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IAQng public signal
How many cigarettes is today's air?
Today's outdoor air, translated into something everyone understands: cigarettes. See how much smoke you're breathing where you live.
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Outside is only half the story
Smoke crosses borders, but buildings decide how much of it people actually breathe. People spend about 90 percent of their time indoors,EPA yet smoke still finds its way inside, often before anyone can see or smell it. Once indoors, particles that escape filtration can keep circulating even after the sky clears. Two buildings on the same street can end up with very different air.
What can I do about it?
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— filter days in the last 30 Filter Load →
1Filter your indoor air
Why this matters
Two moves. Change the filter on the air's schedule, not the calendar's. During smoke, run the HVAC fan more often when the system can handle it and use the highest-efficiency filter the equipment is rated for. Then add what the HVAC cannot reach, a portable HEPA unit sized to the room, which keeps working when the fan is off.
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2Bring in fresh air when it is actually clean
Why this matters
Fresh air is not the enemy, timing is. Close the windows and pull in less outside air while levels spike, as far as your ventilation minimums allow, then flush the building once it clears. Smoke arrives in waves, so there is usually a gap worth waiting for.
— cleanest air in the next 24 hours -
— dust pressure over the last 7 days How settled dust spreads →
3Clean the surfaces people forget
Why this matters
No filter catches everything. What stays indoors keeps circulating for hours, then settles onto every surface, floors, furniture, ducts, light fixtures, the tops of cabinets. Air movement lifts some of it back up for weeks after the smoke clears. Floors get cleaned because the dust shows. The high and hidden surfaces are the ones that get forgotten.
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4See what is actually happening inside
Why this matters
Citywide monitors cannot tell you what a specific building is breathing. SpaceBot combines indoor environmental data, occupancy patterns and building context so facility teams can see where conditions differ, what needs attention and how it all changes over time.
The national picture
Press play to watch the next three days, or click the map to highlight any city.
See the record →Forecast map: NOAA National Air Quality Forecast Capability (NAQFC, public domain). Live city readings: U.S. EPA AirNow (preliminary, not regulatory). Map outline: U.S. Census cartographic boundaries (public domain). Cigarette equivalence: Berkeley Earth. Refreshed hourly by SpaceBot for IAQng. Can you trust this number? →
Public cameras near you
A number is abstract; haze is not. These public cameras look out over the same region, so you can see the air the readings above describe. Nearest first.
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The air near you, over time
The map is a single moment. This is what the air has actually done: fine particles at the nearest EPA monitor, in cigarettes, or in the micrograms EPA reports.
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The worst air days on record
The map above resets every hour. These numbers don't: the highest daily PM2.5 that EPA monitors have ever measured, metro by metro, back to 1999.
100
US metros ranked by their worst measured day, with the full
record behind each one. Measured PM2.5, whatever the cause.
See the full ranking →
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named air-quality events, each resolved to a cause only
where the evidence supports it: EPA monitor qualifiers, NWS alerts, agency
statements, and reporting.
Browse the event catalog →
Know your air. Follow the mission.
IAQng is a public-awareness project: this map, and a manifesto for treating indoor air like it matters. Join the list for the signal and what comes next.
Read the IAQng manifesto →