By Kate Harvey
Content Manager | Pou Whakahaere Ihirangi
If you’re heading out to buy a heater now that the weather is cooler, you might think they’re all much of a muchness. But our testing has uncovered there are some that won’t do a good job of keeping you toasty.
The good news is you don’t have to spend a fortune to stay warm – we’ve found two cheap heaters that outperform nearly all the others in our test.
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3 heaters to avoid
We test heaters in a special room with 81 evenly spaced temperature sensors. We use the sensor readings to create a 3D map that helps us measure the effectiveness of each heater. The map helps us see how quickly each heater warms the room and how good its thermostat is at controlling the temperature.
When calculating the overall score, we also consider how reliable the brand is and how satisfied customers are when they buy that brand.
The three heaters with the worst scores in our test are:
While these two Goldair heaters didn’t score well in our test, there are other Goldair heaters that scored better – and one got our Consumer Recommended tick. Use our heater test results to find the best one for the best price.
These two Recommended heaters cost under $100
Ten heaters get our Consumer Recommended tick. Some of those cost more than $700, but these two are both just $69.
Compare electric heaters
Keep warm with one of our tested heaters. We’ve tested all types of plug-ins including oscillating towers, micathermics, convection, fan and oil-column.
