Leaf Blower Vs Lawn Sweeper: Which Tool Is Best For Cleaning Up Leaves

Fall is notoriously beautiful, with all of the leaves transforming into gorgeous colors and gently drifting down from the trees. Unfortunately their majestic descent ends on your lawn. While it can be tempting to let the leaves stay on your grass to enjoy the colors and avoid the work of raking them, leaves can damage your lawn over time by suffocating it and trapping moisture that can become dangerous. If you don't mind the potential harm to your lawn, you can let the leaves stay and provide a resource for wildlife, and you can even give your lawn a good stomping if you can't bring yourself to rake. But if you decide you do want to deal with the leaves, it's fortunate that technology has evolved far beyond the basic rake. These days, you can choose between two tools that are much more efficient: the leaf blower and the lawn sweeper. Overall, if speed and versatility are your priorities, a leaf blower may be best, but if you specifically want something manual or more eco-friendly for a large yard, then a lawn sweeper may be a better choice.

Leaf blowers and lawn sweepers are both effective methods for moving the leaves in your yard. While leaf blowers push leaves around the yard to where you'd prefer them to be, lawn sweepers gather them up for total removal. Both leaf blowers and lawn sweepers can be good solutions for dealing with a leaf-covered lawn. The product that will work best for you depends on your needs and assessment of the advantages and disadvantages of each method. If versatility is important to you, then a leaf blower may be best, but if collection and disposal is important, then a lawn sweeper may be the better choice.

Leaf blowers are powered by gas, battery, or electricity to blow air with enough force to push lawn clippings, leaves, sticks, and other lightweight debris. Leaf blowers are great for clearing a yard quickly and efficiently, especially around obstacles like furniture and plants. The air will simply blast around the objects to reach the fallen leaves and propel them in the direction you want. This is also a great solution for gravel and rock beds, which can be a pain to remove leaves from. Leaf blowers have the added benefit of popularity, which means they're easily accessible, with many different types of blowers and high-quality leaf blower brands that will leave your yard spick and span. Prices for leaf blowers can be as low as $30, but the average cost is around $150.

Of course, there are some cons to leaf blowers to keep in mind. The first is noise. Gas-powered leaf blowers, in particular, are extremely loud, reaching levels between 80 and 112 decibels, which can harm human ears after a couple hours of exposure. Gas-powered blowers also release pollutants into the air. While battery-powered or plug-in blowers may help reduce these issues, they still have some problems. When you use any leaf blower, more than just visible debris is pushed around by the high-speed air of a leaf blower. Pollen, dust, allergens, and more are stirred up and into the air you breathe. So, while a leaf blower can quickly reshuffle and relocate the leaves and debris in your yard, there are some ways in which a lawn sweeper may be a better choice.

Lawn sweepers, though less ubiquitous than leaf blowers, have their own set of advantages. Lawn sweepers use brushes to sweep leaves and debris up and into their attached hopper. There are essentially two types of lawn sweepers; the first is a manual push option, which usually costs between $50 and $150. The second type is a tow-behind style that can be attached to a riding lawn mower or tractor to collect leaves quickly and easily. Tow-behind sweepers range in price from about $200 to $500. Lawn sweepers aren't typically powered by anything, making them quieter and more eco-friendly, but you can find powered lawn vacuums that perform a similar function — at nearly triple the price. 

Lawn sweepers are ideal for large, flat yards, and they have the benefit of collecting leaves rather than pushing them to another location as leaf blowers do. While that may be an advantage over leaf blowers, there are some cons to learn in order to determine if lawn sweepers are worth buying. Lawn sweepers can be more time-consuming and require more effort to get your yard clear compared to leaf blowers, especially if they must be manually pushed. Sometimes, the brushes do not catch everything, so you'll have to go over the lawn multiple times or follow up with a leaf blower if you want to remove every leaf. Additionally, while their large size can efficiently cover more ground, they also take up more space in storage.