A heated clothes airer is one of the cheapest electric appliances in most UK homes, which is exactly why so many people bought one when energy prices climbed. It is essentially a metal frame with warm bars that takes the chill off damp washing so it dries faster, and because the bars draw only a couple of hundred watts, the cost of leaving one on for an evening is small. The catch is that small and free are not the same thing, and the way you use it changes the bill more than the model you buy. This guide gives you the real running cost at today's price cap, shows you how to work it out for your own airer, and explains where it sits against a tumble dryer and a dehumidifier.
The short answer. Most heated clothes airers draw between 200W and 300W, so they cost roughly 5p to 8p an hour to run at the July to September 2026 price cap of 26.11p per kWh. A typical drying session of six to eight hours works out at around 30p to 60p, and a tumble dryer doing the same load costs several times more. Using a cover and only running the airer until the washing is dry are the two things that keep the cost down.
What a heated clothes airer actually costs to run
The running cost of any electric appliance is just its power rating multiplied by how long you run it, multiplied by your electricity unit rate. Heated airers make this easy because almost all of them sit in a narrow band of power. The cheaper winged and two-tier models tend to draw around 220W, while larger three-tier towers are usually nearer 300W. A few drying pods with a built-in fan heater go much higher, often 900W or more, and those behave more like a small heater than a simple airer.
To turn watts into pennies, divide the wattage by 1,000 to get kilowatts, then multiply by the unit rate. A 220W airer is 0.22kW, so an hour costs 0.22 x 26.11p, which is about 5.7p. The table below shows the common ratings.
| Airer type | Power | Cost per hour | 6-hour session | 8-hour session |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Winged / 2-tier | 220W | 5.7p | 34p | 46p |
| 3-tier tower | 300W | 7.8p | 47p | 63p |
| Heated pod with fan | 900W | 23.5p | £1.41 | £1.88 |
At 26.11p per kWh, Ofgem cap July to September 2026.
So for a standard heated airer you are looking at well under 10p an hour. Even a long overnight run on a 300W model stays under a pound. The high-wattage pods cost more per hour, but they dry a load far faster, so the total per load can still be reasonable. The number that matters is cost per load, not cost per hour, and that depends entirely on drying time.
Cost per load and per year
A heated airer does not dry clothes on a fixed timer. A light load of shirts and underwear might be dry in three or four hours, while towels, jeans and bedding can take most of a day, especially in a cold room. Most people find a full load is dry somewhere between six and eight hours, and that is the figure to plan around.
Take a 250W airer, roughly mid-range, run for seven hours per load. That is 1.75kWh, or about 46p a load. If you dry three loads a week that is around £1.37 a week, or close to £71 a year. A household running five loads a week on a 300W tower for eight hours would spend nearer £164 a year. Most homes land between those two figures.
- Light user, 220W, 6 hours, 2 loads a week: around £36 a year.
- Average user, 250W, 7 hours, 3 loads a week: around £71 a year.
- Heavy user, 300W, 8 hours, 5 loads a week: around £164 a year.
To work out your own number, find the wattage on the airer's label or in its manual, decide roughly how many hours each load takes and how many loads you do, then multiply through. If you want to check the real draw rather than trust the label, a cheap socket meter does the job in a few minutes, as covered in our guide on using a plug-in energy monitor. The same method works for any appliance, which is why understanding how appliance running costs are calculated pays off across the whole house.
How it compares to a tumble dryer and a dehumidifier
The reason heated airers became popular is the gap between them and a tumble dryer. A condenser or vented tumble dryer typically pulls 2,000W to 3,000W and runs for an hour or two, so a single cycle often costs £1 to £1.50. A heat pump tumble dryer is far more efficient and usually comes in around 40p to 80p a cycle, but it costs much more to buy. Against a standard vented dryer, a heated airer doing the same load for 46p is clearly cheaper to run, even though it takes longer.
The honest trade-off is time and space. A tumble dryer gives you dry clothes in roughly an hour with no drying rack taking up a room. A heated airer is cheaper per load but ties up floor space for most of a day and adds moisture to the air, which can encourage condensation and mould if the room is not ventilated. If you already own a dryer, our comparison of tumble dryer running costs and the case for a heat pump tumble dryer will help you decide when each one is worth using.
A dehumidifier is the third option and often the smartest. Run a dehumidifier near an ordinary airer and it pulls moisture out of the air so the washing dries faster, while also protecting the room from damp. A small unit draws around 150W to 300W, similar to a heated airer, so you can run both for a modest hourly cost. Our piece on dehumidifier running costs and the wider look at drying clothes without a tumble dryer set out when this combination makes sense.
How to keep the cost down
The single biggest saving is using a cover. Most heated airers can be bought with a fitted zip-up cover, or you can drape a sheet over the frame. The cover traps the warm air around the bars so clothes dry much faster, which cuts the hours you run the airer and therefore the cost. A cover often turns an eight-hour dry into four or five, roughly halving the bill per load.
- Always spin your washing on the highest setting your machine allows before it goes on the airer. Wetter clothes take far longer to dry.
- Use a cover or a sheet over the frame to hold the heat in.
- Don't overload it. Spread items out so warm air reaches everything, and put the heaviest items, like towels, nearest the heated bars.
- Open a window a crack or run an extractor fan so the moisture leaves the room rather than soaking into walls.
- Turn it off once the washing is dry. There is no benefit to leaving it on, and it is the running hours that cost money, not switching it on.
Some heated airers are sold with a timer or come with a smart plug, which is handy if you tend to forget about them. If you are on a cheaper night rate such as Economy 7, running the airer overnight on the off-peak rate cuts the cost further, since the appliance is happy to dry slowly while you sleep.
Standby power and the energy label
Heated airers are simple appliances. Most are nothing more than a heating element with an on/off switch, so when they are switched off at the wall they draw nothing at all. A few newer models with a remote, a timer or a display can sit in standby and sip a tiny amount of power, but it is negligible compared to a TV or a games console. If yours has any kind of standby light, switching it off at the socket removes even that small draw. Our guide to standby power puts these numbers in context across the home.
You will not find an energy-efficiency rating on a heated airer the way you would on a fridge or a washing machine, because they are not covered by the same labelling rules. That means you cannot judge one airer against another from a label alone. The only figures that matter are the wattage and how quickly it dries a load, so check the power rating before you buy. If you want to understand what the familiar A to G ratings do and do not tell you on the appliances that carry them, our explainer on energy labels is the place to start.
The bottom line
A heated clothes airer is genuinely cheap to run. At the July to September 2026 price cap, a standard model costs roughly 5p to 8p an hour, a typical load comes in around 30p to 60p, and a normal household spends somewhere between £40 and £160 a year depending on how much washing they dry. That is a fraction of what a vented tumble dryer costs to run, which is the whole point.
The cost is driven by hours, not by the model, so the wins are simple. Spin the washing well, use a cover, don't overload the frame, ventilate the room, and switch it off once the clothes are dry. Pair it with a dehumidifier if damp is a worry. Do that and a heated airer is one of the better-value appliances you can plug in, and one of the few that costs less to use than people expect rather than more.