Frequently Asked Questions
Are Large Space Heaters More Powerful Than Smaller Ones?
Nope! It may seem counterintuitive, but large space heaters don’t necessarily heat any better than smaller options. In fact, most space heaters in the US and Canada deliver about the same amount of heat, regardless of size. Space heaters top out at 1,500 watts, which is the highest safe operating load for a 15-amp household circuit. And aside from some low-power personal heaters here and there, most space heaters available are capable of 1,500 watts.
What’s more, electric space heaters are all pretty much 100 percent efficient at converting that electricity to heat. Whether directly or indirectly, nearly all of that energy eventually becomes heat.
So if space heaters share basically the same power and efficiency capacity, why are some 1,500-watt heaters advertised for small rooms and others for large rooms? This likely has as much to do with marketing as science. Pretty much every ceramic, electric-coil, and positive-temperature-coefficient (PTC) heater has about the same amount of juice and, thus, the same ability to heat a room … at least eventually.
What differs among heaters is how and where the heat gets distributed and how quickly. All other things being equal, a heater’s efficiency mostly focuses on whether it puts the heat where you want it to go.
What Are the Different Types of Space Heaters?
All electric space heaters essentially do the same thing: They take electricity off the grid, usually 1,500 watts of it, if you’re in the United States, and turn that power into heat.
The vast majority of space heaters, including ceramic heaters and PTC heaters, are electric-resistance heaters. This means they run an electrical current through something that creates resistance: maybe an electric coil or maybe a specially designed ceramic. This quickly turns electricity into heat.
Most space heaters use a fan to disperse this heat out into the world, where we all live. These forced-air convection heaters tend to be the fastest at quickly raising the temperature of the surrounding air. The air then heats you. While this variety heats quickly, it can take quite a bit of electricity to warm an entire room.
Oil-filled radiators, in contrast, heat oil that circulates inside the device, which then emits heat to the surrounding room. These tend to heat up more slowly than electric-resistance heaters, but they offer even, lasting heat and are very quiet. These radiators operate on the same principle as steam radiators in buildings with a boiler room. And just like steam radiators, they can get hot to the touch.
Radiant heaters, such as infrared heaters, operate much like the sun or a campfire: Rather than heat the air, they directly heat objects or people by radiating energy in their direction. Infrared devices heat the air only indirectly, via the objects they heat. The glow is immediately palpable as warmth, but you’ll need to be in the path of the radiation to feel it, much like the feeling of being in direct sunlight versus the shade. Likewise, the thermometer might not immediately register the warmth you perceive. Infrared heaters tend to be superior for providing warmth without expending much energy, making this type common in large, lofty spaces or outside on a patio.
Though they deliver heat differently, both infrared and oil-filled heaters are subject to the same wattage limitations as electrical-resistance heaters and share efficiencies.
The same is not true of heat pumps, a newer technology that’s expected to provide the next generation of household heat. Heat pumps don’t use energy to create heat. Instead, they move heat energy from one place to another. Accordingly, they require far less energy than other space heater types. But household systems are costly to install, and while more affordable window and portable heat pumps are ramping up, they’re not yet broadly available.
Yes, but also definitely no.
Space heaters are much safer than they used to be. Modern space heaters are heavily regulated, especially regarding exposed heating elements and automatic shutoff switches to prevent overheating. But all heating devices require caution, and so do all devices that pull a lot of energy over long periods.
The vast majority of residential heating fires start with actual fire—specifically in fireplaces and fuel burners. But portable heaters, including electric space heaters, accounted for more than an average of 1,600 fires per year in the US between 2020 and 2022, according to the United States Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC). These fires were associated with an average of 70 deaths and 150 injuries annually during that time period.
So, treat your space heater with the caution and wild skepticism that it deserves. See WIRED’s Guide to Space Heater Safety for a full rundown of how not to start fires or cause other hazards with the machines. That guide follows recommendations from federal experts at the U.S. Fire Administration (USFA) and the CPSC, as well as the Association of Home Appliance Manufacturers (AHAM).
But for the short version:
Don’t leave a space heater unattended. “Unattended” includes sleeping, y’all! Might we suggest a wonderful down comforter instead? When possible, safety experts also recommend you don’t leave a portable heater running unattended in a room with a baby, nor a person with mobility issues.
Plug your heater directly into the outlet. Don’t use extension cords or power strips with space heaters, lest you build up too much electrical load and risk a fire.
Don’t plug another appliance into the same outlet or circuit as the space heater.
Place a space heater only on the floor or on a level surface. Heat rises. You don’t need to prop up a heater on an unstable chair or table. The exception is the rare heater designed to be mounted on a wall.
Keep your heater at least 3 feet from flammable objects. This includes bedding, drapes, furniture, clothes, papers, and books.
Keep space heaters away from water and dampness, whether in bathrooms or in moist basements prone to dripping or flooding.
Read the manual. Manufacturers have good advice.
How We Tested and What We Tested
Testing space heaters involves answering a few key questions: How safe is it? How loud is it? How quickly and evenly can it heat a room?
During intensive testing of dozens of space heaters, I lived for weeks in a home with the thermostat set to a chilly 65 degrees Fahrenheit.
I tested how well and quickly each device heated a medium-size room (14 by 14 feet), and also how well it heated a small seating area in a larger, open-format space. To test each heater’s thermostat and also measure the evenness of heating, I placed thermometers at three or more locations in each room, including behind the heater.
I gauged the loudness of each device with a decibel meter at 3 feet away and verified power usage with a wattmeter. To understand whether the heater’s exhaust put out painful levels of heat, I used an infrared thermometer to collect precise surface temperatures. When in doubt, I put my own fingers on the line.
Finally, I tested safety features and basic durability. I looked at independent safety certifications, of course. But I also rudely knocked over each device to verify how its tip-over protections functioned and confirmed that the heater started working again when set back upright.
To test overheat protection, I smothered each device with an old sheet to see whether the device shut itself off or adjusted its power output to keep internal temperature low. In the event that the heater turned off, I then checked how soon it could turn back on, if it ever did. (Some heaters gave up, in permanent complaint!)
If any device fails the tip-over or overheat tests, I don’t recommend it. If it’s significantly louder than 50 decibels at 3 feet, I don’t recommend it. If the heater breaks during routine operation, I don’t recommend it. Maddening rattles and squeaks are also disqualifying.
I continually test my favorite models to track how they hold up over time and subject new heaters to this testing regimen to see if they can oust the current top picks.
More Space Heaters We Recommend
Photograph: Kat Merck
Amazon Basics Ceramic Space Heater for $21: This was the least expensive heater we tested, and for the same price, you can choose a model that oscillates. It has tip-over protection and auto shutoff if it senses a temperature spike. Dials are analog, though this heater does have a light that glows when it’s plugged in. At about 48 decibels on high, it was loud but not as loud as some other heaters we tested. It seemed to take ages to heat the 100-square-foot room it’s designed for, so I felt like I always had it turned on. But if that doesn’t bother you, it’s a great value. —Kat Merck
Vornado AVH10 for $100: Vornado has an unholy variety of models that look quite similar but have different levels of loudness and feature sets. Some are built in America, some in China. In general, the models I’ve liked best are the ones that advertise “vortex action,” a fancy name for spinning a fan into a spiral grate oriented opposite to the action of the fan. This leads to a mostly quiet and nigh-undetectable column of warm air, directed out to the back of the room, where it scatters. The TAVH10, which is basically this model but with a timer and remote, is my current favorite, though if you need neither, you can save $30 and get this instead. —Matthew Korfhage
Vornado MVH for $75 and Vornado VH240+ for $65: These two devices are very nearly identical. The MVH is among the most silent, even in its heat, and reasonably priced space heaters available. However, the TAVH10 is a bit quieter, and its included remote and timer make it more attractive. This said, there are reasons to favor analog devices like these. For instance, you can regulate them with a temperature-controlled power outlet in order to get the most accurate version of a thermostat. —Matthew Korfhage
Lasko Ellipse Ceramic Tabletop Heater for $70: This little ceramic number from Lasko was the space heater I kept reaching for while testing dozens of other space heaters last year. It’s not the most obvious choice: It doesn’t heat a room evenly, its grill surface gets wackily hot, and the thermostat is an inside joke. I’m not sure I’d run it near babies or small dogs. And yet I still kept voting for it with my cold, cold feet. Why? Because this little thing can radically change my whole experience of life within about 15 seconds of turning on. It brings the heat, as they say, though mostly within an 8-foot radius. Within that manifold, it’s like living inside a hair dryer, which is more pleasant than it sounds. This previous pick for best foot warmer is still good, but it’s just not as versatile as our new top pick for personal heater from Vornado. —Matthew Korfhage
Shark TurboBlade Cool + Heat for $400: WIRED reviewer Kat Merck enjoyed the customizable airflow of Shark’s original TurboBlade cooling fan (7/10, WIRED Recommends), which you can angle every which way. On cooling fan settings, these virtues remain true of the Cool + Heat version. True to its name, the Cool + Heat model also adds a 1,400-watt heater to the equation, with emphasis on “little.” The TurboBlade does not push air through its blade-like “wings” for heating as it does for cooling. Rather, it blows hot air only out of the small vent at the center of the device, whose aperture is only somewhat larger than some hair dryers. The versatility of heating and cooling is nice, and I especially love that the thermostat is accurate. Shark also automatically modulates its energy output to maintain temperature in a room, which helps to avoid the wild on-off swings of some less sophisticated heaters. But for such a small heater, the TurboBlade is quite big and loud. Even on low settings, the high-pitched jet engine whir never stops. Standing in front of it on high settings, my phone registers 70 decibels. So I’d recommend this for someone who predominantly wants to use the device as a fan. The heater is more of a secondary function. —Matthew Korfhage
De’Longhi Slim-Style Portable Panel Heater for $210: This electric panel heater is an interesting hybrid, with dual heat exhausts on each side but also a broad radiant heat panel. This makes for a middle ground between radiators and resistive fan heaters—heating a room much faster than a classic radiator would, but still maintaining warm radiant heat over time. That said, it shares a radiator’s main fault, which is that it’s painfully hot to the touch across a large surface. It still issues the same amount of fan noise as a fan heater, also. But it may be your choice if you need to heat up a space quickly and evenly and maintain that heat over time. —Matthew Korfhage
Dreo MC706 Fan and Heater for $170: Dreo’s innovative 2-in-1 fan-heater combination uses auto-shift positive temperature coefficient (PTC) technology, which moves the heater’s ceramic element aside to allow full fan airflow. Its 1,700 ft/m wind speed is a rarity among tower fans, let alone tower fan/heater combos. It’s not the strongest space heater, but it is sufficient, with five settings, 120-degree oscillation, and tip-over protection. Note that though it includes a remote, it has no smart features, and it does not work with Dreo’s app. —Matthew Korfhage
Dreo Bathroom Heater for $55: Like Dreo’s smart wall-mounted model I far prefer, this ceramic heater comes with an ALCI plug for safe use near water. I prefer to keep bathroom heaters away from the floor, but not all bathrooms have mountable wall space. This remains a possible, though not ideal, alternative, with a somewhat janky thermostat. —Matthew Korfhage
Vornado VC-02 Ceramic Heater for $130: Vornado put out two new ceramic heaters at the tail end of 2025. The less expensive, smaller, horizontally oriented VC-01 ($80) is WIRED’s top personal heater pick. The VC-02 is a bit like the 01 turned on its end and made into a tower heater. The VC-02 is, in most ways, a premium model, with more options in terms of power and fan settings. It’s even quieter than its sister model—in fact, it’s one of the quietest heaters I’ve tested, period. It has a thermostat that’s reasonably accurate. It’s also got a remote and the ability to swivel from side to side for full-room coverage. (It does not pivot up and down, though, the way the VC-01 does.) But while I like all these features, its tower-heater shape makes it less optimized than the VC-01 for up-close heating, which is what ceramic heaters do best. —Matthew Korfhage
Not Recommended
Heatbit Maxi Pro: The Heatbit Maxi Pro (5/10, WIRED Review) is a cool-looking, luxury-styled air purifier and heater with a twist: It offsets its energy use by mining Bitcoin. At the high energy rates and lagging Bitcoin price of 2026, the Bitcoin mining certainly wasn’t profitable. But it did offset the cost of heating with the device by about a third, and made onboarding quite easy for Bitcoin novices. The app and safety features are admirable enough. But the Heatbit is neither a quiet heater nor a great air purifier, and its Bitcoin mining might take most of a decade to make up the $1,500 to $2,000 price tag of the device. In the end, the Heatbit is a conversation item, something to show off to houseguests. But I couldn’t find a way to make it practical. It’s also currently out of stock. —Matthew Korfhage
Lasko Design Series 16″ Ceramic Space Heater: It’s a fact that short space heaters work just as well as tall space heaters to heat a room. However, most of them aren’t much to look at. This little ribbed cylinder, however, sits on a plastic faux-wood tripod base and looks more like a speaker or modern air purifier than a heater. I quite liked having it in my office during testing, and it includes all the trimmings—oscillation, digital thermostat, remote, digital display (which can be snoozed for bedrooms), and a timer. However, its plastic grate got extremely hot during testing, rendering it a burn hazard for kids and pets. —Kat Merck
Boldr Kelvin (Gen 2): The Kelvin is a much different heater than the others on this list: It is a silent white or black panel that slowly heats up over the course of an hour, emitting what the company attests is far-infrared radiation, similar to those mail-order saunas you can find on Wayfair. The standard model tops out at just 450 watts, so the sell isn’t really that it emits a lot of heat. Rather, far-infrared feels warmer if you stand in front of it. It operates on the same principle as heat from the sun, warming surfaces (including people) directly rather than heating up the air. In the ideal case, this means you can feel more warmth while using less energy than a traditional heater. Its makers recommend it for those stubborn cold spots in a house. But I struggled with this heater. A wall-anchored heater offers less flexibility, and, in the shorter term, a radiant heater provides warmth only directly in the path of the panel, meaning it must be positioned with quite a bit of care to be useful. The Kelvin also uses up quite a bit of wall space, and must be located near an outlet. By design, its front gets quite hot to the touch—near boiling, in fact—and the device projects quite a bit of heat backward into the wall even after a second-generation upgrade to its insulation. It’s an interesting concept, with a smart app to track energy use, but the caveats add up. At $400, it’s hard to make it pencil. —Matthew Korfhage
Pelonis 16-Inch Space Heater and Pelonis 23-Inch Space Heater: Both of these towers heated up quite quickly. Both were also incredibly hot at the surface of their vents, with relatively little shielding from the visible heating elements. The 23-inch was significantly quieter than the 16-inch, however. —Matthew Korfhage
Vornado Velocity Cube 5S: This cube’s outer housing stayed quite cool, and the fan functionality is welcome. But its surface vent got a little hot, and the fan was a bit on the noisy side compared to other Vornados. —Matthew Korfhage
Vornado Velocity 5R Whole Room Heater and Vornado VHEAT: The MVH and TAVH line from Vornado are among the quietest space heaters I’ve tested. These were two of the loudest. The 5R topped 70 decibels, and while the vintage-looking VHEAT is quite lovely visually, it’s also a bit of a noisemaker. —Matthew Korfhage
Lasko MyHeat Mini: This little thing looked cute, and I thought it would be a nice desktop or under-table personal heater. But even with its low output at 400 watts, the vent got way too hot to want it anywhere near your laptop or papers. —Matthew Korfhage
Lasko 22-inch Oscillating Tower With Remote: This one failed our tip-over test when I knocked it over, blasting heat endlessly into the rug until it overheated and sent a burnt-plastic smell into the air. It did restart hours later, meaning this shutoff was a safety feature. But this tower’s a bit too tall and tippable to risk repeating these events often. —Matthew Korfhage
Honeywell 2-Position Heater: This compact, simple, analog heater was a nice enough idea, able to rest vertically or on its side. Lord, it’s loud when its fan is in operation, though. As of February 2026, this device is out of stock, but I’ll monitor restocks. —Matthew Korfhage
Honeywell Compact Ceramic Tower: This Honeywell performed well in terms of fast heat and safe surface temperature. Its fan wasn’t too loud, either. But the one I received had a maddening squeak each time the tower oscillated fully counterclockwise. —Matthew Korfhage
Gone but Not Forgotten
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Photograph: Matthew Korfhage
Vornado Sensa Cribside Heater: I loved the idea behind this Vornado Sensa Cribside Heater when I tested it: A space heater with an external temperature sensor, with, therefore, accurate temperature management (which is hard to find among space heaters!) But it’s disappeared from Vornado’s website, and has dwindled on retail sites. It’s no longer available on Amazon, but if you see it on sale at another site, I still like it. —Matthew Korfhage
Also tested but discontinued: Vornado VMHi600, Morento 26-cm Heater, Morento 40-cm Heater, Dyson HP07, many other models of Vornado before the brand’s late-2025 refresh. —Matthew Korfhage
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