PureSpa 4 Person Inflatable Hot Tub with Energy-Efficient Spa Cover

This is my review of the Intex 28431EP PureSpa Plus 85 Inch. First off, the 28431EP at $678 appears to be identical to the 28431E at $1024. I contacted Intex asking the difference and their reply "They are almost the same but the little difference lies in color. And the pool kind is the same but they are different pool sets and would come with different pumps and other maintainence kit. Have a good day." If true, I can't see the colour difference. The pump it came with is labeled 2843100B, and appears and functions the same as the higher priced model. All of the extras, cover, controls, tool kit, appear exactly the same as the model without the P. If there is $300 in less value here, I can't find it. So, about the spa itself. So far so good. Everything was well designed and very easy to set up. The quality appears top notch. Filled water started at 57°f and in 24 hours, was 100°f (my initial setting). The pump/heater is extremely quiet, something I was very surprised and pleased to discover. I have had the small Intex pools before and, as I recall, the filter was rather loud. Of course the air pump is louder but not too bad, about the same level as the bubble noise itself. As for those bubbles, the strength of the massage was completely unexpected. I thought the bubbles were more for appearance, but come to find out, they work exceptionally well. Feels great on the old back. Really glad I got the 85" model, 6 person is a bit of a stretch, but 4 close friends would be doable. For my wife and I, it's perfect. The cover is very well thought out, and looks to do a great job of insulation. The inflatable bladder, give the cover a bit of a dome and should prevent excessive water pooling with rain. My take so far, is save $300 and get the Intex 28431EP PureSpa Plus 85 Inch for $678. Very happy with this purchase. If anything changes, I'll update this review. --Mark Edit: Three weeks of steady, daily, use and the spa is working perfectly. Using the La Crosse Wireless Pool Thermometer, I can see the spa cycles 102° to 104° without any problem. The heating, actually runs less than expected. Consumers tracks my monthly power, so I'll report back with details. I'm old and my back hurts so the biggest problem so far is lifting off the insulated (very effective), cover. The cover that comes with this model, extends to the ground, and is quite heavy. When lifting, the fit is snug, so you're fighting a vacuum to get it off! Easy solution though. When you go to remove the cover, undo the encircling strap, start the air pump, and the cover domes and easily lifts off! 😎 This also allows any rain water to drain off the top. Super easy. I generally take the insulated cover off for a morning soak, leaveing it off all day, using only the inflatable bladder. This seals well and keeps leaves and junk out of the water. Easy on and off makes it simple for a quick soak. I put the cover back on at the end of the day, or if we go away. When I originally fill the tub, I used a garden hose that was a couple years old, and the water was nasty. The hose must have deteriorated. Anyway, took several days and a couple of filter changes, and the pump/filter cleaned the water gin clear. Testing also showed are water was extremely hard. This unit supposedly had some method of softening water, well 8 days in, it tested perfect. With a few other standard pool chemicals, everything balanced out nicely. I check and clean/replace the filters every few days. They clean off well, especially with a bit of compressed air. You should get a fair amount of use before replacement is necessary. I also purchased the Intex 28620EP Handheld Rechargeable Spa Pool Vacuum. Maybe not completely necessary, but makes cleaning extremely easy. I think I read somewhere that the filter/heater timed out after 72 hour, or so. Not the case so far, but I use the spa daily. All said, very pleased with this spa. Stay tuned. Edit: END OF THE SEASON So, it's only mid October, but took advantage of one of the last nice days to store the spa. Read the instructions for storage, and it's pretty simple. Drained with the a hose a instructed and finished up with a wet vac, wiped down and deflated with the air pump. This work really well and collapsed the pool enough that it actually FIT into the provided storage bag! Other parts stored in the original box. Season summary: I used this spa almost daily for just shy of 6 months and enjoyed every minute. One E-90 filter error, when first installed with nasty water from an old hose. New filters and the water cleared up quickly and everything ran perfect all season. At first I was cleaning the filters, to extent there use, but found one one of them really doesn't do anything so just changed them weekly, swapping one with the other at that time. I am guessing the dual filters are a legal requirement, but for a spa this size, not really necessary. My only disappointment is the 104° temperature limit. I understand this is also a legal (or at least industry) requirement, but wish it was just a degree higher. I have a recording temperature gage and the spa consistently cycles between 102° and 104° which is good, but 102° is just a bit low for my taste. My friend has a $44,000 dollar spa and his does the same, so, I guess I can live with it. My electric usage was slightly higher than last year, but not by much. I am sure the spa accounted for some, but too little to put a number on it. As I was storing the spa and components, I had an opportunity to inspect everything. My original hope was to get a couple years out of this. I now suspect I can do much better as everything appears to be in excellent shape. Only a small amount a fading on the dark blue inner wall, otherwise all looks good. It's too bad that Amazon no longer allows replies on product reviews. Would love to compare notes with other spa owners. Summary: Absolutely an excellent value. See you next year, stay warm. Edit: Beginning year three, still good with one problem. At the end of year two, the insulated cover was finished. Started ripping at the seems. Intex does not seem to offer a replacement, so I irer the non-insulated "shorty". Actually, while not as efficient, it sure is easier to deal with. So, as a compromise, I'm happy, (see photo with shorty cover). Otherwise the spa has performed perfectly. Incredibly good deal and a pleasure for daily three (mostly) season use. Recommended.

I ordered this in 2022! I’m now a 72 year old senior female. When it arrived, I set it up all by myself. I have now enjoyed it for several years. It’s on a covered patio in Palm Springs CA area. It’s so easy to maintain and clean. Just make sure you change the filters when needed and change out water at least once a year. I use a little thing with Bromine tablets in it and shock once a week. I have noticed no electric increase as a result of it and it’s on 24/7. I have to say that I’ve purchased thousands of products on Amazon over the years and this has by far been my greatest investment. I was in it tonight and knew that I had to write a review, which I don’t do. It’s so affordable for the value you get. Good for joints. The bubble jets are powerful and quite frankly, it’s as good as the community hot tub which is right across the street from my house in a 55 plus community. I can’t say enough good things about it. I e not had a single problem with it and I e used it everyday since I got it in 2022. The cover keeps it clean even in our sand storms here in the desert! Thank you @Intex for making such a great product! Please keep the filters affordable for us seniors. PS: When I bought it, I thought it would last two years and here I am, going on 4! And, if you want company, even though it says six, it will fit four comfortably. I use it with cool water in the summer. If you want a portable hot tub, easy, affordable solution to for indoor or out door luxury that keeps it temperature and stays inflated, this is the one to pick!! Sorry for long review but great products deserve it!

I was really excited for this product. I read reviews and it looked like it was a quality investment. It was not. Since I hit purchase it has been a NIGHTMARE. I was excited to set it up and the instructions were not helpful. I watched a YouTube video (that showed there are issues with valve alignment), to help me put it together. As soon as I put water in (about halfway filled) it started leaking. I tried to tighten it but the threads kept tripping and water was gushing everywhere. Was awful. I was leaving town, so I put the cover on it was going to deal with it later, but the cover didn’t hold as the water continued to leak while I was gone and when I got home there were leaves etc in it. Was a DISASTER!! I called a plumber to come take a look at it and he said that it was a design defect. The valves on the machine don’t line up with the holes on the hot tub and because the fasteners are plastic, they cross thread and fail. We had no other choice but to return it, leaving the kids a little heartbroken. Now I went through another nightmare trying to return it because it is sooo big and bulky. I just got a message that they are charging a restocking fee of half the amount I paid. This product put us through hell and now I’m going to have to fight to get the original amount I paid back. The customer service is atrocious and I would stay away from any of their products. NEVER AGAIN!

Worth the money! I was hesitant on getting an inflatable tub, but didn't want to pay 1000s for a hardshell until confirming it would get used enough to justify it. After much research, and reading many product and customer reviews, I settled on this one. I was beyond impressed at this material. I knew it couldn't be "pool float" material, but wasn't expecting what I can only describe as kevlar with air in it! This thing is no joke! Most customer reviews I read that were negative, seemed to be related to the components that hook the heater / pump to the tub. Issues such as misalignment, leaking, etc. I don't give 5 stars for the instruction booklet, and wouldn't recommend self-install if you are not super handy with these types of things. My husband can build anything with his hands, and had this installed in under 2 hours, filling with water. Everything fit and aligned perfectly. Nothing did / nor has leaked since installing in late July, 2025. Again, instruction booklet was not the best, and there was some confusion on which outlets got the filters, and which was intended for the light. Turns out, the light (we're assuming) is meant to be on the outlet (where water returns back into the tub). Not only did the light not work properly at all, it also seemed to reduce the water's ability to return to the tub, so we just don't use it. We've had a pool for years, but never a hot tub. Our first fill ended up with what we learned was biofilm. Gross, gross, gross!! We're not sure how or why, but research did mention that the factories that produce the tubs, will run water through them to ensure they're working, and possibly are not drained/dried properly, leaving behind enough to grow bacteria, that when later filled and used by the new tub owner, could introduce bacteria that could lead to biofilm. Since we had only used it once before this showed up, it's a possibility. The chemical mix took a little bit of a learning curve, but once figured out, it is now virtually as easy as the pool. We use the bromine tablets instead of chlorine, but after a few uses, I will add a bit of regular bleach just to ensure nothing "grows". So far, so good. We did end up having to drain it and scrub it after the first incident with the biofilm. This is likely my only complaint with the tub. Where the drain plug is located. I understand the bottom of the tub makes sense, but since you don't want to be moving/rocking this thing around much after set up, we had to use a shop vac to get what didn't seem like much of the last of the water out, but it was. All in all, I would highly suggest this tub to anyone looking to try one! One thing to note, since I could not find this information anywhere when I was looking, when the tub is only in its heating / filtering state, (no bubbles going), there is very minimal visible water movement. Being used to a pool with highly pressurized water being returned into the pool, we wondered if the hot tub was operating at all. Don't expect this kind of water movement. Also, the filters need to be replaced fairly regularly. I have noticed though that one always seems worse than the other, and while I always put a new one in the "worse" one, washing out the not so bad one and re-using makes it last a little longer. More than happy to answer any questions someone may have about this tub before purchasing, or after the fact. Happy soaking!

Update number 2 After some help from the seller they sent over the correct warranty information. They were great help. I went through the warranty process with INTEX they did a great job helping me and replacing the pump. It took lest than a week to arrive. The hot tub is working great again.. all is good.. 4 stars just because we had a pump issue after 6 months.. but the warranty did its thing. Update 1 After 6 months the pump stopped working properly. The error 90 won’t turn off no matter what we do to fix it. Replaced filters, thermostat tried everything to fix it. I’ve been waiting awhile before I wrote a review on this I wanted to use it for a few months to see how it would do. I went in with low expectations just wasn’t sure how’d it do with just air bubbles and I was worried about the size. My wife and I are on the taller larger side. I’m 6’2 she’s 5’9. Now putting together very easy to do I put it on our back porch I did buy some pads to go underneath it just for extra cushion. The instructions are easy to follow. Just for my peace of mind I put it on its own circuit. At 120v its does take about 24hrs to heat up to 104. All that aside. This thing has surpassed all our expectations. The size is good for the two of us. Even though this is a 6 person tub it’s great for 2 large people 4 very close friends… and anymore than that it’ll be tight. The bubbles are actually great the movement is very nice. The temperature starts at 104° after running it (30min) depending on the ambient temperature it’ll go down to 101-100 sometimes 99. I’m in south Texas it’s a little warmer here that makes a difference. Our usage is every other day now for a few months. The cover We use the air up round top mostly just for convenience I did buy some quick disconnects straps I put around the handles to hold it down. The large cover works great to. It keeps the heat at 103-104° I keep the heater on 24-7 I haven’t really noticed a change it my electric bill. Think of it as another refrigerator efficiency wise. All in all you can’t beat it for the price. It’s a good size for 2 the price vs the real deal ones you can’t beat it. I was worried about the quality, it’s strong durable no issues there. Highly recommended it!

This tub is GREAT for the price! I set it up all by myself in an hour or less, the most time consuming part was just waiting for the hose to fill it up and being impatient waiting for it to heat up to 104 because we were so excited to use it! We live in New Mexico and bought it in September so it’s pretty warm up until November-December. I have not noticed a significant change to our electric bill in terms of energy. We decided to keep it under our covered patio because the cover and tub would stay cleaner that way out of the elements and our outlet is under the patio. The jets are more like tiny holes that are in a ring around the bottom of the tub (so not like the powerful jets that blast your back in a traditional hot tub). The set up is self explanatory if you follow the instructions it’s not very complicated! We bought a second pack of pH strips to test all the water levels and an enhanced shock powder that we sprinkle about a tablespoon in after each soak. We are using bromine tablets instead of chlorine as I read it’s easier on the skin however the little floaty tablet dispenser they give you only holds one small tablet and you need more than that to maintain a healthy level of bromine/chlorine. We use the tub at least 1-2x a week and the 6 person one is great size if you’re tall and like to stretch out your legs but truly only holds 3-4 people max comfortably. It maintains around 104 degrees sometimes on colder days it lingers at 103. If you use the bubble jet setting it pulls the cold outside air so after the jet timer stops (30min duration) it’ll drop down to the mid 90s which is a bit of a bummer but it’s a great deal so I don’t complain. I love this tub! So far we haven’t had any holes or other issues aside from forgetting to spray down the filters with the hose and that can give an error reading. Change out the filters more frequently if you use it more often otherwise it can clog and not heat or filter properly. We’ve been able to reuse our filters after thorough high pressure hosing them off. We bought extra neck pillows but honestly don’t even use them nor the ones they came with (there not really comfortable lol) the tray table we bought separately from Intex and that thing is AWESOME!

This is a great bargain for those not ready to spend THOUSANDS on a hard-walled hot tub. I went into a local pool store and asked what kind of a hot tub I could get for $6,000 or less and they basically laughed at me, so I got this instead and I've now used it for 3 seasons, including one winter with it setup in my basement and used nearly every day. If you take care of it it will last and it's hard to find any fault with a hot tub that, so far, has only cost me about $20 a month to own. So what's different about this and a traditional hot tub? Well, it has no built-in seating, which can be a pro or a con depending on what you want. I like to be able to be able to go under water and swim around a bit so that doesn't bother me that much. It also takes much longer to heat the water since it plugs into a standard 120v circuit rather than a 240v, but if you leave it on and set for your preferred temperature that should never be a problem. The only time that mattered was when I foolishly tried to charge my electric car on the same circuit and blew the breaker, didn't realize it shut the hot tub off and came back the next day ready to get in and it was cold... took the better part of a day to heat back up again. The white top of the tub is starting to stain and look a bit dingy and nothing I've tried really brings it back to a clean new looking bright white... thinking about trying to paint or stain it blue next season to hide that. There are also no powerful jets but the bubble ring around the wall is stronger than you think it would be, it really moves you around quite a bit and is really nice to have, I almost always have it on when I'm in mine. Can't really think of anything else to say about it, it's been great for the price and a big positive effect on my life. I would only recommend that if you buy this don't make the placement of it an afterthought, you should honestly spend more money on WHERE you put it than you spend on the tub itself. I built a 20x16 foot deck to put it on with a built-in mini-fridge and heated towel/clothes closet.

We purchased this Intex PureSpa in 2025 and kept it on a covered, enclosed porch its entire life. It has never been exposed to rain or the elements. After relatively light use, we discovered an internal leak inside the control unit. The leak was not from any external hose or connection. Water accumulated inside the control housing and eventually began dripping from the bottom of the unit, even when the pump was turned off. After disassembling the control unit, we found the leak appeared to originate from the heater/manifold assembly. The internal screws surrounding that assembly were heavily rusted, suggesting the leak had been occurring internally for quite some time before it became visible. After researching the issue, we found numerous reports from other Intex owners describing similar internal control-unit leaks involving this same assembly. Despite providing photos and documentation, the seller offered no meaningful assistance. For a spa costing over $600, an internal control-unit leak after such limited use is unacceptable. Based on our experience and the number of similar reports from other owners, I cannot recommend this product.

We purchased this for added outdoor enjoyment with our pool, and this product does exactly that. So easy to set up and use! Gets exactly to 104 and the jet action is surprisingly robust. The hot tub top sits in nicely and is easy to remove. The hot tub cover we received was different than shown and has been hail damaged so we are going to replace. Otherwise, excellent quality product for the price! Ordered cup holders as well!!

Spa de bonne qualité, résistant et facile d’utilisation. Cependant les joints de fixation entre le compresseur et le spa ont commencé à couler après une saison, malgré que j’ai mis des joints et un scellant

This is a very excellent product for the money, extremelky easy set up with awesome instructions, had it up and puttying water into it in 1/2 an hour, takes a full day to reach temperature, and after being in it for an hour in 10c weather it dropped heat pretty quickly, but its a good way to see if you want to spend thousands of dollars on a hard core one. We will use this as much as possible depending on outside temp. the jets are incredible, wish there were 2 speeds for them , be nice to have a little slower ones at times. But for the money it's a excellent buy.

I honestly didn't think this would work for me but I have used it alot and kept it running for 2 years straight. I'm in Canada and have used it year round, even in the snow. The cover insulation has settled a bit, but I use a second patio furniture cover over it to keep, UV rays, wind and rain from damage. It keeps warm, has nice bubbles and was good value.

Wrong lid can't fill bottom with air pump broken