One major symptom of an unhealthy house is high levels of humidity in your space. And a big contributing factor to your indoor humidity is condensation on windows.
While condensation on windows can stem from other root causes like your climate, your home’s thermal barrier or insulation, there are really practical ways to manage condensation on windows. By doing this, you’ll start to create a healthier space by lowering the humidity levels inside your home. And spoiler alert….these are some of the simplest things you can begin doing in your home to not only reduce condensation on windows, but it will be beneficial for your whole space and home health wise.
Why It's Important to Reduce Condensation on Windows
You may be wondering WHY this has anything to do with a healthy house, but the truth is it has A LOT to do with the indoor air quality inside.
If windows continually have condensation sitting on the sill, whether it be wood, vinyl or aluminum, the water creates a ripple effect in the quality of indoor air. First, the water sitting on the sill is damaging to the window casing. If it’s a wood window, you may notice the stain and varnish start to deteriorate rather quickly. Once that protective varnish is gone the risk of damaging the actual wood becomes very serious.
Wood is a natural food source for mold, and once mold has started on the window it can become nearly impossible to completely remove it. The maintenance that’s involved in wood windows that have condensation can be a long, tedious set of tasks.
The second way that condensation on windows affects your home’s health is by the water on the window raising your indoor humidity. If you’ve been around my site you know that indoor humidity can affect things like dust mite reproduction, mold growth and toxin off-gassing and the overall health of your indoor air. When indoor humidity is too high, the negative effects on the indoor air quality begin to take place.
But the good news (because that’s always the most important part of these posts, isn’t it?) is that reducing condensation on windows or eliminating it all together is actually easier than you might think.
1. Embrace and Use Vented Fans
This is a must when it comes to cooking and bathing. Just these two daily occurrences can increase the overall humidity in your home. If you have a master bathroom, it can REALLY affect the humidity levels in your bedroom. The water vapors quickly travel to where the air is dryer. Once humid air hits a cold surface like a window, it turns to condensation that takes quite some time to evaporate.
2. Stop Drying Laundry Indoors
Again, this is a point about adding moisture to the air inside your home. Your laundry habits, whether it be line drying indoors or using a dryer that doesn’t vent to the exterior of your home, can add a lot of moisture to the laundry room as well as the rest of the house. Checking to make sure your dryer is in fact vented to the exterior and that the vent is not blocked by lint will help ensure that most of the moisture is being expelled outside. Also, line drying inside can raise your overall indoor humidity by a whopping 7%-12%. If you MUST line dry, do it near an open window or use a fan of some kind to help.
3. No Over-Watering
While we’re on the topic of humid air affecting the window condensation in your home, make sure to check your plants (how many, location, etc.). Plants are a great source to add moisture to a dry area as well as other benefits to our health and wellness. But over-watering plants or too many plants in general can cause a large increase in indoor humidity levels. And if the plants are right next to the windows, I’m sure you can guess that they’d be more likely to cause window condensation from the humidity near the window area.
4. Use Your Humidifier Strategically
Many homes in the northern half of our country use humidifiers all throughout the winter. While this is beneficial to health and wellness in some respects, you have to use these strategically and safely. This post will help you use a humidifier in a safe and healthy way, but essentially, you want give your room time to dry out between uses. My best advice is to use the humidifier ONLY when you need it when you’re in the space and turn it off and empty the reservoir tank between uses. Second, don’t use the humidifier on the highest setting. And finally, keep the humidifier away from walls, textiles and windows if possible.
5. Keep Temperatures a Touch Warmer Inside
The science behind condensation forming on the interior of windows is that once warm, humid air comes in contact with a cold surface like a window, or sometimes even a wall, the moisture from the air forms condensation on the surface it touches. With this in mind, you can try to warm up the temperatures INSIDE your home, which will then in turn warm up the window surfaces. You may also notice that the windows on the south side of your home don’t have as much condensation in the winter. This is because the surface of the window is warmer.
6. Leave Shades Open
The better the air flow around the window, often times the less it condensation has a chance to form. The reason is twofold, in that the air circulation helps any water forming evaporate more quickly, but it also prevents the moisture forming in the first place due to regulating the temperature of the window. Keeping your shades open as much as possible can help keep air flowing around the actual window pane. This is the reason often times we see condensation in the morning, after the shades have been drawn all night, insulating the window from the warm interior air. The best trick is to open the shades right away and wipe off the window.
7. Use Ceiling Fans Frequently
Using a ceiling fan can be a great way to keep the air circulating in the room and keeping the interior air warmer and a bit more dry to prevent moisture from forming on the window panes. You’ll want to make sure the fan is rotating clockwise in the winter. This will help push the air off the ceiling and back to the floor, keeping the entire room warm. This is an easy change to make and try and often times one of the first things you might do, especially if the condensation is localized to one or two rooms.
8. Avoid Blocking Vents with Furniture
Air flow is imperative when trying to avoid condensation on windows. Make sure that you don’t have furniture blocking any vents that are in your space. You’ll want to keep HVAC vents clear of any rugs or furniture so that conditioned air can move into your space. And you’ll also want to make sure that you’re cold air returns are unblocked as well so you have better ventilation in your room.
9. Add Weather Stripping
Weather stripping either on the window or the window sash can help prevent cold air from leaking into the house, which can change the temperature of the window on the inside. Again, we want to keep the window on the inside of your home the same temperature as your indoor air to prevent condensation from forming. Weather stripping can be as easy as a foam adhesive strip you can add, or it can be as complex as adding a bead of caulking to the corners and edges. Either way, finding some quality weather stripping can help prevent condensation on the interior of your windows.
10. Ventilate for 5 Minutes Per Day
Opening your windows and letting fresh air in for just 5 minutes a day can greatly reduce the humidity that is inside the room as well as allow fresh air inside. If it’s cold outside, you can simply close the bedroom door and open the window so you won’t affect the rest of the home’s temperature. And all you need is just 10 minutes to bring that cooler, fresh air inside to help dry out the inside air. Some people even use this practice to improve their indoor air quality throughout the day.
Do you do any of these already to minimize condensation on windows? All of these put together will give you a home that has lower humidity, better indoor air quality and best of all, no condensation on windows.
