna domes, pop-up tents, or blankets. I’ll also show you affordable DIY options that outperform many store-bought units.

Read the transcript >

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Transcript

Some of those are just hard to beat for the money. You’re not gonna be able to get something else available on the market with that type of performance for that money. A ton of people on Facebook and on YouTube have been asking about mistakes they should avoid when they’re buying a portable sauna.

And I know what your stance is on portable saunas. I think there’s a use and a time for them. They’re not the worst, but they’re not the best. If you wanna start or you’re moving a lot, they’re a good option.

But the general question that people have been asking is, what are mistakes that you see people make when they’re buying those portable saunas and how can we avoid those mistakes? Portable saunas seem like an easy way to get started, but most people get it completely wrong. I see it over and over again.

If you’re thinking about buying one or already using one, here are the five mistakes you need to avoid. Mistake number one is buying based on looks or Amazon reviews. I don’t know if you’ve ever bought anything from Amazon, but some of the time, before the product even arrives in the mail, you get the email saying, can you give us a five-star review in exchange for X?

So a lot of five-star reviews on Amazon aren’t from people who have even touched or seen or unboxed the product yet. I myself have fallen victim or prey to that. I looked at the reviews and I’m like, oh, this is gonna be great. Let me just order it.

I think it’ll be fine. And then I get it. I’m like, this is a pile of crap. These people ever even touch this thing?

I think portable saunas are rampant with build quality issues. If you look at some of the other YouTube videos, we’ve got 700 on the channel. You can see like an example of a really bad quality vinyl rubber type fabric or material. That might get great reviews, but the second you take it out of the box, I mean, the nose doesn’t lie.

It’s just horrendous, horrendous. So, you know, sketchy branding, fake reviews, pretty doesn’t mean functional, shady trends on Amazon. The companies have gotten really good at emailing you before you even receive something with some incentive to leave a five-star review.

That has no bearing on whether or not the product is good, so That is true got great reviews I myself had a great experience with it mine didn’t catch on fire But a couple of other customers caught on fire and that made me hesitate. I was like, uh You know, maybe this The thing could take the whole house down and it’s like I don’t know about saving a couple hundred dollars to get something that might Burn my burn me alive, you know Companies like that.

I have zero confidence in their ability to deliver something. That’s actually safe, you know for people Forget about all the other stuff. I mean We’re being nitpicky when we get into EMF and VOC and this feature in that feature Before all of that if the damn thing is a fire hazard, that’s that’s a no Even something It’s difficult for me to say with portable saunas because All of them are so small.

You’re in close proximity to the electronics Yeah, so there’s only two on the market that really get good readings and good readings are subjective With a caveat in some of these cases, so most of them don’t have shielded cabling a couple of them do Some of them don’t even have grounded power, so that’s obviously a no-no The biggest thing is just understanding that There is nowhere to put the wiring the power supply or anything like that that gets far enough away from your body like a wooden sauna For it to be a complete non-issue So all of the portable saunas are gonna have some level of detectable EMF Now there’s a couple companies that you help me with one of them.

You haven’t seen the other one There’s a couple companies that have done a really good job, and they’re best in class best in the industry the one that’s top That just comes out on top flat out is the SoftBank SoftBank is one of the companies that I’ve worked with a lot and I’ve had a lot of success with them And I’ve had a lot of success with them

If you look at my videos for the OneLove sauna dome, those have really good levels. They also mitigate the electric fields, the ELF, both clear light and sunlight and kind of slacking on that. They’ve reduced some of the EMF, the magnetic fields, but not the ELF. And so when you’re in a dome or a portable sauna, your body is in such close proximity to the heaters.

I mean, you can really get high body voltage when you spot check these levels. The second thing that comes to mind is the sauna blankets are terrible, right? Some of them aren’t even infrared. They’re really cheap ones, like the $150 ones on Amazon, super high EMF, but also no far infrared.

It’s just like a woven heat coil, like an electric blanket. So the OneLove sauna dome, really good. The Persona, if you search the Facebook group for Persona, their sauna blanket is actually shielded and does work. I’m not a huge proponent of sauna blankets, but that doesn’t mean some people don’t still want them.

So I recommend you take a look at that. For a pop-up tent style sauna though, circling back to closing out the EMF, the Relax sauna, if you look at my reviews on the Relax sauna individually, those have some AC magnetic and electric EMF in them, but they do keep it at your feet.

So out of the portable sauna tent options, and also VOC wise, their tent does air out after a little while. When it’s vacuum sealed in the package in the cardboard box, when you first open it, it’s got a little off gassing, but it gets better over time. By no means is that a cheap sauna, but for somebody that’s looking for these things specifically, it does fit the bill.

Generally, how much are those compared to the OneLove dome? Oh man, I think I’ve seen multiple price increases from the Relax. It’s nowhere close to being an affordable thing anymore. To me, it’s ungodly expensive now.

I think it’s like $1,700. Dude, for that price, you’re right at getting a wooden sauna.

Like you are like within $100 or $300 of getting like a decent wooden sauna I mean you could even look at actually I have one behind me you could look at the life Pro Which is also 1,700 bucks, but it’s not gonna be low EMF It’s not gonna be you know It depends on what you’re looking for but the relax on a definitely top of the market as far as Price goes the thing that it has going for it though if you’re looking for like the best portable sauna experience The damn thing basically preheats instantly I mean just put like a towel over the little hatch Turn it on for 5-10 minutes.

Go make your sauna drink your electrolytes and come back and it’s just ready Yeah, pretty much I mean there’s a couple points you could talk on here number one If you feel lightheaded or nauseous if you’re not paying attention to any plastic smells You know, we talk about VOC, but we don’t talk about when you’re in a portable sauna you’ve got this thing zipped up around your neck like a tuxedo and Any vapors from inside are gonna come right up here right up your neck onto your chin.

You breathe them right in That’s why I think you know pause for concern on some of those things But if you’re too far away from the panels if you’re doing things that are covering up Your infrared exposure inside you’re gonna have poor sauna sessions. You’re not gonna get a good detoxicating You know sebaceous sweat You know So your setup matters you see height a lot of times the the camping chair benches that come with them They kind of suck You need to get either a shower bench chair from Amazon or a wooden stool or something that doesn’t block the infrared from your lower Back, you’re not gonna get the same experience and a lot of times the cheaper ones the little I call it a camping chair But the little nylon foldy chair thing is just very uncomfortable It’ll ruin your seating position and make it to where you won’t use it.

So just changing that can make a huge difference

actually lead lead me to like the last thing, which is if it’s not comfortable, if it smells, if it smells bad, if you’re not using it correctly, if you’re using the wrong chair, whatever it is, you’re not going to use it consistently. And that’s the point of all of it.

So while I see a lot of people use portable saunas to kind of dip their toes in to see if sauna is for them. I think that that will never carry on and never continue. If they’re not enjoying their sauna experience. And I think that’s a huge mistake I’ve personally seen with people getting portable saunas is they’ll get like a cheap one, they’ll try it out for a week, and then they never use it again, because it sucked.

And then that’s their sauna experience. Yeah, I mean, it comes down to your point about quitting too soon. You know, sweat response takes time, just like exercise takes time to build up your ability to do it. So sometimes, you know, portable units, you know, they’re not as nice as some type of a wooden unit with a glass door, and your seating position is different, your heater coverage is different.

Sometimes the panels are short, they don’t hit, you know, the same areas of your body with as much far infrared saturation. But if you give it a few weeks of consistent use, I mean, you’ll find that your body will adapt, you can build a great sweat in a portable sauna, it can get you by.

And I don’t know if you know this or not. But three or four days ago, I put a video on YouTube, talking about a cheap or really affordable portable sauna options. And it goes over like a $200 one that you can buy on Amazon, it’s not going to be low EMF, low VOC, but it will get you by if you want to get your feet wet.

It also talks about the videos that you helped me do with the DIY sauna. Yeah, those are really affordable, and we know that they work. So you know, it goes through and gives examples and options so that you don’t have to figure all this stuff out on your own.

We’ve tried them, just watch those videos, and it’ll pretty much you know, take care of it for you. While we talked about the one love dome, and we talked about the relax sauna, I think, I mean,

I know I’m biased about this, but I’ve watched it work and I’ve watched, you know, you film inside of it and within 10 minutes you’re sweating, just standing with the door open. The best bang for buck that they can get is the DIY sauna. Yeah. You get so much more.

You don’t lose that cabin space. You’re able to move around. You’re able to sit in a normal position. You could, I mean, some of those tent setups that you did, you could do freaking yoga in those things.

So, I mean, maybe not you, but someone could do yoga in those things. Now, why you say I can’t do yoga? You trying to say I’m too big or I don’t have the moves? Yeah, I would agree with you.

The, um, those are, those are good options. It’s really hard to, some of those are just hard to beat for the money. You’re not going to be able to get something else available on the market for with that type of performance for that money. You know, at the end of the day, it’s just like anything else.

It just comes down to, is it right for you? What are you looking for? What fits your needs? And one of these is going to work for you though.