Infrared heaters are more effective heaters than other electric heating systems. Therefore, they will help save on your electricity bills. in general, an infrared heater uses about 40% less energy to produce the same level of comfort as other heaters. Your electric bill will be about 40% lower as a result.
In this article, I will discuss:
- why infrared heaters are more efficient
- how much energy infrared heaters use compared to other heating systems
- how much money is saved by switching from regular heating to infrared
- are infrared heaters worth it?
Why are infrared heaters more efficient?
Infrared heaters send their rays out into the room and heat any object or person that is hit by these rays. This works very similarly to the sun. In this way, infrared heaters are able to directly transfer their heat to you and the objects in the room, instead of heating the air. Because of this, infrared heaters are much more efficient heaters.
This is especially true for rooms that have a high ceiling. Normally, heaters warm up the air, which rises to the ceiling where it is effectively useless. You need to wait and keep the heater running until the entire room is full of warm air. Since infrared heats objects and people directly, they heat quickly and without much energy loss.
Infrared energy use compared to regular heating
Infrared heaters use about 40% less energy to create the same level of comfort as other heating systems. However, not every room requires the same amount of heating. Therefore, I created the following table showing the amount of energy required per room per square foot.
| Area | Infrared heating: wattage per sq. ft (0,1 m²) | Regular heating: wattage per sq. ft (0,1 m²) |
|---|---|---|
| Living room | 7 W | 10 W |
| Bedroom | 4.5 W | 6.3 W |
| Bathroom | 9.3 W | 13.3 W |
| Closed porch | 9.3 W | 13.3 W |
| Open outdoor area | 28 – 56 W | Warm air cannot heat an outdoor area |
If you want to easily calculate how many watts you need based on this table, you can use my wattage calculator. You can find it here: Infrared wattage calculator: how many watts do you need for any room?
How much money is saved by using infrared over electric heaters?
Since infrared heaters use about 40% less energy, they will significantly reduce the total costs for electricity. The following table shows the running costs of infrared heating vs conventional electric heating.
Keep in mind that this table is only an indication of the differences in costs since it assumes the heater runs only 6 hours a day. This is based on the expected time the heater will run when you are at home during the evening and early morning.
| Run time | costs infrared | costs electricity |
|---|---|---|
| One hour | 0.3 $ | 0.44 $ |
| Day (6 hours) | 1.84 $ | 2.64 $ |
| Week | 12.86 $ | 18.45 $ |
| Month (30 days) | 55.1 $ | 79.20 $ |
| Year | 671.6 $ | 963.6 $ |
Total yearly costs per heater type
The following table shows the costs for using a 1500 watt heater for one year for 6 hours a day. This includes running costs and the average costs of purchase per year. There are three types of infrared heaters (portable quartz heaters, infrared fireplaces, and heating panels), which differ greatly in purchase costs and warranty. Therefore, I included both in this table.
| Heater type | Price range | Warranty | Average purchase costs per year (based on price and warranty) | Running costs per year | Total yearly costs |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Infrared: portable quartz | 75 – 140 $ | 3 years | 36 $ | 672 $ | 708 $ |
| Infrared: fireplace | 210 – 370 $ | 1 – 3 years | 145 $ | 672 $ | 817 $ |
| Infrared: heating panel | 600 – 700 $ | 10 years | 65 $ | 672 $ | 737 $ |
| Electric | 24 – 80 $ | 1 – 5 years | 52 $ | 964 $ | 1016 $ |
As can be seen in the table, when the purchase cost and warranty are included, infrared heaters are much cheaper than regular electric heaters. Regular electric heating will cost 1016 $ per year (running 6 hours a day for 365 days). Infrared heaters can reduce this by as much as 308 $, or 26 $ per month.
Infrared fireplaces come out relatively expensive compared to the other infrared heaters. This is the case because they are very similar to quartz infrared heaters but you pay extra for them to look like a cozy fireplace. I highly recommend checking out sylvane.com or amazon.com for your infrared heater purchase (plus you will support me if you make a purchase this way!).
Infrared heaters can reduce your monthly electric bill by as much as 26 $
Are infrared heaters worth it?
Based on the cost comparison between infrared and electric heaters, infrared heaters are clearly worth it. However, there are many more aspects to infrared heaters that make them an attractive option over other electric heaters.
I wrote an article where I compare infrared, electric, and gas-based heaters on costs and aspects such as health and safety. You can find it here: Are infrared heaters worth it? (yearly costs, health, and safety)
I highly recommend checking out the available infrared heaters on amazon.com
Sylvane is an excellent company for quality heaters. I highly recommend checking them out at Sylvane.com