Fans have a long history. China has manufactured simple wooden hulled windmills in many years BC, and its working principle is basically the same as that of modern centrifugal fans. In 1862, Guibel of the United Kingdom invented a centrifugal fan. Its impeller and casing are concentric circles, the casing is made of bricks, and the wooden impeller uses rearward straight blades with an efficiency of only about 40%. It is mainly used for mine ventilation. In 1880, people designed a volute casing for mine exhaust and air supply, and a centrifugal fan with backward curved blades. The structure has been relatively complete. In 1892, France developed a cross-flow fan; in 1898, the Irish designed a forward-blade Sirocco centrifugal fan, which was widely used in various countries; in the 19th century, axial flow fans were used in mine ventilation and metallurgical industry. However, the pressure is only 100-300 Pa, and the efficiency is only 15-25%. It was not until the 1940s that the rapid development was achieved.
In 1935, Germany first adopted axial flow equal pressure fans to ventilate and induce air for boilers; in 1948, Denmark made axial flow fans with adjustable moving blades in operation; rotary axial flow fans, meridian accelerated axial flow fans, diagonal flow fans and Cross-flow fans have also been developed.