Heated airer vs clothes horse: what we learned
The horse was free to run and still cost us money. The airer is about 62p a load and dries every load by the next day.
We've used both, in the same house, on the same washing. This isn't a lab test — it's one household's experience of drying clothes without a tumble dryer, and the part nobody tells you: an unheated horse looks free, but it only saves money when everything dries on time.
What each one costs to dry a load
| Drying method | Time | Per load |
|---|---|---|
| Unheated clothes horse | 1–3 days, weather dependent | No electricity |
| Heated airer (300W) | about 8 hours | ~62p |
| Heated airer + extractor fan | about 8 hours | ~64p |
Illustrative examples from our own drying, not measured averages. The extractor fan adds roughly 2.1p to a load — a rounding error next to the electricity the airer uses. Clothes, spin speed, load size and room conditions all change the times.
What went wrong with the horse
An unheated horse has no running cost at all, so on paper it's the cheapest option in the house. In practice we could never guess when a load would actually be dry. Thick items stayed damp, went back in the wash, and the pile kept growing — so the "free" method quietly cost us a second wash, more water, and the time it took to deal with the backlog.
Drying indoors also puts moisture into the air, which is where condensation and mould risk come from. That's true of any rack, heated or not.
What the airer changed
We now run a 300W heated airer in the utility room with the extractor fan on. It's slower than a tumble dryer, but every load is dry by the next day and nothing comes back damp. That predictability is the whole point — we stopped rewashing, and the rack stopped becoming a backlog.
The fan is what makes it work. An ordinary fan just pushes damp air around the room; an extractor takes the moisture outside. A small 10W extractor left on 12 hours a day for a month uses about 94p of electricity — less than most people expect.
It still puts moisture in the air
A heated airer dries far more predictably than a horse, but it still releases roughly 2 litres of water per spin-dried load. Dry it in one room with the door shut, a window open or the extractor running, and keep it out of bedrooms and box rooms where air barely moves.
- Air has to go somewhere. A closed, unventilated room collects the moisture on the coldest surfaces — usually a wall or window.
- Don't crowd the rack. Cloths pressed together dry slower and release their water over a longer period.
- Wipe the window. Condensation on the glass is the visible sign the room can't take any more.
- Small rooms need the extractor. A utility or bathroom dries clothes faster than a hallway, and the fan keeps the damp out of the rest of the house.
- Check the care labels. Some fabrics shouldn't be spun hard or dried with heat at all.
Summer, a shed or a garage, or a small load of thin things — a horse is unbeatable when the air is dry and warm and nothing important is in a hurry. The problems we had were in winter, with heavy items, inside a house that couldn't get rid of the damp.
If you dry outside when you can and only reach for the airer in the wet months, the running cost stays small either way.
All prices calculated at 26p per kWh
See how drying compares with cooking, heating and boiling water — all priced the same way.