10 best heated clothes airers that dry laundry fast, tried and tested

Dry:Soon’s mini three-tier heated clothes airer is one of the most reasonably priced options, but it will handle anything you throw at it, making it the best one I’ve tried.

It can hold up to 15kg of washing. While this is not as much as some of the larger airers tested, my washing machine only has a capacity of 8kg, so this heated clothes airer can still hold almost two full loads.

Because it’s smaller, it has a running cost of 6p per hour, making it one of the cheapest to run among the models tested. I also like the fact that it comes in one piece, so you can use it straight out of the box.

The rails heat up in a couple of seconds, and T-shirts, shirts and sports kits dry in three to four hours. If you want to speed this up, you could buy a Lakeland heated airer cover (£44.99, Lakeland.co.uk) or opt for a heated airer and accessories bundle (£169.98, Lakeland.co.uk)

Weighing 4.3kg, it’s relatively light and easy to move around the house, if you have guests coming over and want to move your smalls out of sight. The airer also folds up neatly to just 8cm deep, so it fits under a bed or neatly behind a wardrobe when not in use.

If you’re on a budget, turn to Beldray’s heated drying pod system, which transforms a regular clothes horse into a heated clothes airer. Suitable for most three-tiered airers measuring 65cm x 55cm x 145cm, simply hang up your laundry and place the heater underneath, and it will blow warm air up towards your garments, while adding the cover will stop the heat from escaping.

Beldray claims this system offers “fast and even drying”. On test, I found shirts dried in a couple of hours, which is twice as long as it took with Dry:Soon’s heated cabinet (also included in this guide), but Beldray’s system is half the price. Jeans were ready in less than four hours, with no damp patches.

A built-in timer helps save electricity and adds convenience, so you never need to remember to switch it off, either. The drawback is obvious – you need a tiered airer already, or this won’t work. If you already have one, it will be hard to find anything that works as well for this price.

This Easylife XL three-tier heated airer is best for anyone who needs an airer with a timer. The airer has two- and four-hour settings that automatically switch off the unit. This has several advantages. It’s a great safety feature for peace of mind. It helps avoid wasted electricity and makes it easy to plan around off-peak tariffs.

But it also has a large capacity, featuring 30 heated rails and a 15kg load limit. It can comfortably handle two washing machine loads simultaneously. Easylife claims the airer “takes up no more space than an armchair,” and I’d say that’s a fair description.

When the laundry’s done, this airer folds completely flat for storage. The wheeled base means it is super easy to manoeuvre, too, even when fully loaded.

Drying is slower (about six hours) than on covered models, but loosely draping a sheet over the top can speed things up.

Just be sure to leave ventilation gaps, so moisture can escape – a sealed cover will trap condensation, slow down the drying process, and you may end up with that dreaded musty smell.

Read the full Easylife XL three-tier heated airer review

For speedy drying, look to Dry:Soon’s pod-style dryer, which features a base pole on a tripod and six rails that can hold two items each. It couldn’t be simpler to set up, which is great news if you’re lacking in the DIY skills department. Simply attach the two parts of the base pole together, put the bottom end into the base, add three legs, plug in and power on.

It truly is compact, taking up less space than a coat rack, and it’s powerful. With the cover on, the unit heats up to 70C, which means warm air is constantly circulating around your clothes to dry them fast. Shirts and T-shirts were dry in just 60 minutes, while thicker fabrics, such as denim jeans, were mostly dry after two hours during testing. There’s a timer that will automatically shut off power at intervals of 30 minutes up to three hours.

To get a second opinion on the drying performance, I called on fellow IndyBest tester Tamara Hinson, who also tested and reviewed this model. She found it equally “incredibly easy to set up”, and noted that the “average shirt will dry in around an hour, while thicker garments, such as jeans, take up to two hours”.

With space for 12 items on hangers, you can dry a mix of items, including smalls, as you can buy sock hangers or underwear hangers to use in one of the 12 slots. The cover gives your garments some privacy as well as speeding up drying times. However, the trade-off for its efficiency is capacity, so it’s not the best choice for bigger households, and there’s no way it can be used for bedding.

Read the full Dry:Soon drying pod review

Beldray’s three-tier heated clothes airer is a large airer that excels at drying bulkier household textiles. With a huge 30kg capacity spread across 36 wide aluminium rails, you can drape towels and bedding without them bunching, cutting down drying times and reducing creases.

The rails warmed up within two minutes, and large items dried evenly, without any cold spots. However, smaller garments still took longer to dry compared with using covered heated clothes airers such as the Beldray and Dry:Soon pod airers.

The running cost is impressively low (8p per hour) for such a huge airer, so long drying sessions won’t dent your bank balance too much. If you get through a lot of laundry in a week, this airer could save you a fortune compared to running a tumble dryer.

Shaped like a slim wardrobe, the Dry:Soon heated cabinet hides laundry behind a zipped cover, so you can dry clothes in a hallway or living space without looking at damp socks.

The enclosed heating system dries a 10kg load in three to four hours, which is quicker than uncovered racks such as the Easylife XL, though its higher running cost (31p/hour) is worth noting.

The six-hour auto shut-off is a great safety feature, and the pod’s slim profile makes it one of the easiest to store. However, its smaller capacity means it’s best for couples – large families might find that it doesn’t provide enough space.

For the price, this airer is surprisingly effective. It’s essentially a small heated base with a tall support pole, covered by a zip-up fabric dome. Beldray promises fast and even drying, and, while it doesn’t quite match the speed of the Dry:Soon pod above, it dried shirts in just over two hours and jeans in less than four hours during testing, which is respectable for the cost.

When not in use, the poles and base can be zipped inside the cover and stored neatly in a cupboard. The big advantage with this model is that it’s one of the cheapest airers with a cover (a game-changer for fast drying).

It also has a built-in timer, so you can avoid wasting electricity. I just wish it could fit more items, as I found it only held 10-12 hanging garments, making it best for smaller loads or emergency drying. It was also surprisingly noisy, making the same amount of white noise as an electric fan on a high setting.

Beldray’s affordable heated airer is capable of holding up to 15kg of washing across 18 heated bars. I liked that it could be used with the wings extended or collapsed, so I could shorten the length if I only had a small load of washing to dry.

Although it’s longer horizontally than the tiered airers I tested, there’s something quite refreshing about its diminutive height. At 72cm, it’s never in your eyeline, so you aren’t constantly reminded of your laundry chores.

The 230W heating filament meant satisfactory drying times, but this heated clothes airer wasn’t as fast as models with covers.

A cover massively speeds up drying times and is normally an added extra, so I was pleasantly surprised that this £60 Minky heated clothes airer had one included in the box.

I could easily fit a whole load of washing on the rails, spreading out socks and underwear on the wings and using the main rack for larger items such as towels and dresses. It was also brilliant for drying delicate items such as woollen jumpers, which we spread flat over the larger section, to avoid rail marks denting the material.

A real advantage of this winged airer is that it folds completely flat, making it a dream to store when not in use. At almost 1.5m in length with both wings extended, however, it occupies a lot of space.

Black+Decker’s three-tier heated airer is another large airer that can handle a full washing machine load of clothes and more, making it the best pick for families. I found that the rails are spaced out more than on other rail-based airer models, and this tiny change makes a huge difference.

The bigger gaps make arranging clothes fast and simple. There’s none of that tedious faff to squeeze a pair of jeans into the middle rail, for example – you can simply throw the clothes over it as fast as you can and get on with something else. It makes a huge difference when juggling lots of tasks for a busy family.

At 300W, drying times are respectable. You don’t have to wait for it to heat up, as this airer can reach full power in less than a minute. Should you need to move it, the lightweight aluminium frame weighs just 4.5kg, making it impressively portable, given its size.