Ice, Ice, Baby: The Sun Home Cold Plunge Pro Ice Bath Creates Its Own Ice

As cold plunging grows in popularity, the methods also grow, from $100 inflatable tubs to feature-rich premium options that cost thousands of dollars. The Sun Home Cold Plunge Pro fits into the latter category. At $13,800, this cold plunge is pricey, but it has a premium build, a comprehensive filtration system, and can hold subfreezing temperatures, even in the middle of summer. 

The stainless steel interior and 1-horsepower chiller (the most powerful that we’ve tested) make this a tub worth checking out for athletes or cold plunge enthusiasts who can afford it. I was lucky enough to take this bad boy for a spin for a few months, and I can say that it lives up to its lofty price tag and then some. 

In short: The Home Sun Cold Plunge Pro costs a pretty penny, but it’s well worth the cost. The stainless steel build is durable and easy to clean, it can hit the coldest temperatures I’ve tested (it makes ice, for Pete’s sake), and the filtration system is highly effective and nearly zero-maintenance. Plus, the perks like variable ambient lighting and rolling caster wheels make it stand out even more.

What I Tested

I tested the Sun Home Cold Plunge Pro by plunging daily for about 4 months. These plunges involved submerging up to my neck for 3-8 minutes at temperatures ranging from 28 to 44 degrees Fahrenheit.

The first thing I noticed when it arrived was that it’s a beast. This all-in-one cold plunge is made with stainless steel (more on that later) with the chiller integrated inside, which adds up to a hefty 345-pound dry weight. If you fill it up to the 150-gallon capacity, the weight bumps up to around 1,500 pounds. 

Luckily, the Cold Plunge Pro sits on six caster wheels that make it a cinch to move around. This is the only tub that has this simple yet brilliant add-on, and it made me wonder why every plunge doesn’t have this feature. 

Those caster wheels were the first indicator of a cold plunge tub packed with thoughtful features. The LED control panel is bright and intuitive, providing a simple means to control the temperature. The jet (yeah, there’s a jet) blasts the coldest water right into your chest while you plunge, and the variable interior and ambient lighting turn the surrounding area into a day spa.

As noted above, the tub itself is made of stainless steel. The interior is bare steel, and the exterior is covered with a textured coating that’s weather- and UV-resistant. In addition to adding durability, the coating also gives the tub a premium look and feel that wouldn’t be out of place in a high-end spa. 

The plunge has a few added perks as well — Sun Home provided matching stainless steel steps to help you get in and out of the tub, a waterproof pillow with suction cups, a branded towel and robe, a cleaning kit with extra filters, and a remote control for the lights. 

It comes with a waterproof, insulated cover that keeps the temperature cool and debris out of the tub if it is stored outside. The cover has four locking clips to keep it tied to the plunge, which is useful for households with small children. 

The setup was as simple as you could want. Once you get it out of the crate, just roll the tub where you want it, lock the caster wheels, fill it up, and set the temperature. Once the water gets cold, you’re ready to go.

Sun Home Cold Plunge Pro Review

Water Chilling

This is the star of the show here: Home Sauna’s 1-horsepower chiller cools the tub’s water extremely fast to wildly low temperatures. Where most plunge chillers cool to a very respectable 34 degrees, I cranked this bad boy down to 28 degrees to test its highly-touted icemaking abilities. 

Overnight, the tub’s interior was lined with an inch of ice, while the rest of the water had the texture of a thin Slushee. After another day, there were a few inches of ice lining the interior. Once the tub’s thawing function kicked in (it’s wild that a cold plunge tub even needs a thawing function, by the way), the temperature “heated” up to 35 degrees or so, allowing the ice to break up and float to the top. 

The result was the invigorating experience of lowering myself into a miniature iceberg field for what might be the most intense, invigorating cold plunge experience I’ve ever had. 

Hot exterior temperatures didn’t seem to affect it, either. I was able to get the chiller down to 28 degrees F in the middle of a blazing Sacramento summer when temperatures regularly surpassed 100 degrees outside. So yeah, the chiller works like a dream.

Tub Ergonomics

The tub is 33 inches tall with an interior that measures 47 inches long. At 5’8” and 220 pounds, I had plenty of room to stretch out. One of my favorite features is the headrest, a small, waterproof pillow that sticks to the end of the tub via two suction cups. This small, but thoughtful add-on allowed me to lie back and relax while I soaked. It’s one of those little perks that makes a big difference. 

Most of the hard tubs that I’ve tested are made with acrylic, a lightweight, durable material that’s easy to clean. The Cold Plunge Pro’s interior is stainless steel, which, while also easy to clean, somehow made the cold plunge feel even colder. I’m used to plunging in 45-degree water, but somehow, my first plunge in this tub felt like it was my first time all over again. 

Another difference with this tub is the single jet that sits just below the water line. While every tub has some form of current to move water through the filter, this tub’s current takes the form of a jet that’s just slightly less powerful than a hot tub. While it doesn’t massage you, it blasts water right from the chiller into your chest, adding to the frigid experience. 

Speaking of the jet and chiller, it’s worth noting that both of them are nearly silent compared to every other chiller that I’ve tested. The Ice Barrel Chiller comes close (you can read about it in our Ice Barrel 500 and chiller review), but the Cold Plunge Pro’s chiller and pump were so quiet that I had to open the tub several times to make sure everything was working properly (it was). 

Water Filtration, Purification

Like many higher-end plunge chiller combinations, the Cold Plunge Pro uses three different filtration systems to keep the water clean: A 20-micron filter, UV filtration, and ozone filtration. Unlike every other plunge I tested, access to the filters and valves required to maintain the tub is easy to find and access. Some tubs required me to access levels of flexibility that I never knew I possessed, but not this one.

Despite Sun Home’s recommendation of changing the filter weekly and draining the tub every few weeks, I only changed the filter twice and only emptied the tub once to see how it would hold up. And despite jumping into the plunge every day after 15 minutes inside a sauna (which adds a lot of sweat and oil to the plunge’s water), the water stayed crystal clear. 

Even if this tub didn’t lower the water temperature to ludicrous levels, the filtration system’s effectiveness and low maintenance requirements go a long way toward justifying the cost.

Durability

I’ve tested tubs that cost north of 10 grand before, and most of them have had at least one minor breakdown over the months they were tested. One had an issue that required a chiller replacement, and one that just shut down completely after 2 months of testing. 

Bottom line: These are expensive tubs. If you’re going to make such a significant financial investment, it had better last. I’ve put the Home Sun Cold Plunge Pro through its paces and then some, and it is showing zero signs of slowing down. 

The chiller and pump are as quiet as they were from the start, there have been no mechanical breakdowns of any kind, and that stainless steel build will probably outlive me. 

Sun Home also offers a 1-year warranty on the Cold Plunge Pro, but based on my experience with it, you likely won’t be using it.

Lighting

Look, lighting isn’t the most important part of a cold plunge experience. But if you’re shelling out over 10 grand for a cold plunge, every aspect of it should make you say “wow.” Lighting is no exception, and in this case, the Cold Plunge Pro delivers. 

Many plunges offer interior lighting, but the Cold Plunge Pro steps things up with interior lighting, an illuminated logo, and ambient lighting all along the bottom of the tub. Since it’s elevated on those caster wheels, the ambient lighting has a decent spread, turning the whole area into a day spa. 

Plus, the lighting comes in a range of colors so that you can adjust it to the vibe that you’re going for. I’m pretty sure that I went with a green (fun fact: I’m colorblind) that somehow made the water look chillier. If the color in the photos isn’t actually green, feel free to give me grief. 

Final Thoughts

If you’re a serious athlete or a wild cold plunge enthusiast (guilty on both charges), the Sun Home Cold Plunge Pro is about as good as it gets. It’s a powerful, durable, nearly-zero-maintenance cold plunge that can achieve and hold subfreezing temperatures in the dead of summer. 

Those extra few degrees made a difference for me. I used it to recover from workouts, and the extremely cold temperature even helped keep me moving somewhat comfortably as I recovered from a fairly serious back injury. Details like ambient lighting, sturdy steps, and a handy little bath pillow are icing on the cake (pun intended).

My only real complaint is the $13,800 price point, which is going to be out of many plungers’ budgets. But the build quality, minimal maintenance requirements, and astonishingly cold chiller go a long way toward justifying the cost. If the price point works for you, the Sun Home Cold Plunge Pro can be an excellent investment.