We then test the heaters in various rooms and locations around our home – a home office, a living room and a cold, poorly insulated room. For the panel and bar heaters, we put them behind a work desk to see how well they warm the legs and waist area. We then move the products to a typical sitting room position – the panels are positioned a couple of metres from our seating position, and we time how long it took for the infrared rays to reach us. We also time how long it takes for the heaters to reach full heating capacity. Finally, we also test each unit in a small but very cold room to see how effective they are at projecting heat across an exceedingly cold environment. There’s something calming about having a white scheme. It’s a blank canvas you can add to and change up whether it’s with cushions, plants and flowers' First, we examine each product’s overall design, its build quality and any special features such as app connectivity and thermostat controls.

However, it should be noted that very few electric heating systems are capable of beating the lower running costs of heating a whole home using a gas central heating system, so we’re still quite some time away from discovering the Holy Grail. Can you really feel the warmth emitted by an infrared heater? Short-wave infrared radiation is the most intense of the three options. However, this wavelength poses some risks as long-term and/or close exposure to this type of infrared can lead to skin burns and damage to the eyes (similar to looking into a bright light). That is why glass-blowers and welders wear protective equipment. An oscillating patio heater, or one that dishes out multi-directional heat, can be a good bet if you have multiple people sharing one heat source.

The usual downside of a fire pit is the smoke that they produce, with wood-fired flames tending to mean that guests can end up with a face full of smelly smoke whenever the wind changes direction. However, Solo Stove aims to eliminate this problem thanks to its innovative 'smokeless' fire pit range.

When it comes to the appearance of infrared panels, Mirrorstone has a lot to offer. The company’s range includes regular white panels, mirrored panels, panels with set images, and custom-image photo panels. If you find that these panels aren’t for you for some reason, the company also offers a 60-day cooling-off period, where you can return them for free. Patio heaters are usually either electric or gas, unless you're considering using one of the best fire pits on the market to add some warmth. For instance, where a typical 1.2kW fan heater could cost upwards of 50p per hour to run, an infrared heater will typically cost a fraction of that sum, around 15p at today’s higher energy prices.

Various types of infrared heaters have different maximum output at different wavelengths -- Halogen IR heaters at 1 µm, Carbon heaters at about 2.5 µm. Therefore at 3 µm the High Power Carbon heater provides three times the irradiance of a Halogen heater. See the chart below. If you want to know more about the efficiency of infrared heating, please read my article: Everything I learned about infrared heating efficiency. Some infrared heaters come with the option of different heating modes. Heating modes simply change the use of energy, and therefore the production of heat. For example, a 1500W infrared heater has the option to run on 900W, 1200W, or 1500W, depending on the desired heat output. A quartz heater is an electric heater that produces infrared (IR) radiation to provide warmth. Quartz heaters are available as indoor space heaters, outdoor patio heaters, or a heater designed for industrial purposes. Infrared heaters made with marble are fast gaining popularity, because of this material’s remarkable heat-retaining and distribution properties, along with the ability to remain warm for quite a while after being turned off. Some portable, stand-mounted models, such as the Klarstein HeatPal we review below, use raw, unpolished marble to help radiate the heat generated by the internal coil, while companies such as Elith produce beautifully polished slabs of high-quality marble with infrared coils behind them. Polished marble panel heaters aren’t cheap to buy or install, but they’re unquestionably the most elegant way to heat a home.