Infrared Sauna Accessories: A Buyer's Guide by Salus Heat
"Three months ago I rebuilt a one-person sauna in my garage. By the second week I was using the backrest. By the fourth week I was looking for the towel rack. The cabinet came with bench wood, panels, and instructions — and that was about it." Most people who actually use their sauna discover the same five missing pieces in roughly the same order.
That is the gap this post exists to close. The cabinet is the start, not the kit. The accessories are what turn “I bought a sauna” into “I use a sauna.” Most of them do not look essential in the photos. In real use, almost all of them are.
The right sauna accessories solve five small problems: towels too close to the heater, water inside a wood cabin, skin drying out faster than it should, sweat pooling on the bench, and the room never quite getting the chromotherapy you paid for. None of these are dealbreakers. All five are solved with one or two of the products on the SalusHeat accessories page.
The Whole Accessories Page in 90 Seconds
The SalusHeat accessories collection is deliberately small. There is a reason for that — most generic “sauna accessories” out there were designed for traditional saunas that run at 80 to 100 degrees Celsius. SalusHeat saunas run cooler, between about 50 and 65 degrees Celsius of infrared heat, and the accessories on the page were tuned for the way that heat actually behaves in a small wood cabin.
There are four categories that cover everything most people actually need:
| If you want to… | The SalusHeat accessory for it | Why it matters |
|---|---|---|
| Sit comfortably without leaning against a heater | Ergonomic Sauna Backrest | Keeps your back away from the infrared panel, protects skin, supports posture during longer sessions |
| Keep water, oil, and a towel in reach | Universal 3-Piece Sauna Set | Stops the “where do I put my water bottle” problem and protects the cabin from oil spills |
| Add red-light therapy to a sauna you already own | Red Light Therapy Expansion Kit | Turns a heat-only session into a combined infrared + 660/850 nm light session |
| Protect an outdoor sauna year-round | Waterproof Outdoor Saunas Cover | Stops rain, snow, and UV from aging the cabin and electronics, saves energy on reheat |
| Get back up and running after wear | After-Sales Accessories | For older cabins that need a fresh heater panel, door handle, or bench refresh |
That is the whole page, organized the way a real customer would buy it. Everything below the table is the “why” behind each one and how to actually use it.
The Ergonomic Sauna Backrest: The One Most People Skip and Regret
The Ergonomic Sauna Backrest is the most-recommended single accessory in the entire SalusHeat catalog, and the one customers most often say they wish they had bought on day one.
The single mistake this solves. Sitting on a flat bench in a small cabin means your upper back is right against the rear wall — and in a SalusHeat sauna, that wall is where one of the infrared panels lives. Without a backrest, you are either leaning against a heater (not great for skin or for the heater) or leaning forward into the room with sore shoulders halfway through a 30 minute session.
What the SalusHeat backrest actually is: a curved, S-shaped hemlock wood piece that bolts to the rear wall of the sauna cabin. It pushes your back 4 to 5 inches forward, holds the natural S-curve of your spine, and creates an air gap between your skin and the rear infrared panel.
The benefits in real use:
The backrest is the cheapest ergonomic upgrade you will ever make for a place you sit in for 30 minutes three times a week. Hemlock does not warp below 100 degrees Celsius, which is well above the cabin's operating temperature. It also matches the Canadian hemlock or basswood the rest of the cabin is made from.
- Safer distance from the heater. A consistent air gap between your skin and the rear panel means no “hot spot” where your shoulder blades meet the wood for 30 minutes.
- Longer sessions without soreness. Most people can sit for 10 to 15 minutes comfortably on a flat bench, then start shifting. With the S-shape, 25 to 30 minutes is the natural ceiling — you actually use the full protocol.
- Posture carryover. A small thing, but people often notice their lower-back soreness drops by week two of using the backrest consistently.
- Install once, forget it. Bolts to the rear panel of the cabin in about 10 minutes. No tools beyond what comes in the box.
The collection page lists the backrest from $59. It is the only accessory below $100. If you are choosing one accessory to start with, this is the one.
The Universal 3-Piece Sauna Set: Stop Stacking Things on the Floor
The Universal 3-Piece Sauna Set is two towel racks, a cup holder, and an oil holder, all in matching hemlock. It looks like a small thing in the photos. It changes the entire feel of the session.
Without a rack system, here is what actually happens in a real customer’s cabin:
- The water bottle goes on the floor (cold air pools there, the water goes lukewarm, you pick up a wet towel to dry it).
- The towel ends up draped over the heater panel, which is the safety no-no the manual warns you about.
- The essential oil bottle sits on the bench, rolls into your hip halfway through the session, and leaves a ring on the wood.
- You spend the first 5 minutes of every session rearranging all three of these.
The rack set solves the entire thing. Towel goes on the rack, water in the cup holder, oil in the dedicated shelf. The cabin stays a place to sit in, not a place to manage.
A small accessory set does something bigger than itself: it removes the small decisions you would otherwise make at the start of every session. Decision-free rituals are the ones people actually keep. That is most of why some cabins get used three times a week for years and others get used three times and forgotten in the corner.
The Universal set runs $69 (regular price $89). The Deluxe 3-Piece version is the same hardware in a more engineered profile with a dual-hook towel rack and dual-slot cup holder, and is the right pick for two-person or family cabins. Either version is hemlock and matches the existing cabin — no visible “aftermarket” look.
The Red Light Therapy Expansion Kit: The One Most People Underestimate
This is the only SalusHeat accessory that changes what the session actually does, instead of what the cabin feels like. The Red Light Therapy Expansion Kit adds a panel emitting 660 nm (red) and 850 nm (near-infrared) wavelengths to a sauna you already own.
The case for it is built on three documented findings:
| Wavelength | Penetration depth | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| 660 nm (visible red) | About 2 to 3 mm into the skin | Improved skin cell function, mild collagen support, improved tone over weeks |
| 850 nm (near-infrared) | About 3 to 5 cm into tissue | Reduced inflammation in muscle and connective tissue, faster recovery markers |
| Combined with infrared sauna heat | Both at once | Adds red-light benefits on top of the heat-stress benefits without lengthening the session |
The reason it is the most underestimated accessory is that it is invisible in a 30 minute session. There is no “feeling” of light therapy the way there is a feeling of heat. The effect shows up in week three: skin tone looks slightly different, post-workout soreness is shorter, sleep is slightly better that night.
If you wear glasses or contact lenses inside the sauna, take them off before the red-light panel fires up. The 660 nm wavelength is bright visible red, and direct exposure over a 30 minute session can leave you with mild eye fatigue. Most SalusHeat cabins come with the panel angled toward the bench rather than your face, but it is worth checking the first time you use the kit.
The kit is listed as Pre-Order on the accessories page. It is one of the higher priced add-ons, but if you already use the sauna three or more times a week for recovery, the math tends to make sense — it is effectively an extra modality tacked onto a session you are already paying for in time.
The Waterproof Outdoor Sauna Cover: The One Most Indoor Sauna Owners Skip But Shouldn't
If your sauna is outdoor, this is not optional. It is the maintenance tool that decides whether the cabin still looks like new at year five.
The SalusHeat outdoor cover is a waterproof, reinforced fabric cover that drapes over the entire sauna cabin. The product listing page describes it as a “wave-shaped rain valance” with a patented one-hand fastening system. In real terms, that means:
- Waterproof top and sides. Keeps rain and snow off the wood panels and off the electrical housing.
- UV-resistant fabric. Stops the most common cause of wood fade on outdoor cabins, which is not the rain — it is the sun.
- Wave-shaped valance at the base. Routes water away from the bottom of the cabin instead of letting it pool at the joint between the cover and the ground.
- Reinforced, tear-resistant material. Stops the cover from wearing through at the corners during wind.
The cover also pays back its cost in the energy bill. A covered outdoor cabin reaches set temperature in about 18 to 22 minutes. An uncovered one takes 28 to 35 minutes because the panels have to fight cold air leaking into the wood. Over a year of three-sessions-a-week use, that is roughly 30 to 40 hours of extra heater time you are no longer paying for.
The cover is listed as a sale right now — regular price $249, current price $109 in the SalusHeat accessories page. If you are on the fence and your sauna lives outside, the discount tends to make the decision easier than the use case does.
The After-Sales Accessories: The Quiet One Most People Forget About
The After-Sales Accessories page is not really a single product. It is a parts page — the place you go when something on an existing sauna cabin needs refreshing. Replacement infrared panels, door handles, bench pieces, light bulbs, control units, that kind of thing.
If you own a SalusHeat sauna that is more than three years old, this is the page worth bookmarking. The most common call the support team gets, by some distance, is “my sauna is fine but the bench is a little worn / a panel is dimmer than it used to be / the door handle is loose.” Almost all of those have a replacement part under $200 that takes under an hour to swap.
The lifespan math. SalusHeat's warranty policy is structured in two tiers. Wood structure is covered for 1 year. Heating elements & electrical — the infrared panels, controls, and the parts that actually drive the session — are covered for 2 years. Both terms align with what /pages/warranty and the product-page warranty summaries publish. The cabin itself comes with a 1-year comprehensive warranty that can be extended by 1, 2, or 3 additional years at the time of purchase. Replacement parts are an order of magnitude cheaper than a new cabin. Owners who know the page exists tend to keep their saunas a decade, not five years.
How To Pick What You Actually Need
If you have never thought about which accessories matter, the short version is below. Read this once and you have made the decision.
| If this is you | Buy this first | Add this later |
|---|---|---|
| I just bought my first sauna and I have no accessories | Ergonomic Backrest + Universal 3-Piece Set | Red-Light Kit once the session is a habit |
| I have an outdoor sauna | Waterproof Cover (don't skip) | Backrest and rack set once covered |
| I have an older SalusHeat sauna (>3 years) | Check the After-Sales page before buying anything new | A new panel or a control board refresh if anything is dim |
| I use the sauna for recovery after workouts | Red-Light Kit + Backrest | The 3-Piece Set for water and towel |
| I use the sauna for skin or relaxation | The 3-Piece Set + Backrest | Red-Light Kit if you also want the skin-tone benefits |
That is the whole shopping list. There are no accessories on the SalusHeat page that you need to buy all at once. There are also no accessories that are pure decoration — every one of them solves a real problem that shows up in week two of regular use.
When To Skip Buying More Accessories
If you have owned the sauna less than a month, your first job is the 3-week protocol, not more gear. Most people who go accessory-shopping before they have built the session habit end up with a closet full of unused equipment and a sauna that still gets used twice a month. Get the daily use stable first. Then buy accessories for the use case that has actually shown up.
- Less than a month with the sauna — finish the 3-week protocol first
- You do not actually like the session yet — accessories do not fix that
- Budget pressure — the backrest is the only one that is hard to skip, the rest can wait
Accessories are small upgrades in a small cabin. They are also the easiest way to turn “I bought a sauna” into “I use a sauna.” The SalusHeat accessories page is small on purpose — there is no lamp that absolutely needs to match the bench, no accessory that exists only because it photographs well. Each one solves a friction that we have seen customers run into over and over again.
What that means in design terms:
- Wood-matched hemlock on every wood accessory, finished with zero-VOC water-based varnish so the cabin air stays clean even at sauna temperatures
- Tuned dimensions for SalusHeat cabin walls, bench heights, and heater panel positions — not generic fits from third-party suppliers
- 1-year warranty on accessories, matching the 1-year coverage on wood structure under SalusHeat's master warranty policy
- 1-year warranty on heating elements & electrical — the infrared panels, controls, and the parts that drive the actual session
- Factory-direct pricing that keeps the cost of the right accessories under what most people spend on a single spa visit
The full warranty terms — coverage periods, what counts as wood structure vs heating elements & electrical, and the optional 1-/2-/3-year extension — are on the SalusHeat warranty page. The whole accessories collection lives at SalusHeat accessories. If you already know which sauna you have, the right starting list is above — backrest first, rack set second, everything else once the daily use is stable.
Frequently Asked Questions
Do I need any accessories to use my SalusHeat sauna?
No. A sauna works without any of them. But the Ergonomic Backrest is the one most customers say they wish they had bought on day one — it is the cheapest comfort upgrade in the catalog.
Are SalusHeat accessories compatible with non-SalusHeat saunas?
Most of them are universal in design but tuned to SalusHeat dimensions. The backrest fits any sauna cabin with a flat rear wall. The 3-Piece Set attaches with screws, so it works in any wood cabin. The Red-Light Kit is built for the SalusHeat power and mounting points.
How long does the waterproof outdoor cover last?
Most customers get four to six years of daily-outdoor use before the fabric thins. SalusHeat sells replacement covers through the same accessories page when you need a new one.
Will the red light therapy kit work in any SalusHeat sauna?
It works in most current SalusHeat cabins. Check the product page for compatibility before ordering — the kit lists every supported cabin model.
Can I install sauna accessories myself?
The backrest, rack set, and cover all install with the included hardware and a basic screwdriver. The Red-Light Kit should be installed by SalusHeat support or an electrician if you are not comfortable with low-voltage wiring.
What is the warranty on SalusHeat accessories?
Accessories are covered for 1 year from the date of purchase. The full sauna itself runs on the same two-tier structure that the [SalusHeat warranty page]publishes: 1 year on wood structure, 2 years on heating elements & electrical, and an optional 1-, 2-, or 3-year extension that can be purchased at the time of order.
Where do I buy replacement parts for an older sauna?
The After-Sales Accessories page on the SalusHeat site carries replacement panels, handles, bench wood, light bulbs, and control units for most older cabins.
Questions? Please contact salusheat customer service representative at help@salusheat.com.
