When you work from home, it’s important to make your home office a place you want to spend time. Improving your workspace can significantly improve productivity, and make your work day much more enjoyable.

There is one simple element that can help you enhance your home office easily and affordably. And that’s by introducing air purifying plants.

The Problem of Air Pollution

When you imagine air pollution, you might think of smog lingering above a cityscape, or fumes billowing from a factory. But indoor air pollution is becoming an ever-increasing issue.

In our homes, there can be a number of air pollutants having an adverse effect on our health, whether we notice it or not. In the home, we come into contact with solvents found in glues, chemicals found in cleaners and odorless harmful gases such as radon and carbon monoxide.

These can be worse during the colder, darker months when we spend longer inside with curtains drawn and the heating on full blast. And if you decide to open the window for a blast of fresh air, how fresh is the air that’s coming through the window?

Read also: The Best Indoor Plants for Appartments

The Solution

It’s not all doom and gloom, however, even though it may seem that way from this article’s intro. There is one companion that has been on earth longer than all of us and still serves to help make the air we breathe safer. The humble plant.

Plants are natures decontaminant and they actually purify the air we breathe. According to the NASA Clean Air Study, plants take in harmful gases and pollutants and make the air safer to breathe.

Plants do this using a process called phytoremediation. This is a fancy word for purification and involves the plant removing harmful substances from the air.

It should come as no surprise then that having these leafy friends around can impact on your health and productivity.

There are certain plants that are particularly good at both removing the pollutants from the air and being easy to look after in a home office environment.

Best Plants to Add to Your Home Office

Perennials

These green, leafy plants will stay more or less the same all year round and continue to work impressively, all they need is a little water and sunlight. This group includes plants such as aloe vera, areca palm, boston fern and golden pothos.

These plants are well known for their ability to remove harmful pollutants in the air such as formaldehyde, benzene and carbon monoxide, as well as having the ability to get rid of the chemicals given off by paints and exhaust fumes.

They can grow to a range of different sizes so pick one that suits the space you have. Most of the green perennial air purifying plants need little attention other than watering and sunlight, but will provide a service that money can’t buy.

See also: 20 Tips to Stay Ultra Productive While Living The Laptop Lifestyle

Flowering Plants

If too much greenery isn’t your style, then there are flowering plants that can do the same job for you. Plants such as African daisies, chrysanthemums, peace lilies and dendrobium phalaenopsis.

These plants will flower and have pretty flowers to look at. However, looks aren’t everything and they will also perform the important function of purifying the air in your home office.

These plants also remove formaldehyde, benzene and carbon monoxide, as well as ammonia, trichlorethylene and xylene, a pollutant found in paint and glues.

These plants are usually a little more tricky to take of, as they require certain levels of water and sunlight and aren’t as hardy as the perennials are. But for the service they provide and the elegance they can give a home office, you can’t put a price on their value.

With these plants it is important to remember that while the flowers are lovely and give the room colour and decor, it is often the green leaves of these plants that do all of the important filtration work and therefore do not be too hasty to get rid of the plants if their flowers die or have not yet sprouted. They are still carrying out the job you want them to perform.

Air purifying plants are the one thing that no home office can be without. Their health benefits combined with the attractiveness they can provide a bleak and lifeless space is invaluable and certainly something that anyone with a home office should look into adding.

Try them out for yourself and see if you notice the incredible benefits these plants offer.

About The Author

Kelli is a healthy lifestyle blogger for GroomAndStyle. In her free time, you’ll likely find her reading or doing something outdoors.