How to Choose an Ozone Therapy Machine for Home Use (2024)

At a Glance:

1. Ozone therapy is growing, especially given what’s happened in recent years, so there’s a lot of interest in home ozone therapy machines. That means there are many cheap options that may not be in your best interests.
2. To safely do ozone therapy, you need to produce pure ozone-oxygen gas mix, which means they need to come from medical-grade oxygen, not ambient air or oxygen concentrator. Also, the machine and all equipment needs to be made from ozone-resistant components.
3. When buying ozone therapy machines, pay attention to ease of use, accuracy and safety features, warranty (>6 months), and whether the company provides comprehensive training and customer support. These all reflect the quality of the product and ethics of the company.
4. These days, all ozone therapy machines use corona discharge technology. There are 3 types of ozone therapy machines: flow of gas, flow of gas + dial, and digital. Flow of gas (adjusted by the oxygen flow) is the cheapest and may be suitable for home users. Whereas, the dial and digital may become essential for clinics and users that need very precise ozone levels. Clinic users also need machines that withstand high usage levels and have excellent heat control, as heat can change the ozone concentration. 
5. To learn more, check out our ozone therapy guide.

‍Ozone therapy has become more popular in recent years both for intractable conditions and self-care purposes. That means there are more players on the market than before, many of which are relatively inexpensive. 

If you’re looking for a medical-grade ozone generator, there are a few criteria to keep in mind to make sure that the ozone you produce is pure and ozone handling is safe.

1. Ease of Use

Ozone handling requires great care and a machine that’s easy to safely operate. If you’re looking for wellness use at home, make sure the machine is easy to use with simple interfaces. An easy-to-use instruction manual is also helpful. 

2. Meets Criteria for Medical Ozone Generators

The International Scientific Committee of Ozone Therapy (ISCO3) set forward guidelines for medical ozone generators. These include:

Mandatory criteria

• Producing pure ozone from at least 99.5% pure medical-grade oxygen. Machines that use room air do not qualify as medical grade ozone generators.
• All parts that are exposed to ozone must be made from ozone-resistant materials to avoid erosions or off-gassing into the resulting ozone-oxygen gas.
• The resulting gas must be in therapeutic concentrations, between 5 - 80 gamma (μg/ml), with nothing else other than oxygen and ozone gas.
• Accurate ozone output with less than 10% error rate 
• A reliable cooling system to avoid interrupting ozone generation. Cold corona discharge ozone production is the best because it doesn’t heat up or cause changes in concentration.
• An easy-to-use syringe port

Desirable criteria include:

• Having a non-carbon ozone destructor built in to eliminate all extra ozone
• Vacuum pump that makes it possible to pump and destroy used ozone
• Capable of manual adjustment of electric current

Many less expensive ozone therapy machines are not ISCO3-compliant. There are numerous ways to cut corners, such as less precise engineering that produces impure ozone from room air, or using cheaper materials that will readily degrade with ozone.

3. They Are Used and Recommended by Trustworthy, Well-known Sources 

Look to your well-researched doctors and health advisors such as Dr. Mercola, Dr. Hyman, Dave Asprey, Ben Greenfield, Dr. Rowen, Hope 4 Cancer, Riordan Clinic, and others for their ozone therapy machine of choice.

Click here to download our ozone therapy guide

4. The Company Educates and Is Accessible for Questions

Just as ozone therapy is unregulated (or regulated against), it’s prone to misinformation and being mistaken as quackery. An ethical ozone therapy machine vendor will educate its customers on the safest and most effective use of its devices. They should also have customer service teams or account managers available to guide you through getting started. You want to work with a brand that cares about ozone therapy and its customers’ health. Not all companies prioritize this after you make a purchase.

5. They Have a Trustworthy Refund Policy and Warranty

The company’s refund policy and warranty should reflect confidence in their product. If it doesn’t work or constantly breaks down, they wouldn’t be in business. 

What to look for in a company:

• Demonstrable results — The company should be able to demonstrate results with the equipment through customer testimonials, objective tests, and third-party tests.
• Return Policy — A 6-month return policy with no questions asked is ideal.
• Warranty — A lifetime warranty with NO fine print. Some companies add fine print to make it seem like a lifetime warranty, when it’s only on the piece that will never break.

At the end of the day, you should buy from the company you feel the most comfortable with. That’s the most important thing. 

Click here to download our ozone therapy guide

Three Different Types of Medical-Grade Ozone Generators

What do the terms “flow controlled” and “dial” mean?

There are two ways to change the strength of the ozone produced by an ozone generator:

1. The first is by how fast you dispense the oxygen from the tank (flow controlled). 
2. The second is with a dial that changes how much energy is being used to create the ozone.

Why does changing the strength matter? Depending on the therapy you do, you may need to change the strength (aka concentration). For example, most people start doing rectal insufflation at 20 gamma (μg/ml). Over a couple of months, they may want to go up to a higher dose of 40 gamma. 

If you’re not a doctor and do ozone therapy at home, you’ll just need #1, the ozone therapy machine regulated by the flow of gas. Whereas, if you run a clinic or do applications that need more precise ozone doses, like IVs or injections, you’ll need ones with a dial or a digital machine. 

There are three variations of generators 

1. Flow of gas (best for home users trying to save money)
2. Flow of gas + dial (best for doctors who do IVs and injections)
3. Digital (best overall), also the most expensive

Medical-grade ozone generators can change the strength (concentration) of the ozone gas. You need to be able to change the strength of the ozone gas for different therapies. 

When you do ozone therapy, most of the gas is oxygen. Only a small portion is ozone (less than 5%). You wouldn’t want 100% ozone gas because it would be too strong. 

The strength of ozone gas is measured in gamma — aka micrograms/milliliter (μg/ml). A typical therapeutic dose ranges from 10–60 gamma. So depending on the therapy, you need to be able to change the concentration within that 10–60 gamma range.

The ozone generator takes pure oxygen and converts it into ozone. Two factors alter the strength of the ozone gas. 

Click here to download our ozone therapy guide

The first factor is how fast the oxygen is flowing into the device. The slower the flow of the gas, the stronger the ozone gas will be. This is because the oxygen spends a longer period in the reaction chamber (where the oxygen is converted into ozone). 

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Flow rate + amount of energy in the reactor = how much ozone is created.

You don’t need to understand all of this unless you want to. The right home ozone therapy machine should be easy to use and come with instructions that will tell you exactly what to do.. 

Click here to download our ozone therapy guide

Flow of gas generators

Most people use a generator that only has an option to change the amount of ozone by altering how fast the gas flows through it. 

There is a piece on the oxygen tank called an “oxygen regulator”. It has a simple knob on it that changes how fast the oxygen flows into the ozone generator. There’s a chart on the ozone generator that shows you what setting to turn this knob to. 

“Flow of gas” generators are the best for most home users for these reasons:

• Most simple and easy to use, with no extra bells and whistles to overcomplicate things 
• The simplicity makes it less likely to ever break down
• They do all the basic therapies for home applications but aren’t ideal for injections and IVs because they have limited concentrations to choose from

Flow of gas + dial generators

Some ozone therapy machines have a dial to change the strength of the ozone, in addition to the flow of gas described above.

The dial is technically called a potentiometer or rheostat. Its job is to change how much energy is being applied to the oxygen, thus changing how much ozone is created. 

The reason people choose an ozone therapy machine with a dial is because it has more concentrations to choose from. That’s it. This doesn’t matter for ozone therapy at home. 

However, it is helpful if you’re doing injections or IVs. A practitioner administering knee injections may want to slowly increase the concentration each session. For example, from 10 gamma to 13 gamma to 16 gamma to 20 gamma. Same for IV ozone therapy.

Most injection and IV protocols slowly increase the concentration of ozone because starting out too strong can cause discomfort to the patient.

Digital ozone generators

These devices are the best and easiest because there’s no messing with the oxygen tank or regulator. You just select what you want and it automatically dispenses it. 

You don’t need to change the flow rate from the oxygen tank because the machine does it for you once it’s connected.

On the digital interface, you select the concentration you want. You can also change the flow rate if you like. 

Usually, practitioners get these units because of the aesthetic look, ease of training staff, easier to use, and reduced amount of time required.

It’s the “I just want the best” machine. 

Click here to download our ozone therapy guide

Other equipment and peripherals for your home ozone therapy 

Some ozone therapy brands sell kits to make it easier for you to get started. Regardless of which type of administration you’ll need, you’ll always need an ozone therapy machine with an oxygen regulator, and an oxygen tank purchased locally.

Here’s a picture of the regulator. This is where you change the “setting” that is shown on the concentration chart. 

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It’s worthwhile mentioning that some regulators are different. They typically have fractions.

This table below lists the extra peripherals you’ll need for each type of home ozone therapy.

Extra peripherals required for different ozone therapies at home

Ozone Therapy Route	Peripheral Needed
Rectal Insufflation	3-chambered ozone bag
Ear Insufflation	3-chambered ozone bag Ozone delivery headset
Breathing Ozonides	Ozone Oil Bubbling System Nasal Cannula

Click here to download our ozone therapy guide

Best Ozone Therapy Machine for Practitioners

For practitioners doing ozone therapy in a commercial setting, you’ll want machines with more settings that can handle high-volume use. Many practitioners may wish to start at a low dose and slowly titrate up, for example. So, the adjustable ozone output (flow control + dial or digital) is essential. Also, high volume use means temperature control becomes even more important than for home use. 

Why Do I Need Oxygen and How Do I Obtain It?

Medical ozone generators require 99.9% pure oxygen for ozone therapy.

You can’t use room air or oxygen concentrators because it is not pure oxygen and will produce harmful contaminants when put through the ozone generator. Oxygen concentrators do not provide the same level of purity (95% at best) as an oxygen tank (99.9%).

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Unlike all other parts and ozone therapy equipment, oxygen tanks cannot be shipped on airplanes because they’re at risk of fire and explosion. Therefore, you need to get an oxygen tank locally. You’ll have to go to a local oxygen supplier and pick one up. Refer to this article about oxygen tanks, your options, and how to get them. 

Next step: Download our ozone therapy guide here.