11 Best Electronic Thermometers

Mer­cury ther­mome­ters famil­iar to most, despite their ver­sa­til­i­ty, dura­bil­i­ty and high mea­sure­ment accu­ra­cy, are los­ing their posi­tions in the mar­ket, giv­ing way to dig­i­tal options. Mod­ern man is accus­tomed to sim­pli­fy any manip­u­la­tion, includ­ing tem­per­a­ture mea­sure­ment. An elec­tron­ic ther­mome­ter reads infor­ma­tion using sen­sors and dis­plays the read­ings on the screen, where they are clear­ly vis­i­ble even to peo­ple with poor eye­sight.

The main advan­tage of the elec­tron­ic mod­el is the absence of mer­cury and the inabil­i­ty to break them, which attracts users in the first place, espe­cial­ly if there are chil­dren in the house, from whom it is bet­ter to keep clas­sic mer­cury ther­mome­ters away. The dis­ad­van­tages include the risk of break­age, the pos­si­bil­i­ty of inac­cu­rate read­ings, includ­ing through the fault of the user who incor­rect­ly car­ried out the mea­sure­ment pro­ce­dure (you must care­ful­ly study the instruc­tions for a par­tic­u­lar mod­el).

What to look for when buy­ing:

• Mem­o­ry.
  Devices can remem­ber from one to sev­er­al recent mea­sure­ments, which allows you to track tem­per­a­ture changes.
• Tip.
  It is bet­ter to choose flex­i­ble tips, espe­cial­ly if there is a child in the house. They allow the instru­ment to adjust to the sur­face, which facil­i­tates the process and helps to obtain more accu­rate data. Also on sale you can find prod­ucts with gold plat­ing, which are designed for peo­ple who are aller­gic to met­als.
• Sig­nal.
  An audi­ble sig­nal indi­cates the end of the mea­sure­ment. More advanced ver­sions may beep at ele­vat­ed body tem­per­a­ture, improp­er loca­tion of the device.
• Case.
  The pres­ence of a pro­tec­tive bag great­ly facil­i­tates stor­age and trans­porta­tion.
• Dis­play.
  Peo­ple with visu­al impair­ments should choose mod­els with a large screen and a clear dis­play.
• Frame.
  It is nec­es­sary to find out if the prod­uct is designed for dis­in­fec­tion pro­ce­dures. For adults, this is not so impor­tant, but if the pur­chase is made for a child, it is bet­ter to choose a water­proof option that can be dis­in­fect­ed.
• Design.
  There are two types — chil­dren and adults. Tod­dlers can buy a prod­uct of bright col­ors and attrac­tive shapes, so that the mea­sure­ment process evokes pos­i­tive emo­tions. For the lit­tle ones, paci­fi­er ther­mome­ters are on sale.
• Food.
  It can be replace­able (con­ven­tion­al bat­ter­ies) and sol­dered. The lat­ter option is more suit­able for small chil­dren due to safe­ty (lack of small parts).

Intro­duc­ing the rat­ing of elec­tron­ic ther­mome­ters 2021. The top 11 mod­els that were select­ed by our experts based on user reviews and rat­ings.

infrared thermometers

Price

: 2–7 thou­sand rubles

Infrared ther­mome­ters allow you to mea­sure tem­per­a­ture with­out con­tact with a per­son or ani­mal. This speeds up the process and reduces the risk of trans­mis­sion.

An infrared ther­mome­ter mea­sures heat radi­a­tion from the sur­face of the human body. The work­ing dis­tance of home mod­els is ‑3–8 cm, ther­mome­ters for mass use (indus­tri­al pyrom­e­ters) “beat” fur­ther.

Usu­al­ly the sen­sor is direct­ed to the auri­cle or fore­head. The process is some­what rem­i­nis­cent of scan­ning bar­codes at the check­out in a super­mar­ket.

Infrared ther­mome­ters are now used at air­ports, train sta­tions and in trans­port. The result is imme­di­ate­ly vis­i­ble on the LCD screen, so you can quick­ly iden­ti­fy poten­tial­ly sick peo­ple in the stream.

Infrared ther­mome­ters can also mea­sure the tem­per­a­ture of sur­faces. Or, for exam­ple, hot tea or soup.

But the mea­sure­ment accu­ra­cy will be dif­fer­ent: from 0.1–0.4 degrees Cel­sius for human body tem­per­a­ture to 1–3 degrees for oth­er mea­sure­ments.

Infrared ther­mome­ters from well-known man­u­fac­tur­ers of med­ical equip­ment are more accu­rate than the Chi­nese non­ame. But gad­get man­u­fac­tur­ers are also enter­ing the mar­ket: for exam­ple, Xiao­mi with Mi Mijia iHealth.

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Thermal imagers

Price

: 50–300 thou­sand rubles, rental — 5–10 thou­sand rubles a day

A ther­mal imager is a spe­cial device that dis­plays a pic­ture of the tem­per­a­ture dis­tri­b­u­tion over a cer­tain sur­face. This is clear­ly not a toy for home use, but a mil­i­tary and indus­tri­al gad­get.

The oper­a­tion of a ther­mal imager is based on Planck­’s law: all bod­ies whose tem­per­a­ture is above absolute zero emit ther­mal elec­tro­mag­net­ic radi­a­tion. The wave­length of radi­a­tion and the spec­tral den­si­ty of its pow­er depend on the tem­per­a­ture of the body.

The high­er the tem­per­a­ture, the short­er the wave­length. Most of the bod­ies in the space around us gen­er­ate a max­i­mum of radi­a­tion in the mid-infrared range: in the range from ‑50 to +50 degrees Cel­sius, wave­lengths — 7–14 microns.

The ther­mal imager dis­plays the tem­per­a­ture map in real time. The dis­tri­b­u­tion of col­ors depends on the instru­ment set­ting.

Usu­al­ly hot objects are shown in red, cold objects in blue or pur­ple. This is use­ful when scan­ning large areas: for exam­ple, the “red­dest” per­son in the crowd is poten­tial­ly infect­ed. There are many mod­els with a black and white screen (white — hot, black — cold).

The­o­ret­i­cal­ly, the real tem­per­a­ture of the object for the ther­mal imager can be masked. For exam­ple, cloth­ing or lay­ers of ther­mal insu­la­tion. This will allow you to give out 37.8 degrees Cel­sius for 36.6, but not hide in the steppe. Although with the face you still have to do some­thing.

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conclusions

Hav­ing decid­ed on the need to pur­chase a non-con­tact ther­mome­ter, the buy­er must remem­ber the fol­low­ing nuances:

• when choos­ing a device need pay atten­tion to the range, accu­ra­cy and mem­o­ry of mea­sure­ments;
• in advance costs deter­mine the need to obtain tem­per­a­ture indi­ca­tors of var­i­ous objects and air. Many mod­ern mod­els have this capa­bil­i­ty;
• Auto-off fea­ture helps pro­long bat­tery lifethere­fore it is bet­ter to pur­chase a device with this pro­gram;
• an impor­tant role is played by the pres­ence of var­i­ous sen­sors and indi­ca­tors. With them, using a non-con­tact ther­mome­ter will be much more com­fort­able;
• atten­tion should also be paid to ergonom­ics, build qual­i­ty and mate­ri­als used. It is bet­ter to give pref­er­ence to a mod­el from a trust­ed devel­op­er.

Thermal cameras for smartphones

Price:

500–5 thou­sand rubles

Infrared sen­sors for microUSB, Light­ning and 3.5 mm con­nec­tors are offered both on Aliex­press and in gad­get and acces­so­ry stores. In fact, these are infrared ther­mome­ters that mea­sure ther­mal radi­a­tion on the skin and trans­mit data to a smart­phone.

As a rule, the price and accu­ra­cy of such acces­sories are close­ly relat­ed. Before buy­ing, look for reviews and reviews of a par­tic­u­lar mod­el.

We have already reviewed some of them.

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How to choose a thermometer to measure body temperature?

A ther­mome­ter for domes­tic use is cho­sen accord­ing to sev­er­al para­me­ters:

• Tem­per­a­ture mea­sure­ment method. The most pop­u­lar are ther­mome­ters for mea­sur­ing tem­per­a­ture under the arm, but also rec­tal and fore­head mod­els, although they are not very pop­u­lar in our coun­try.
• Ther­mome­ter type. All devices are divid­ed into ana­log (mer­cury) and elec­tron­ic. The lat­est devices can be con­ven­tion­al, non-con­tact and infrared.
• Safe­ty and hygiene. Mer­cury ther­mome­ters are con­sid­ered the most accu­rate, but if such a device breaks, all res­i­dents will be at risk. Elec­tron­ic, infrared and con­tact­less devices are con­sid­ered safer.

What to look for when buying

The issue of buy­ing a ther­mome­ter caus­es dif­fi­cul­ties, as it has many nuances and dif­fi­cul­ties. As a result, a mar­riage may be revealed, the price will not cor­re­spond to the declared one, or there is no func­tion­al­i­ty in the device. Let’s go into more detail below.

Device type

There are three types of ther­mome­ters in stores: mer­cury, elec­tron­ic, infrared.

The for­mer are clas­sics for mea­sur­ing tem­per­a­ture, so they are pur­chased due to the fact that this is a time-test­ed spec­i­men. His mea­sure­ments are usu­al­ly the most accu­rate. How­ev­er, if you break it by neg­li­gence, there is a risk of leav­ing your home and dis­pos­ing of the met­al plac­er.

Elec­tron­ic (dig­i­tal) mod­els are con­sid­ered the most com­mon, because they allow you to quick­ly and safe­ly deter­mine body tem­per­a­ture. A high mea­sure­ment error is asso­ci­at­ed with non-com­pli­ance with the rules of oper­a­tion. So, the device, for exam­ple, must be held not for the declared “60 sec­onds”, but from 1 to 5 min­utes.

Infrared devices are much more expen­sive than pre­vi­ous ther­mome­ters, but allow you to spend a full sec­ond on the mea­sure­ment. In order for the device to work smooth­ly, its indi­ca­tors are clear and accu­rate, you must fol­low the rules described in the instruc­tions:

1. use 30 min­utes after eat­ing;
2. do not use imme­di­ate­ly after exer­cis­ing in the gym;
3. do not take mea­sure­ments after bath pro­ce­dures.

Display

For those who can’t see well, the pres­ence of a large back­lit dis­play will be a huge plus. It will also help you see the result in the dark.

Built-in memory

This fea­ture is use­ful for any patient who mon­i­tors tem­per­a­ture through­out the day. The stan­dard range is from 10 mea­sure­ments and up.

Pos­si­bil­i­ty of auto­mat­ic shut­down

Auto-off sig­nif­i­cant­ly saves bat­tery con­sump­tion and makes it eas­i­er to turn off the ther­mome­ter.

Sound indicator

The pres­ence of sound accom­pa­ni­ment is a manda­to­ry attribute on all elec­tron­ic devices. You will nev­er need to stand near the dial and count the cher­ished min­utes, as hap­pened before with a mer­cury ther­mome­ter. Some­times the sound indi­ca­tor is set not just for the mea­sure­ment time, but for an ele­vat­ed tem­per­a­ture.

flexible tip

Such an exter­nal device adapts to the shape of the body and allows you to take mea­sure­ments even in a child.

Water resistance

The water-resis­tant case helps pro­tect the device from dam­age when it gets wet. Also, this fea­ture great­ly facil­i­tates dis­in­fec­tion.

Availability of replaceable batteries

Addi­tion­al func­tion­al­i­ty that is not required for all mod­els. If a child uses a ther­mome­ter, then from a safe­ty point of view it is bet­ter to buy a sol­dered mod­el (with­out the abil­i­ty to change bat­ter­ies).

Storage case

An undoubt­ed advan­tage for the own­er is the pres­ence of a spe­cial case, case or cov­er for com­fort­able car­ry­ing in a bag.

Below, we have made a detailed overview of the very best ther­mome­ters by type, appear­ance, price range and the num­ber of fea­tures they con­tain.

Instructions for use

And final­ly — a few tips and a brief instruc­tion on the use of an IR ther­mome­ter.

• First of all, care­ful­ly read the instruc­tions and fol­low all the man­u­fac­tur­er’s rec­om­men­da­tions, includ­ing cal­i­brat­ing the device. That is, you need to mea­sure their body tem­per­a­ture sev­er­al times.
• If the ther­mome­ter was trans­port­ed along the street, then before start­ing the mea­sure­ment, let it stay at room tem­per­a­ture for about 15–30 min­utes.
• If the child’s tem­per­a­ture is mea­sured, then the lat­ter needs to be in the room and in a calm state for at least 10 min­utes.
• Do not for­get to select the desired oper­at­ing mode after turn­ing on the device.
• Mea­sure the body tem­per­a­ture until the sound sig­nal that the device gives out after the end of work.
• Look at the dis­play and eval­u­ate the results.
• Next, turn off the device or leave it alone until the auto-off moment.
• If you need to mea­sure the tem­per­a­ture again, wait at least one minute after tak­ing the tem­per­a­ture.
• Clean the ther­mome­ter sen­sor after use if it has been in con­tact with the body.

Rating of the TOP 12 best thermometers 2020–2021 of the year