The standard option for cooling a home is to use a centralized AC unit. This is a great option for pushing cold air to every room in a large house. On the other hand, if you have a smaller house, or a home that does not need a lot of cooling for whatever reason, using a central-air system might be overkill. In some cases, a mini-split system could work better. In order to choose the right cooling system for your home, you need to analyze your cooling needs and determine which system will best meet those needs. 

What Cooling Needs Best Suit a Mini-Split System?

A mini-split system has one condenser until located outside your home and up to four smaller evaporator units which you place right in the rooms that you want to cool. Thus, if you have a small home, a mini-split system is a good choice. You can, however, use a mini-split system in a large home depending on your situation. For example, if you have a craft room, office, guest room, or any other room that does see constant use, you don't need to cool these full time. You could instead, place your mini-split's evaporator units in the rooms you most use. This will help you save money in that your are using a smaller system and not pumping air into rooms you don't use. 

What Cooling Needs Best Suit a Centralized AC System?

If you have a large home, and you routinely, if not daily, use every room in the home, you will need a central-air system which can push conditioned air into every room. There are other situations that could require a larger system. For example, if you have a lot of large, open space in your home, the smaller evaporator units used with the mini-split system may have a hard time cooling a large space. Thus, if you have an open floor plan, you might want to steer toward a centralized system. 

Mini-split AC systems offer a great value in that they let you use a smaller unit to target the cooling in your home. Each evaporator will have a separate thermostat, so you can even turn the AC off to rooms as you leave them to further limit your cooling costs. While these features can help you to save money, you don't want to sacrifice your comfort to mind your budget. A central-air system is the right choice for large homes with a lot of traffic. If you have any questions about which AC system will work best for your home, call an HVAC technician to learn what can work best for you. Click here for more information.