Mini-Console Evaporative Humidifier 5D6 700

Most frugal and mostly effective? A large bowl of water with a towel submerged and draping over the sides. You also don't need to do the whole house, the bedroom will get you most of the benefits unless you WFH or something. Generally most frugal and effective: evaporative humidifiers. Low cost for volume/ability to humidify, and doesn't need DI water. Just a little bit of solution added to tap water, and/or rinsing off the wicks occasionally. I have a: "AIRCARE D-Series Small Home/Large Room Humidifier (1,250 sq ft, White)" but it looks like their price has dramatically increased since way back when. Just find something similar for cheap: wicks in a bucket with a small fan and humidity sensor on top. Besides that make sure it's easy to refill, which is another reason this design is great.

Look into an evaporative humidifier. The Aircare Mini Console works great for me in the winter.

Aircare Mini evaporative humidifier. It is perfect and easy to use.

I have the AirCare mini console and it is struggling to get our small living room up to 30%.

I own this and my wick turned orangey from my hard water so quickly. I use bacteriostatic additive so I don’t think that bacteria is the issue but the wick changing color certainly doesn’t give me confidence so this humidifier doesn’t feel low maintenance to me, at least not with hard water

I have a whole house evaporative humidifier that I use year round that has been going strong for 4 years so far. The warm mist humidifiers I've used last only a year before my very hard water breaks them. And ultrasonic humidifiers coat everything in a sticky dust that's hard to clean. The humidifier I use (older version of this one: https://share.google/fFdK2WzaIkj0Lc09W) has a wick that needs replacing about once every other month, so long as I keep it saturated. I buy a cheaper generic wick from Walmart to save money. Other than that, I just need to clean it occasionally to remove dust and prevent bacterial growth.

Evaporative is the solution. Once you try one you will never go back willingly. I had one for several years that used a single wick replacement each season. The only maintenance I had to do was add the anti microbial solution to the tap water i dumped into the container every other day, it was spotless inside after months of continuous use. I had a fairly large aircare console that had a humidistat as a controller, it ran through 5 gallons in about two days all winter long.m Before I got an evaporative I went through several cool mist, ultrasonic, style humidifiers. Without fail they all became a petri dish of slime and mold within a week on average. I cleaned these things with vinegar, dish soap, antibacterial solutions, and finally bleach which only extended the average by a couple of days. These require DI water since any dissolved salts will get misted as well, precipitating as dust and being an irritant for many people. I've also read some comments about the slime and bacteria getting turned into mist and either spreading spores or endotoxin to cause problems. Tldr: evaporative is cheaper and easier to use

I used to love our evaporative humidifier by Aircare. It's just a bin of cold water, a filter to wick up the water, and a fan to pull the moisture out and blow it into the room. The fan has a nice drone to it to create a white noise effect.