Comfort
Office air quality: which values to meet.
In Spain, the RITE sets the recommended comfort range and workplace safety rules set the limit you must meet. Here are the values for each, what measuring shows and how to monitor it zone by zone.
By Carles Morales, founder of Orpheus ·
In short: what an office must meet
- Temperature
- 19–27 °C
- Comfort: 21–23 °C in winter and 23–25 °C in summer.
- Relative humidity
- 30–70 %
- Comfort: 40–60%.
- CO₂
- max. 1,000 ppm
- Comfort: up to 900 ppm.
Limits Orpheus applies, based on RD 486/1997, the INSST and the RITE. Details and sources below.
The values
Two criteria: recommended and required.
The RITE says when people are comfortable; RD 486/1997 and the INSST say below what people can’t work. Orpheus applies both: the RITE range as the comfort criterion, which each company can adjust by zone, and the safety limits as what must be met.
- Temperature
- Recommended · RITEWinter: 21 to 23 °C. Summer: 23 to 25 °C.
- Required · workplace safetyBetween 19 and 27 °C, stricter than the legal minimum: RD 486/1997 sets 17 to 27 °C for sedentary office work. The INSST recommends 20 to 24 °C in winter and 23 to 26 °C in summer.
- Relative humidity
- Recommended · RITEWinter: 40 to 50%. Summer: 45 to 60%.
- Required · workplace safetyBetween 30 and 70% (at least 50% where there is a risk of static electricity).
- CO₂
- Recommended · RITE900 ppm. The RITE asks for no more than 500 ppm above outdoor air (category IDA 2, the one for offices), and Orpheus always takes outdoor air as 400 ppm, a conservative assumption.
- Required · workplace safety1,000 ppm: above it, the INSST considers ventilation inadequate.
- Draughts
- Recommended · RITE—
- Required · workplace safetyUp to 0.25 m/s where it isn’t hot.
Watch out for energy saving: in office buildings, RITE IT 3.8 doesn’t allow heating above 21 °C or cooling below 26 °C. In summer that limit sits above the comfort range: each company decides its set point.
And CO₂ isn’t a toxin here: the occupational exposure limit (5,000 ppm over eight hours) isn’t reached in an office. It’s used as a ventilation indicator: when it rises, the air isn’t being renewed enough for the people inside.
What measuring shows
In meeting rooms, out of every ten hours in use:
- 1 hour
- with CO₂ above 1,000 ppm, the INSST criterion.
- 1 h 30 min
- with the temperature outside the room’s comfort range.
- 30 min
- with humidity outside 30 to 70%.
The safety temperature limit is hardly ever reached: what fails is comfort, and above all the air in meeting rooms, which are small, closed and full for an hour.
Orpheus office park, September 2026: meeting rooms, only the time with people inside.
How to monitor it
From “it’s cold” to the data.
Today the complaint arrives without context and maintenance works blind. Five rules so it arrives with data.
- 01
Measure next to people
The wall thermostat and the duct probe measure the system’s air, not the air at the desk. Comfort is measured where people sit and in each room, at their height.
With Orpheus: Comfort sensors on the floor and in the rooms, with no construction work.
- 02
Zone by zone, not the average
The floor average hides the stuffy room and the cold corner. Look at each zone and each room separately, hour by hour.
With Orpheus: Each floor’s map flags the zone that goes out of range.
- 03
Count people, not square metres
An empty room within range tells you nothing. What matters is how many people are comfortable: if 100 people are in and 97 are comfortable, the building is at 97%.
With Orpheus: Space’s comfort index counts people in comfort.
- 04
Two thresholds, two routes
Leaving the comfort range is a nuisance: it goes to maintenance. Leaving the safety limit is a risk: it takes another route. Every alert comes with the zone, the measured value, the people affected and the time.
With Orpheus: Alerts, with a work order in your CMMS via API.
- 05
Start where most people are
With several alerts at once, first the zone affecting the most people. And when someone complains and the data is within range, you can show that too.
With Orpheus: Alerts are ranked by people affected.
Get more info
Want to know how your office feels?
Leave your name and email and we’ll tell you how to measure it, zone by zone.
Sources
RD 486/1997, anexo III
Temperature, humidity, draughts and air renewal in workplaces.
RITE (RD 1027/2007): IT 1.1.4 · IT 3.8
Comfort conditions, indoor air categories (IDA) and temperature limits for energy saving.
INSST · NTP 549
Carbon dioxide in indoor air quality assessment.
INSST · Guía técnica de lugares de trabajo
Recommended office temperature.
Get more info
Comfort can be measured too.
Leave your name and email and we’ll tell you how to start.