Selecting your sauna in Dubai involves many considerations and factors. You can always change the exterior and interior designs, but the essential factor is the technology that heats your sauna. If you are buying your sauna for the first time, you will get confused with the two terms used in the sauna industry, infrared and traditional sauna.
Well, you are at the right place, as we will be answering all your questions. Here we will be discussing:
- What is Infrared & Traditional Sauna?
- What are the key differences between traditional and infrared saunas?
- What are the factors you must consider before selecting your sauna?
Let’s Step Into Sauna World
Sauna is a century-old traditional practice used by various civilizations to enhance endurance, heal their body, and relax. As the technology and scientific studies evolve, we see development in the technology of sauna baths. Today, saunas are generally divided into two types of experience: Traditional sauna and infrared sauna.
What is a Traditional Sauna?
Traditional Sauna, as the name suggests, uses traditional heating methods to generate the steam and heat. Traditional saunas use sauna stones, which store the heat generated from electric stoves. Water is poured over the stones to generate steam.
Hot steam and the heat from sauna stones creates temperature up to 110 degrees. This entire setup is placed in a sauna cabin made of wood with high quality insulations to contain the temperature and humidity.
Exterior is usually made of high-quality wood, with doors made of tempered glass. The interior has wooden benches, some cozy lights, and you can also have an entertainment setup inside.
What is an Infrared Sauna?
An infrared sauna uses infrared technology to generate heat. Infrared lights replace sauna stones in an infrared sauna. The infrared sauna does not generate steam or raise the temperature of the entire room, but it raises your body temperature to up to 70 degrees.
Infrared sauna comes with various settings, same as traditional sauna, where a wooden sauna cabin is used with insulation to contain the temperature.
What Makes Traditional and Infrared Sauna In Dubai Popular?
The popularity of the sauna bath in Dubai has significantly increased in recent years. As the scientific studies support the health benefits of sauna baths in Dubai, people are interested in having a home sauna bath.
Key Health Benefits of Sauna Bath In Dubai
Scientific studies prove that a sauna bath has multiple long lasting heath benefits, from being an amazing muscle recovery remedy to permanent treatment of your stress, sauna bath offers all.
Sauna Bath Helps In Muslce Recovery & Reduces Inflammation
Sauna bath in Dubai is an amazing remedy for muscle recovery; the heat from the sauna bath relaxes the muscle tendons and reduces inflammation. An increase in cardiovascular activity increases blood flow and lymphatic activity, which flushes out cellular waste and relieves pain.
A traditional sauna bath is good for muscle recovery as the high heat relaxes the muscle and relieves pain, while an infrared sauna bath is good for joint pain as the infrared heat penetrates the muscle and relieves joint pain.
Sauna Bath Reduces Stress Hormones & Enhances Sleep Cycles
A sauna bath is proven to help reduce stress. During your sauna bath session, your body undergoes some major changes. Your body experiences mild stress during your sauna bath, but as you step outstside it slowly relaxes and resets your nervous system to the Parasympathetic Nervous System, which helps you relax.
This relaxation makes your body increase the flow of happy hormones (Endorphin) and decrease the flow of stress hormones (Cortisol). With a relaxed nervous system, you experience comfortable sleep with less stress.
Sauna Bath Boosts Blood Circulation & Helps Flush Intoxicants
Once you are in your sauna bath, your cardiovascular activity increases as your body is in mild distress, the heat dilates the blood vessles causing a pump in blood flow. This sudden rise in blood flow brings oxygenated blood to your body and flushes away cellular waste. Fresh oxygenated blood helps in the repair of cells and boosts muscle repair.
The pump in the blood flow also increases lymphatic activity, which flushes away all the buildup of lactic acid in your body. The sweat helps flush away dirt and other oils, and toxic matters from your body.
Key Difference Between Infrared and Traditional Sauna
Infrared and traditional sauna both serve the basic purpose, but they do have some key differences. Traditional saunas have their own experience with steam and stones, which were heated by fire back in the days, but as time passed by, traditional fire was replaced with electric stoves.
On the contrary, the infrared sauna is a modern-day product. Created to substitute the benefits of a sauna but with modern touches. To dissect the subject in detail, let’s segregate the key differences between an infrared sauna and a traditional sauna into the following.
Heating Mechanism: Traditional Vs Modern
The heating mechanism is the key difference between the saunas. The purpose of both saunas is to heat your body; for that reason, one uses sauna stones over an electric stove, while the other uses infrared lights.
Traditional Sauna: Sauna Stones with Electric Stove
Traditionally, saunas use fire with wood to heat the stones, but to accommodate commercial and residential use, fire is replaced with an electric stove. The electric stove is controlled with a thermostat to control the temperature of the stove.
A traditional sauna in Dubai comes with various types of sauna stones, including vulcanite, olivine diabase, ceramic, jadeite, and soapstone. Each of the sauna stones comes with its own ability to store heat.
When water is poured over the heated stones, it creates heat, which is the basic essence of every traditional sauna in Dubai.
Infrared Sauna: Infrared Technology
An infrared sauna does not require sauna stones to contain heat. An infrared sauna in Dubai uses infrared technology to heat the sauna. The infrared heaters emit light of different wavelengths to heat your body.
Unlike a traditional sauna, which uses two mediums to heat your body (stones and air), an infrared sauna directly heats your body with infrared waves.
An infrared sauna in Dubai uses three different types of waves to heat your body.
- Near Infrared (NIR): For skin-level penetration
- Mid Infrared (MIR): For tissue-level penetration
- Far Infrared (FIR): For core and organ level penetration
Sauna Experience: Steam Vs Heat
Another major difference between traditional and infrared saunas is the sauna experience. A traditional sauna produces steam, which heats your body. You have to pour water, heat the stove, and spend some time in your sauna cabin to experience the essence of a traditional sauna. While an infrared sauna does not produce any steam or heat because it directly heats your body without any hassle of pouring water or waiting for the stove to heat stone.
Traditional Sauna: Steam & Experience
A traditional sauna takes time to heat the sauna cabin with the steam and humidity. It is more of an experience to be in a traditional sauna with a bucket of water and all the steam. The heat from the stones and the hot steam slowly heats up the temperature upto 110 degrees.
You can control the heat of your stove with the thermostat and the steam with vents in your sauna cabin.
Infrared Sauna: Dry Sauna Bath & Quick Heat
An infrared sauna in Dubai heats your body quickly, making it fast because an infrared sauna directly heats your body with its infrared heaters rather than heating the air first. An infrared sauna in Dubai is also known as the dry sauna because it does not produce any steam.
An infrared sauna is a perfect choice for those who prefer results rather than experience.
Power Consumption: Traditional Vs Infrared Sauna
Another major difference between traditional and infrared saunas is their power consumption. Since both of them operates of different technologies, the power consumption is different. Infrared saunas use less power than traditional saunas because of various factors, depending on the size of the sauna and placement (indoor & outdoor).
Traditional Sauna: High Power Consumption
Traditional saunas in Dubai consume more electricity. The electricity consumption of a traditional sauna is higher because it requires more time to preheat. A traditional sauna usually requires 30 to 40 mins to heat the stones. Once the stones are heated upto 80 degrees, you can start using your traditional home sauna in Dubai. A traditional sauna requires 250V power lines to support the electric heater.
Once the preheat kicks in, the thermostat starts working and maintains the temperature in the desired range. The preheat time and thermostat temperature also depend on the placement setting of your sauna.
If you are using an outdoor traditional sauna in Dubai with a 6kW electric stove, the electric stove needs to work harder to maintain the temperature because of the humidity outside (typically uses around 5kW in preheat). It may use less power during the preheat because of the famous 45-degree weather of Dubai but during the session, your thermostat needs to work harder to maintain the temperature as the humidity kicks in.
An indoor traditional home sauna requires more time to preheat than an outdoor traditional sauna. They do need less energy during the sauna bath session than the outdoor traditional sauna because of the indoor temperature.
Infrared Sauna: Energy Efficient
Since infrared sauna uses infrared heaters to heat your body directly, they need less time to preheat (15 mins). An infrared sauna in Dubai can reach up to 75 degrees using various types of waves. Infrared heaters do not require more energy as they usually operate using 8 to 11 amps of power from a typical 220 to 240V supply.
With a lesser preheat time (15 mins), an average infrared sauna bath uses 1.5 to 3kW of power. Since the heaters only heat your body, the outside temperature does not play a role in an indoor infrared home sauna. For an outdoor infrared home sauna in Dubai, when the summer heat and humidity kick in, your infrared heaters need to work harder to maintain the temperature.
Key Differences:
| Traditional Sauna Bath | Infrared Sauna Bath |
| Uses an electric stove to heat sauna stones. | Use infrared lights to generate heat. |
| Generate steam when water is poured on hot stones | Dry Sauna: does not generate steam |
| Heat the entire sauna cabin | Only heat the body |
| The maximum temperature reaches 110 degrees | The maximum temperature reaches 75 degrees |
| A traditional sauna uses 4.5 to 9 kW of electricity for a typical sauna session | Infrared sauna uses 1.5 to 3 kW of electricity for a typical sauna session |
Step-by-Step Guide For Selecting Your Home Sauna In Dubai
The factors that we have discussed above play a vital role in selecting your home sauna in Dubai. You might be interested in a traditional home sauna in Dubai for the experience and amazing health beneifts or you might want to have an infrared home sauna for the affordability and direct heating.
To help you with selecting your home sauna in Dubai, go through the guide and choose what suits your needs!
What Is Your Use?
The first question you have to answer is how often you will be using your sauna and for what purpose. Do you want to have a home sauna just for the health benefits, or did your doctor refer you to have frequent sauna baths for your recovery? Let’s break it down!
Frequent Use Vs Occassional Use
- If you are a frequent user of the sauna bath in Dubai, you can have an infrared sauna because of the shorter preheat time and affordable power consumption.
- If you are an occasional user of a sauna bath and want to enjoy your experience, then a traditional home sauna is a perfect choice for you.
Fitness Enthusiast
- If you are a fitness enthusiast who wants to enjoy the amazing health benefits of a sauna bath, you can go for both traditional and infrared saunas in Dubai. Depending on your space and affordability.
Referred By a Doctor or Recovering From an Injury
- If you are referred by a doctor to have a sauna bath or you are recovering from an injury, then an infrared sauna bath is the perfect choice for you. Infrared sauna, with its deep heat penetration, helps in muscle recovery and relief from joint pain.
Where Do You Live?
Another important question while selecting a home sauna in Dubai is where you live. If you live in a residential apartment (building), you have limited space, and some apartments even have a limit for power consumption for each apartment. Villa owners, they do have lawn areas and plenty of outdoor space.
For Apartment Owners
- If you are living in a residential apartment in Dubai, you can go with an infrared home sauna in Dubai. The infrared home sauna uses less electricity, fits perfectly indoors, and does not generate steam, which is perfect for indoor use with a limited ventilation option.
For Villa Owners:
- If you are living in a villa or a bungalow, you have access to open space, which increases your options for both infrared and traditional saunas with both indoor and outdoor options.
