Infrared Sauna - Carbon or Ceramic?

Infrared saunas are the modern-day version of saunas. The days of steam saunas are past now. These days, individuals no longer need to boil their bodies in a steam room to gain the benefits that a sauna offers. In fact, infrared saunas are more effective compared to steam saunas, as the infrared rays penetrate deeper into the skin and detoxify the body in a much deeper manner compared to the traditional steam sauna. However, there are two primary makes of infrared saunas available today – ceramic and carbon panel saunas. Which ones are better, and why? The short answer The short answer is that carbon saunas are way better. So if you don’t care about the reason and just looking for the answer, you know it now. Go for a carbon sauna and ignore ceramic saunas. If you don’t have enough money to buy a carbon-panel infrared sauna, then d yourself a favor: don’t buy a sauna at all. If you at all buy an infrared sauna, go for carbon. The longer answer Well, now you know what to go for – the carbon sauna. But why? To understand the reason, you first need to understand the notion of hot spots. A hot spot is nothing but a red dot on your skin, caused by burn due to overexposure to heat. So if some parts of your skin get exposed to high heat then those parts will get burnt. And other parts, that have not been exposed at all (or have been minimally exposed), will remai “cold”. The problem with ceramic infrared saunas is that they cause such hot spots on the body. This is because, the infrared heat produced in the ceramic sauna panels are by small tubes made of glass. And almost all the times, the glass tube placements are not up the mark. As a result, the heat does not distribute all over your body evenly. Some parts of the skin receive much more hat compared to the others. And how starts the vicious cycle. Since some parts of your skin will not have received sufficient heat while you are in a ceramic sauna, you will want to adjust your sitting position hoping to expose the unexposed parts of your skin to the infrared heat. More often than not, you will end up re-exposing most of the already-exposed part of your skin, while some part will for sure receive exposure for the first time. But by this process, some parts of your already-bu t red-spotted skin will become even worse. It’s terrible. The bottom line Ceramic infrared saunas were the state of the art once upon a time. However, the technology has moved much forward. While it is indeed true that ceramic saunas generate lesser heat compared to carbon infrared saunas, the bigger and worse truth is the set of red burn spots on your skin. The modern carbon saunas produce not only higher amounts of heat, but also distributes the heat evenly. As a result, you never get burn spots while using a carbon panel infrared sauna. There are different qualities of carbon panels. Using infrared saunas from companies that produce organic carbon with the wave-360 technology (which ensures even heat distribution all around the body) is the healthiest choice among all.