My stress and anxiety during this pandemic have doubled being a wife, business woman, and mother at the same time. Ever since I started using this, I love waking up and reconnecting with myself. The cold plunge, I believe, changes my life. It relieves my stress and clarifies my thinking, which is really huge help for people like me.
Start with the room, not the heater. If the screenshots on your phone are full of saunas and what stops you is picturing where one would stand, here are the five checks, in order. Bring a photo to the call before you have measured anything.
A short call, by phone. No deposit taken.
The order matters. The first check decides which models are even possible, so it saves the most reading. The last decides whether you want any of them, so it saves the most money. If all five come out clean, book your free expert consultation. If one comes out badly, you have just saved yourself an expensive mistake.
Not measuring anything tonight? Book your free expert consultation and bring a photo instead. We will tell you what to measure.
Most sauna research starts at the wrong end: a tab about heater brands, a tab about infrared against traditional, and three evenings later fifteen tabs and no decision.
None of it settles until you know the room, because the room rules models out faster than any spec sheet.
Two shapes cover almost everyone: an indoor cabin for a spare room, a garage corner or a large bathroom, or an outdoor cabin on a level base, usually in a covered corner off the back door.
You are giving a corner of the house a job: twenty minutes at the end of the day behind a shut door, phone somewhere else. So a cold garage you reach through the laundry is a worse answer than a smaller spot you would actually walk to at nine at night in a towel. Convenience is the difference between a sauna and a very expensive cupboard.
The room rules models out faster than any spec sheet.
Every model's dimensions are on its product page in millimetres, down to the crated size. Tell us the room and we read them against it on the call.
Keep the scepticism on, including for us. Things you can check without asking us:
Now the checks. A tape measure, your phone, about ten minutes.
Check one is the ceiling. It is first because it gets skipped, and because it is the only check here that rules a model out completely. People measure the floor. Almost nobody measures the air.
Indoor cabins are taller than they look in a photograph: a standard ceiling usually takes one, a low bulkhead, a dropped ceiling or a sloped roof line can fail. Outdoors the same question is the beam over the corner.
Then the part almost nobody thinks of: the route in. A cabin arrives crated and is assembled in place, so the doorway, the hall turn and the side gate have to pass as well as the room. If the spare room is up a staircase with a tight turn, say so on the call first. It changes the shortlist.
The models most people choose between at this stage, priced as on our product pages; several carry a range because sizes differ within a model.
| Model | Where it usually goes | Price |
|---|---|---|
 Mini Infrared Full Spectrum | Infrared cabin, smaller footprint | $12,116 |
 Max Infrared Full Spectrum | Infrared cabin, larger footprint | $14,943 |
 Full Spectrum 2 Person | Spare room, entry infrared | $5,450 |
 Arc Barrel | Outdoor, entry barrel | $7,990 to $10,990 |
 Cove Barrel | Outdoor, covered corner or open yard | $10,490 to $17,990 |
 Mini Traditional Sauna 2.0 | Outdoor cabin, smaller footprint | $11,990 to $16,990 |
 Max Traditional Sauna 2.0 | Outdoor cabin, larger footprint | $14,990 to $19,990 |
Prices as displayed on pluslifehealth.com.au on 13 August 2026 and subject to change. Delivery and assembly are quoted for your address on the call, before any deposit. The electrical connection is excluded; check three explains why.
Your spec sheet and the technical drawings for your model come with your written quote. If the only space has a bulkhead over it, or the only way in is a staircase with a turn, no amount of good timber fixes a ceiling: renovate first, or wait.
People measure the floor. Almost nobody measures the air.
Check two is what the cabin sits on, and what the room does with warm damp air afterwards.
Indoors, the floor has to take water: tiles, sealed concrete, vinyl, or sealed timber with a mat at the door. Carpet does not. Then the air: warm damp air has to go somewhere, a window that opens, an exhaust fan, or a door onto a hall.
Outdoors, the cabin needs a level, weight-bearing base: a slab, a proper deck, or compacted pavers. A lawn is not a base, so cost the deck or slab before you cost the sauna. A door out of plumb by a few millimetres is a door that stops sealing.
On a public forum, an Australian owner of another brand's barrel described cracked boards and a roof he could see through inside the first year, and ended on the line that matters here: he was not keen to buy another and “have to repay an electrician too”. Get this wrong and you pay for the sauna and the electrician twice.
The alfresco question comes up constantly: can a cabin go in a covered outdoor corner? Our outdoor cabins and barrels are built for it and weatherproofed, so any of them can also be used indoors if you prefer that style. The infrared line is Australian design, available indoor and outdoor. A covered corner does not shrink your shortlist; the base underneath it is what decides.
Most listings leave this one to the fine print, so it goes third and in plain words. Every sauna we sell needs a licensed electrician: traditional saunas hard-wire, and the connection is a separate line item whichever model you choose. There is no plug-it-in model here.
For the room, that means a run from the switchboard to the cabin, and the length and difficulty of it is most of the bill. Electrical costs are not on the website because they vary by property, and it is the one line we exclude.
One buyer in Victoria, posting on a public sauna forum and not a PlusLife customer, described his as a dedicated 240 volt, 30 amp circuit run in conduit to the sauna's supply point, under AS/NZS 3000. That is the level of job it is. We also have a network of sauna-trained electricians we can recommend. If you would rather use your own, they can speak to our team before they quote.
One thing to settle while your electrician is at the board. Every traditional sauna can take the Wi-Fi controller as an option (a premium applies) or comes with built-in controls, depending on the heater you choose; prices are on the website and confirmed on the call. The app is Harvia's. We partner with Harvia, the biggest sauna heater manufacturer in the world. Harvia is a publicly listed company, with options based on your usage and sauna size.
What kills a home sauna is almost never the heat. It is walking in tired to a cold cabin and a wait. Heat-up is 20 minutes to an hour on average, depending on the temperature you want. With the controller you start the session from the app before you leave work, it learns how long your cabin takes, and it tells your phone when it is ready.
There is no plug-it-in model here.
A short call with a PlusLife specialist, by phone. Bring a photo of the space and you will leave knowing which models fit it and what to hand your electrician.
Book your free expert consultationNo deposit is taken on the call, no quote to sign.
This is the check people apologise for, and they should not. How it looks is a spec. You are putting a timber box the size of a small shed into a room you chose the paint for, or the corner you see from the kitchen sink every morning. If it fights the house you will feel it daily.
Take the photo you will bring to the call and look at the timber, the glass, the frame colour and the roof against what is already in the shot: render or brick, decking or tile, black window frames or timber. The cabin has to live in that.
The Max Traditional Sauna 2.0 above is warm timber under a dark roof, at home against brick, render and decking; the Mini Traditional Sauna 2.0 is the same family in charcoal, made for a courtyard with black window frames. Finishes per model are confirmed on the call.
Indoors the same check is the frame and the glass. The Mini Infrared Full Spectrum below is built to be seen: a dark frame, a full glass front and light timber inside, which is why it reads as furniture in a spare room rather than equipment in a garage. If the room allows it, the Max Infrared Full Spectrum is the same answer with a larger footprint.
From a photograph they all look like the same box: three tabs, three timber cabins, three prices close enough to be confusing. So here is what the money buys on ours, per line.
We pride ourselves on having the best quality saunas available in the Australian market, and that list is what it means per line: 42mm walls on the premium traditional line, with the insulation and faster heat-up they buy, thermo-treated timbers chosen for this climate, a Harvia heater, a build that is 100% European, and our own in-house assembly team putting it together at your address.
It is a lot to spend on something you have only ever seen on a screen. So check five is the cheapest on the list and the most often skipped: sit in one before you decide. Twenty minutes on a bench settles what twenty tabs cannot.
If you already use the sauna at the gym most weeks, you have done this check. If not, here is where.
Worth saying plainly: plenty of our buyers are in other states and order without ever sitting in a PlusLife cabin. We would still rather you sat in one somewhere first. When you do, give it the full twenty minutes, not five, and ask the only question that decides whether this was a good buy: not whether you liked it, but whether you would go back in on a Wednesday, tired, when nobody would notice if you did not.
The other half of this check is our install gallery of Australian homes, photographed after handover: ask to see it on the call, starting with the Mini 2.0 tight-space install on our website, the proof of what our in-house assembly team can do with a difficult corner.
Twenty minutes on a bench settles what twenty tabs cannot.
You will have other tabs open, and you should. Ask these of whoever you end up talking to, in writing, before anyone takes a deposit.
If another brand answers all five as plainly, go with the one that suits your house. If they cannot, that told you something on its own.
This is sponsored content, published by PlusLife Health, family-run since 2021, which sells the saunas discussed. We wrote it because the question we are asked most is where would it even go.
On the quotes. The forum material on this page is labelled as such, from Australia, and none of those people are PlusLife customers.
On the case for it. Sauna bathing has decades of research behind it, the well-known Finnish studies among it, with physical and mental benefits year-round, and paired with an ice bath you get the hot-cold contrast at home.
Yes. Our outdoor cabins and barrels are built for it and weatherproofed, and a covered corner is kinder to timber than open sky. Infrared comes in indoor and outdoor versions. The base underneath is what decides, so cost it before the sauna.
Yes, for every model we sell. Your electrician quotes the connection; check three lists what they will want to know.
You bring a photo of the space, and the measurements from check one if you have them. We read those against the dimensions on each product page and tell you which models clear your ceiling, fit the footprint and come through the route in. If the space is wrong for a sauna, we will say so.
Nothing is decided on the call. You leave with the numbers in writing: the model, the price, delivery and assembly to your address, and what your electrician needs to be told. Then you get their quote and decide in your own time.
From there it runs in five steps: the base goes in, a deck or a slab; the sauna is delivered; our team assembles it; your electrician connects it; then you heat it and enjoy it. A deposit holds your unit until your site is ready, and Australian Consumer Law sits on top of anything we write.
PlusLife ambassadors. Paid partnership.
You have read the part nobody else can do for you: looking honestly at your own house. Bring it to a specialist, measured or not, and we will work backwards from the room.
Choose a time on the next screen and a specialist rings you then. The call opens where this page opened, with the room, and by the end of it the screenshots on your phone are a plan with an address in it. The measuring is the cheap part, and it is the part that is sitting still.
Free, no obligation, no deposit taken on the call.
One photo, one short call, and you will know what fits.
Not sure which sauna or ice bath fits best? Speak with our team to get clarity and confidence before you buy.
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