A simple guide to buying an air conditioner

Chances are, you have stumbled upon this article after one of the hottest days of the year, leading you to decide it’s time to bite the bullet and buy an air conditioner. Welcome, then, to a simple buying guide. • How many rooms do you want to cool at once? Will one or two split-systems do the job?

• What features do you want? Phone control, sensors, sleep mode?

• How powerful does the air conditioner need to be? Aim for a unit that can easily cool your room, rather than one that is too small, as this will make it work harder to cool the room and use more energy.

If you are a renter, you are limited in your choices and need to either consider a portable system or utilise the recent hot weather to convince your landlord to install air conditioning. For the average homeowner, there are two types of air conditioning to choose between.

A split-system air conditioner has two parts, an outdoor compressor unit and an indoor cooling unit. A reverse-cycle split-system is an increasingly common sight. This just means you can heat your room with the unit as well.

Split-system air conditioners are the most popular, simply because they can be used to cool individual rooms, giving you more control for a cheaper price, potentially saving you money in usage costs.

Split-system air conditioners can range from hundreds to thousands of dollars. A good rule of thumb is to aim for the middle, somewhere around $1300 to $1500.

There are also multi-split-systems which enable you to cool or heat your rooms separately, which can be ideal for homes that are not suited to ducted air conditioning.

Ducted air conditioning (and often reverse-cycle) is the more expensive option, often extending past $5000. It is popular because it is essentially invisible with ducted air conditioning grates in the ceiling, or easily hidden behind furniture.

This system works well for houses where most, or all, of the rooms are generally in use.

A larger initial outlay, between $5000 and $10,000.