Martin Lewis warns anyone who's using tumble dryer and not a dehumidifier

The BBC Sounds podcast host and ITV regular spoke out on a recent episode of his personal finance podcast and consumer champion show, which airs weekly.

Martin Lewis has issued a warning to anybody who uses a tumble dryer over a dehumidifier. The BBC Sounds podcast host and ITV regular spoke out on a recent episode of his personal finance podcast and consumer champion show, which airs weekly.

Speaking on an episode of The Martin Lewis Podcast, Martin said: “Many dehumidifiers have different wattages – the one I checked out was 200W. Once we know it’s 200W and we know a kilowatt is 1,000W, which is how electricity tends to be priced, we know this is a fifth of a kilowatt.

“And you pay roughly 34p per kilowatt per hour. A fifth is 7p, so you’re going to pay roughly 7p per hour to run a dehumidifier at 200W, assuming it uses full power the whole time.” The tumble dryer dries clothes using an electric motor which rotates the drum filled with wet clothes. At the same time, the appliance drives the fan which circulates hot air through the drum.

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According to data from the price comparison site uSwitch, the average tumble dryer uses 3kWh of energy per cycle and each tumble dryer cycle costs around 83p under the current price cap. If you use your tumble dryer for 150 minutes a week it will cost you £1.72 each week or £89.44 over the course of a year.

According to uSwitch, the average dehumidifier uses about 185W to run and has a cost per load/ cost per hour of around 10p. The price comparison site says households use a dehumidifier on average for around 180 minutes per week. This means the weekly cost to use one will sit at around 29p per week or around £15.03 per year.

With the heated airer, uSwitch says the average household runs their dryer for around 116 minutes a week. This comes at a cost of 16p a week - or around 8p per cycle/ hour according to its Power House data. Over the year, a heated air dryer racks up a cost of £8.31.