The QP Lite and QP Pro are great pieces of kit that Smart Air has been selling for the past year. Smart Air’s own internal testing shows the devices were the most accurate we have ever tested. But how do they fair in third-party government tests?
We sent them to the California Government’s testing program: the South Coast AQMD in the for further testing. The results of the test are truly impressive.
QP Monitors Performance – Third-Party Tested
The QP Lite and QP Pro both earned a top 10 spot when compared to the 82 monitors tested by the AQMD. The QP Lite ranked 7th and the QP Pro 8th.
AQMD observed a remarkable correlation between the reference devices and QP monitors, reaching an accuracy rate of 97%.
Note: R2 is used as the measure of the accuracy of the monitors. R2 measures how much variance exists between the actual value of PM2.5 versus the calculated value by each monitor. An R2 of .7 is represented by an accuracy of 70% in this article.
Read More: Best PM2.5 Air Quality Monitors in 2023
The QP indoor monitors have the lowest mean absolute error (MAE) out of all tested. MAE is the average of the absolute difference between the monitor and the reference devices. Smaller MAE values mean lower measurement error. The QP monitors achieved the lowest measurement error of only 1.8µg/m3 in the field test.
PM2.5 Air Quality Monitors: Price ≠ Accurate
The price range of these top 10 monitors varies from $70 to $2000. Once proven again, shown in the chart below, there was no correlation between price and accuracy. The more expensive PM2.5 monitors did not necessarily perform better. The 3 highest-performing air quality monitors were all priced under $200. QP Lite is the second most affordable monitor among the top 10 list.
Read more: Cheap Air Quality Monitors More Accurate Than Expensive Sensors
Open Data
The South Coast AQMD performed the air quality monitor tests. The complete test data are openly available on their website. The table ranks monitors based on their field MAE values, lowest value means the least measurement error and highest accuracy in an alternative perspective.
| Rank | Monitors | Model | Price(USD) | Accuracy | *Field MAE (µg/m3) |
| 1 |  | QP Pro | $135 | 88% | 1.8 to 2.3 |
| 2 |  | QP Lite | $96 | 89% | 1.8 to 3.6 |
| 3 |  | Elitech (Temtop LKC-1000S+) | $140 | 92% | 3.1 to 3.6 |
| 4 |  | Tera Sensor (NextPM) | $70 | 91% | 3.9 to 5.6 |
| 5 |  | Sensirion (Nubo) Discontinued | $2,000 | 91% | 4.7 to 5.2 |
| 6 |  | Atmotube (Pro) | $189 | 88% | 4.9 to 5.9 |
| 7 |  | Applied Particle Technology (MINIMA) | $995 | 88% | 5.8 to 6.5 |
| 8 |  | Air Quality Egg (2022 Model) | $671 | 89% | 6.0 to 7.1 |
| 9 |  | PurpleAir (PA-II) | $200 | 95% | N/A |
| 10 |  | PurpleAir (PA-I) | $150 | 91% | N/A |
Read More: Qingping Air Quality Monitor Review: Pro and Lite Models [2022]
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