What is a cabin air filter?

The primary purpose of cabin air filters, located on most vehicles since 2000, is keeping the air inside your vehicle’s cabin clean.

It’s typically located behind the glove compartment or under the hood or dashboard on most modern vehicles.

Its job is to filter all of the air that comes through the car’s HVAC system to prevent pollutants, such as dust, pollen, smog and mold spores from entering. The filters can also catch rodent droppings, leaves and other unwanted debris.

However, it is usually not the top of people’s list for vehicle maintenance. But it does play an important role in filtering pollutants from entering the vehicle’s cabin.

Why it is important?

- Help with allergy problems

- prevent pollen from getting in the car if you live in an area with a lot of trees. (This is especially the case in most Australian Cities)

- prevent an expensive repair as when air is dirty, the A/C will work harder and the motor can burn up

Time to replace it

You should consider to replace the cabin air filter once a year or certain kilometres as recommended in your owner’s manual (if any).

Changing a cabin air filter is a do-it-yourself project, but it may be difficult to remove, for such a case, you may want to engage a mechanic to do it for you.