Use this page to check infrared space heater electricity consumption for your own infrared space heater: enter your wattage, hours of use per day and electricity rate, and press Calculate. You see your daily, monthly and yearly cost plus your yearly kWh consumption. Those same results also cover infrared space heater power consumption.
Wondering what infrared space heater electricity consumption will do to your bill this winter? An infrared heater draws anywhere from 300 to 1,500 watts, and the energy it uses is simply its wattage multiplied by the hours it runs, so the cost of heating a single room is easy to predict once you know your rate. Below you get the formula, a fully worked example with your own numbers to swap in, and a clear answer on when electricity use stays low.
Every electric heater is rated in watts, which is the rate at which it pulls electricity from the wall socket. Your utility does not bill you in watts, though. It bills you in kilowatt-hours, so the first step is converting between the two. One kilowatt is 1,000 watts, and running a 1,000 W device for one hour uses exactly one kilowatt-hour (shown as kWh on your bill).
A heater's label tells you its draw at full power. Most infrared panels and portable units are built between 300 and 1,500 watts, and a 1,500 watts model uses 1.5 kWh for every hour it runs flat out. In practice, a built-in thermostat cuts the element off once the room reaches your set temperature, so real electricity usage is usually lower than the label multiplied by the clock. The time a heater spends switched on is what matters, and the share of that time spent heating at full output is its duty cycle.
Resistive electric heaters turn almost all the electricity they draw into heat, so there is no hidden loss inside the unit. What differs between heater types is how that heat reaches you. Infrared heating is radiant heat: it travels through the air to heat objects and people directly, a bit like sunshine on your face. The efficiency gain comes from delivery, not conversion. That is why a modest wattage can feel comfortable at a desk or sofa, even though the room air itself stays cooler.
You only need three figures: the heater's power in kilowatts, the number of hours it runs at full output, and your electricity price per kilowatt-hour. Multiply them together and you have the answer to how much electricity does an infrared heater use in cost terms, which is its operating cost. Compare with how much electricity does an umbrella dryer use.
$$\text{Energy (kWh)} = \frac{\text{Watts} \times \text{Hours}}{1000}$$
$$\text{Running cost} = \text{Energy (kWh)} \times \text{Electricity rate}$$
Start with the cost per hour: divide the wattage by 1,000 and multiply by your electricity rate. Then multiply by the hours you heat each day to get the daily figure, and by the days in the month to get the monthly total. The cost to run any heater depends on the unit price printed on your latest utility bill, because the electricity price varies widely between regions and tariffs, and standing charges are billed on top whether or not the heater is on.
If a heater is switched on for ten hours but its thermostat holds it at full output for only six of them, count six hours. Estimating that fraction honestly is the hardest part of any forecast, so treat the first month of readings from a plug-in energy meter as the real answer and the formula as a planning tool.
Take a home office with a wall-mounted 750 W infrared panel and an electricity rate of $0.1763 per kWh. You heat the room for 6.5 hours on each working day during a 150-day heating season, and for this first pass we assume the heater stays at full power the whole time.
Now assume the room is reasonably sealed and the thermostat keeps the panel at full output for 60% of the 6.5 hours. Daily energy falls to 2.925 kWh, the cost per month drops to about $15.47, and the whole heating season uses about 438.75 kWh and costs about $77.35. The same heater, the same schedule and a working thermostat give you roughly 40% less electricity use, which is why control matters as much as wattage.
The table applies the same $0.1763 rate and the same 6.5 hours a day at full power to four common sizes, so you can see how energy consumption scales in a straight line with the rating. Next, look at how many watts does a water cooler use.
| Rated power | Typical use | Cost per hour | Energy per day | Cost per month (30 days) | Cost per heating season (150 days) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 400 W | Desk or bathroom panel | $0.07 | 2.6 kWh | $13.75 (78.0 kWh) | $68.76 (390.0 kWh) |
| 750 W | Home office panel | $0.13 | 4.875 kWh | $25.78 (146.25 kWh) | $128.92 (731.25 kWh) |
| 1,200 W | Living room panel | $0.21 | 7.8 kWh | $41.25 (234.0 kWh) | $206.27 (1,170 kWh) |
| 1,500 W | Portable room heater | $0.26 | 9.75 kWh | $51.57 (292.5 kWh) | $257.84 (1,462.5 kWh) |
Doubling the wattage doubles the draw over the same hours. A bigger unit is not automatically a bigger bill, though: if it reaches the set temperature faster, the thermostat shuts it off sooner. A small unit that never catches up with the room's heat loss will run all day and can cost as much as a larger one that cycles.
Not per watt. A 1,500 W heater draws 1.5 kWh each hour whatever its type, so the label alone never makes one technology cheaper than another. The savings come from how much heating time you need to feel comfortable, and that depends on how each heater delivers warmth. Compare with how much energy does an oil-filled radiator heater use.
A convection heater warms the air, which rises and escapes through gaps, so it has to run longer in a large or drafty space. A fan-forced unit moves that air faster but does not change the underlying losses. Infrared panels use direct heat on whatever sits in front of them, which suits spot heating at a desk or chair, and the room does not have to reach a high air temperature before you feel comfortable.
A ceramic heater reacts quickly but loses its warmth as soon as it switches off. An oil-filled radiator takes time to warm up, then keeps radiating after the element cycles off, which can suit all-day use. A storage heater charges overnight and releases heat during the day, which pairs well with off-peak tariffs. A heat pump is the real outlier: it moves heat rather than creating it, so it can deliver several kilowatts of warmth for each kilowatt of electricity, which makes it far cheaper to run for whole-house heating than any resistive heater.
For one occupied room, infrared space heaters usually win on comfort and efficiency per kilowatt-hour, because you can lower the central heating thermostat and heat only the area you use. Used that way, the heater supplements your main system instead of replacing it.
Two homes with the same heater can have very different bills, because the heater's rating describes its draw while the building decides how long it must run.
Room size sets how much power you need. As a starting point, an insulated room with a normal ceiling needs about 100 watts for each square metre, so a 12 m² office wants roughly 1,200 W of heating power. A poorly insulated room with big windows, drafts and several outside walls loses heat quickly and needs more; a well-insulated room needs less. Better insulation reduces heat loss, so the thermostat has less work to do.
If infrared panels are your main heat source, your usage follows the building's heating demand in kilowatt-hours per square metre per year, which you can find on its energy performance certificate. Because nearly every kilowatt-hour of electricity becomes a kilowatt-hour of heat, the sum is direct: 90 kWh per m² across a 40 m² flat is 3,600 kWh a year, or about $634.68 at $0.1763 per kWh.
Short, targeted sessions in a small room keep your total power usage low. Leaving a heater on all day in a large open space is where the electricity bill climbs, since the running time stops being offset by the thermostat. The efficiency advantage fades here, and it stops being a bargain compared with an efficient central heating system.
Cutting energy use is mostly about running the heater less, not turning the wattage down. These habits make the biggest difference:
Infrared panels are simple resistive loads, so they can run from solar panels and an inverter in a cabin or an off-grid setup. Size the system for the load: a 1,500 W heater needs 1.5 kWh for each hour, so a few hours of use needs a battery of well over 5 kWh.
They are worth it when you heat a small area for a few hours. Your savings show up when the central thermostat comes down a few degrees and the heater covers one room. They are a poor deal when several heaters run through the day, or when an upgrade to insulation would solve the underlying cold.
Installation changes your bill less than the wattage does, but mounting position matters: a wall or ceiling panel aimed at where you sit gives targeted heating, while a unit hidden behind furniture runs longer for the same comfort. A dedicated circuit is wise for whole-room systems so several panels do not overload the supply. There are no moving parts and no fuel, so maintenance adds nothing to the running cost beyond a wipe with a dry cloth, and unlike gas or propane heaters there is no fuel bill on top of electricity.