Best Space Heaters for a Home Office
Working in a drafty attic or basement? Here's how to stay warm with a quality space heater.
By Consumer Reports
If you’re one of the many Americans working from home at least some of the time, you might consider setting up—or further equipping—your home office. According to recent research from the consulting firm McKinsey, 58 percent of 25,000 surveyed Americans can work from home at least one day a week.
And as the weather gets chilly, you might find that your office space needs a space heater, especially if you’ve set up shop in an attic, basement, or any drafty part of the house.
When it comes to space heaters for your home office, our tests found some stand-alone models that work well and kick off a good amount of heat.
First, decide whether you want the space heater to heat just you or warm up the whole room. Our tests found that not all models do both well. The Comfort Zone model (shown above) is a champ at keeping a large room warm and making a person feel toasty—also known as spot heating. We test space heaters by evaluating how well they warm a standard-sized living room in 15 minutes and how well they spot heat in 15 minutes. CR’s spot-heating test uses a mannequin wired with sensors, says CR engineer Chris Regan, who oversees our space heater ratings. “We want to know how your body will feel when you’re sitting about 4 feet from the appliance,” he says.
It’s safest to keep heaters on the floor rather than on a table, and away from upholstered furniture, curtains, and anything else flammable. Look for models with auto shut-off, so if the heater gets knocked over, it turns off automatically. Always plug a heater directly into a wall outlet, not an extension cord, and never leave it running unattended.
Below are some of the top-performing models from our space heater tests. For more choices, see our full space heater ratings or our list of the best space heaters you can buy right now. And for shopping tips, check out our space heater buying guide.
Best Space Heaters Overall
Comfort Zone CZ499R
CR’s take: A small heater that makes a big impression, the low-priced Comfort Zone CZ499R, a CR Best Buy, heats you and a room equally well. It earns an Excellent rating on our fire safety test, meaning that the chance it will ignite nearby materials is low, but it isn’t as cool to the touch as other models in our tests. It weighs 6.4 pounds and comes with a fan, timer, and remote control.
Dyson Pure Hot+Cool (HP04)
CR’s take: The Dyson Pure Hot + Cool HP04 is by far the most expensive space heater in our ratings. For that price, you get a stylish lightweight heater that’s packed with bells and whistles, including WiFi connectivity. Dyson claims it heats and cools the air as well as purifies it (we tested it as a space heater). In our space heater tests, it earns Excellent ratings for room and spot heating and gets top marks in our ease-of-use test. It garners middling scores on both our noise and hot-surface tests, so if those are concerns, you can find a model that heats just as well, costs less, and doesn’t have those shortcomings.
Best Space Heaters for Room Heating
Lasko Designer Series 6435
CR’s take: A far cry from the basic black box, the eye-catching Lasko Designer Series 6435 resembles an antique urn. This lower-priced model earns a spot on our list of CR Best Buys, and it aces our room-heating test and gets a Very Good rating for spot heating. But it’s mediocre for noise. It has handy controls on top, weighs just 6.9 pounds, and comes with a fan, timer, and remote control.
Lasko FH500
CR’s take: The Lasko FH500 is a champ at keeping a room warm, but it’s not the best at spot heating. With its tall, slim profile, this space heater fits nicely where boxier models might not. It has a tip-over switch that automatically shuts off the unit if it gets knocked over. But it earns only a Fair rating on our hot-surface test, which means that touching the area where the heat exhausts can cause a burn. It weighs 13 pounds and comes with a remote control and timer.
Best Space Heaters for Spot Heating
Vornado VMH600
CR’s take: The Vornado VMH600 has the best Overall Score of all the space heaters in our tests. It tops our spot-heating test while falling just a bit short in room heating, where it still earns a Very Good rating. It’s one of the quieter heaters in our tests, too, and it sports safety features such as a tip-over switch and a timer that allows you to program when the heater turns on and off. It weighs 10 pounds and has a fan and a remote control.
Heat Storm Mojave
CR’s take: With a name like Heat Storm Mojave you expect a lot, and this small model delivers, hitting our spot-heating test out of the park. The machine also earns Very Good ratings for room heating, noise, and ease of use. It weighs 9.5 pounds and comes with a fan and a remote control.
Editor’s Note: An earlier version of this article also appeared in the February 2021 issue of Consumer Reports magazine.
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