Meaco Sefte Smart 36" Tower Fan review: powerful cooling for larger family spaces

RRP at time of testing: £100 | Check price at Amazon, John Lewis or Meaco directly

Our verdict

We gave this fan a thorough workout during a particularly hot August, when the temperature inside our home climbed above 30°C. It kept all four of us comfortable during family film nights and pushed a noticeable breeze right across our large open-plan living space.

It’s much sleeker than the ageing tower fans we’ve owned before and feels sturdier too. There’s none of the creaking, clicking or wobbling I’ve come to expect from an oscillating fan. With 12 speeds and four oscillation angles, it’s easy to adjust, while Night mode and the magnetic remote earned their keep. The app is handy, but hardly essential.

It did make us work a little harder in our dormer bedroom. The bed blocked much of the airflow, so we propped the fan on a box and shuffled its position until it covered our super king bed properly. It worked, but it’s worth knowing if you’ve got a tall bed. And while the app is useful, I’m still not convinced every household appliance needs to colonise my phone.

At £100, I think the price is fair. I’ve bought worse fans for not much less from Amazon and Argos over the years. This one feels well made, performs strongly and, after a month of near-constant use, feels built to last.

How we’ve tested the Meaco Sefte Smart 36" Tower Fan

I tested the fan for a month during August, including through a particularly hot UK heatwave. At one point, the temperature inside our home rose above 30°C.

We used it in two very different spaces: our dormer master bedroom, where heat rises and tends to linger, and our open-plan kitchen, dining and living area, where our family of four spends around 80% of our time.

It's the tallest tower fan I've owned

We used a range of fan speeds, including eight and nine while watching television and the maximum speed of 12 during the hottest weather. We also tested the 45° and 90° oscillation settings, Night mode, the touch controls, magnetic remote and Meaco app.

DH and I didn’t test Eco mode because the weather remained so hot that we preferred consistent settings. We didn’t need the 180° oscillation setting because neither room required such a wide span and finally, the timer went unused because the fan was switched on for roughly 95% of August.

Meaco Sefte Smart 36" Tower Fan: what’s in the box?

The fan arrived with its base, mains lead and slim magnetic remote, protected by sleeves inside the outer cardboard box. Both the sleeves and box went straight into our household recycling.

No storage bag is supplied with the larger model. That isn’t a problem while it’s being used constantly, but we’ll need to find another cover to protect it from dust when it goes into storage.

It takes just a few minutes to get the thing set up - but you do need a screwdriver to hand

Setup, design and portability of the Meaco Sefte tower fan

Setup was straightforward overall, although aligning the base properly involved a small learning curve. Once I had worked out how everything fitted together, the fan felt secure and stable.

The controls sit flat against the top of the fan and respond to touch. This gives it a much neater finish than our older tower fans, which have physical buttons sticking out of the casing.

At 92.5cm tall, it’s larger than the models we’ve owned previously, but its base has a small footprint. It hasn’t got in the way in either our bedroom or living space.

There’s a hidden carry handle on the back, which makes it easy to move upstairs at bedtime and bring it back down again the following day. At 4.1kg it isn’t featherlight, but I could carry it between floors without trouble. 

Its pale finish also survived a month in a family home without becoming grubby, although our children’s strict no-touch policy deserves some of the credit.

Putting the base together is a little fiddly, but it's easier on a table

Performance of Meaco’s Sefte fan in our dormer bedroom

We positioned the fan at the foot of our super king bed. Unfortunately, because the air outlet begins relatively close to the floor, the foot of the bed blocked much of the airflow. Our highly sophisticated solution was to put it on top of a box.

Once raised, the fan did a much better job of directing air over the mattress. It was still a little hit and miss getting the angle right, so we had to shuffle the base around before its narrowest oscillation setting covered both sides of the bed.

The 45° setting was narrow enough to keep the airflow focused on the bed. It reached both edges without swinging away and wasting half its time cooling the wall. During the worst of the August heat, we used speed 12 overnight and it kept us comfortable even when the temperature inside the house had climbed above 30°C.

The fan was audible at full speed, but it produced a steady, white-noise-style hum rather than an irritating mechanical sound. There was no clicking as it oscillated and it didn’t keep either of us awake.

Meaco provide a allen key/screwdriver to put it together

Meaco Sefte fan’s performance in our open-plan living space

The fan was arguably even better suited to our open-plan kitchen, living and dining space. We positioned it in the corner of the lounge area beside the back door. At full speed, we could feel the airflow while standing in the kitchen around seven to eight metres away.

We changed the oscillation to 90°, which matched its corner position perfectly. Instead of concentrating the airflow on one or two people, it swept across our seating area and kept all four of us comfortable during family film nights throughout the summer holidays.

It doesn’t reduce the room temperature in the way an air conditioner would, but the broad stream of moving air made a substantial difference to how comfortable we felt. Our youngest did complain that he was too cold on one occasion, but we gave him an extra sofa blanket and carried on. 

Noise and smart controls on the Meaco Sefte tower fan

At its lower and middle speeds, the fan blends into the background well. We found speeds eight and nine comfortable during film nights, with little disruption to the television.

At speed 12, the larger model is noticeably louder. We usually have our television volume set to around 14, but we needed to turn it up while the fan was running flat out. That wasn’t a huge price to pay during a heatwave. It also had the unexpected benefit of drowning out the children when they asked questions halfway through a film.

We used the slim magnetic remote more than any other control method. It attaches to the top of the fan for storage and stays securely in place unless a child knocks it off.

The remote lights up in the dark at night

The Meaco app explains the settings clearly and proved useful when the remote disappeared between the sofa cushions. I still begrudge installing another app on my phone, though. For a fan, as well. Do we really need apps for fans? That said, being able to adjust the airflow from the sofa is convenient, and more tech-savvy households will probably appreciate it more than I did.

The shine-through display shows the room temperature in the centre, with illuminated bars for the selected speed. Small symbols show the active mode, including a moon for Night mode and a thermometer for Eco mode. The temperature reading was generally one or two degrees lower than our home thermostat, probably because the fan stood beside the back door.

Night mode switches off the display and silences the controls. There were a few nights when I forgot to activate it, only for my half-asleep husband to grumble at me to turn the display off. Thankfully, the remote does actually glow in the dark, so I could find it on my bedside table and identify the correct button without switching on a light.

Meaco says Night mode reduces the speed gradually overnight. We both fell asleep too quickly to notice it happening, so I can confirm that it didn’t disturb us, but not precisely how or when the speed changed.

Cleaning, running costs and value of Meaco’s Sefte tower fan

The removable blades can be cleaned more thoroughly, but I haven’t needed to do that after one month. The fan still looks clean and there’s no visible build-up of dust inside. Meaco doesn’t specify a rigid cleaning timetable for this tower fan. Its general Sefte guidance is to clean when visible dust appears and before storage. As I haven’t removed the blades myself, I can’t yet judge how straightforward the process is.

The fan uses between 3.5 and 34W. Based on Meaco’s quoted electricity rate of 26.11p per kWh, even running continuously at maximum power costs just under 0.9p an hour. At that maximum, 24 hours would cost roughly 21p and every hour of a 31-day month would cost around £6.60. Real-world costs should be lower because most people won’t use speed 12 continuously.

After only a month, I can’t say how the fan will perform several summers from now. What I can say is that it feels built to last. The base is stable, the casing feels sturdy and it doesn’t creak or wobble while oscillating.

Yes, I would buy it with my own money. I’ve bought considerably worse tower fans for not much less. The app and voice compatibility won’t matter to everyone, but the core performance, broad airflow, build quality and flexible oscillation justify the £100 price IMO.

The buttons are easy to find and press

Compare tower fans: Sefte Smart 36" vs. Sefte 19" Tower Fan

The larger smart model is designed for floor-standing, whole-room cooling, while the smaller model is intended for desks, worktops and bedside tables.

Final verdict: is this the right tower fan for you?

After a month of testing, I’d recommend this fan for families and larger rooms. It’d also likely suit home offices where space might be limited. It sent a noticeable breeze to the far end of our open-plan living space and kept all four of us comfortable through the August heat. Just bear in mind that the fixed vertical airflow makes placement important beside a tall bed.

The carry handle makes it easy to move around

At £100, it feels fairly priced for the performance, sturdy build and smart features. I could live without the app, but the remote, Night mode and adjustable oscillation all proved useful. So, simply put: it’s a fan I can see us hauling out every summer.

About the author

Rebecca Roberts is a Senior Content Editor hailing from Leeds. Here at Mumsnet, she aims to bring parents content that’s designed to make life easier. As a mum of two herself, she knows all too well just how much things can cost these days. From mattresses and bedding to kitchen gadgets and beauty tech - she's on a mission to find and test the products that are designed to make life that little bit easier for parents (and won't break the bank).

Beyond her role as an editor here at Mumsnet, Rebecca can be found balancing life as a working mum of two young kids and when she’s not at her desk, you’ll likely find her at a school PTA meeting, in a nearby coffee shop, or walking her two dogs up and down country lanes.

About Mumsnet reviews

All Mumsnet product reviews are written by real parents after weeks of hands-on testing. We never accept payment for coverage, and our verdicts are independent and honest. We may earn a small commission through affiliate links, which helps fund our work - but it never influences our opinions.

All prices are correct at the time of writing.

Read next:

• Best fans

• Best tower fans

• Best quiet fans