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Heat one room or heat yourself?

See what it costs to warm yourself where you sit, or to heat a whole room, at current electricity prices. Options that do different jobs are kept apart.

What do you want to keep warm?
How is the rest of your home heated?
Change assumptions
Example rating. Check the label on yours: they vary widely.
A thermostat switches it on and off. 100% means it never switches off.
Empty uses the price cap: 26.32p

Warms you

  • Heated throw or electric blanket

    7.9p for 3 h

    Warms you while you sit or lie under it. The room stays as cold as it was.

    2.6p an hour, 0.30 kWh in total

  • Hot-water bottle

    4.3p a fill

    One kettle fill. Warms you for a while; never use boiling water.

Warms the room

  • Portable electric heater

    95p for 3 h

    Warms the air in one room. Oil-filled, fan and convector heaters use the same electricity for the same heat; they differ in how fast they warm up.

    32p an hour, 3.60 kWh in total

With gas central heating

A unit of heat from an electric heater costs about 26.3p, against about 9.4p from a gas boiler. Heating one room with an electric heater can still cost less than heating the whole house, but only if the rest of the house is turned down.

Ofgem price cap, GB average, Direct Debit, 1 Oct – 31 Dec 2026. Keeping warm matters for health: do not let your home get so cold that damp or illness become a risk.