Hair Dryer Running Cost Calculator

This hair dryer running cost calculator shows what your hair dryer costs per use, per week and per year. Enter the power in watts, the minutes each use takes, how many times a week you dry your hair and the heat setting you usually use. It starts with the UK price cap unit rate, has EU presets, and you can type your own tariff.

Quick answer: A hair dryer costs its power in kW times the hours it runs times your unit rate. A 2,000 W hair dryer on full heat for 10 minutes uses about 0.33 kWh, which costs about 8.77p at 26.32p. Used 5 times a week, that is about 44p a week or £22.81 a year.

How Is Hair Dryer Running Cost Calculated?

Divide the wattage by 1,000 to get kilowatts, multiply by the share of power your heat setting uses, by the minutes divided by 60, and by your unit rate.

Most of a hair dryer’s power goes into the heating element. The motor that blows the air uses only a small part. So the heat setting makes a big difference: the full rated power is drawn on the hottest setting, while warm and cool settings draw less. The calculator uses 100% for hot, about 60% for warm and about 10% for the cool shot as examples. It multiplies the cost per use by your uses a week, then by 52 weeks for the yearly cost.

How Do You Use the Hair Dryer Calculator?

1. Enter the hair dryer power from the handle or box.
2. Enter how many minutes one use takes.
3. Enter how many times a week you use it.
4. Choose the heat setting you usually use.
5. Choose a price preset or enter your unit rate.

How Much Does a Hair Dryer Cost to Run?

At 26.32p per kWh on full heat, a hair dryer costs about 0.44p per minute for every 1,000 W of power.

The wattage is usually printed on the handle, the plug or the box. The 26.32p rate is the Ofgem price cap average for October to December 2026. You can check the latest figure on the Ofgem energy price cap page.

Does a Higher Wattage Hair Dryer Cost More?

Per minute, yes. But a more powerful dryer can dry hair faster, so the cost per use may end up similar.

A 2,400 W dryer uses twice the power of a 1,200 W one each minute. If it dries your hair in half the time, the cost per use is the same. In practice the drying time depends on hair length and thickness, how much water you towel off first and the air flow of the dryer, not just its wattage. The best way to compare is to time how long you actually use the dryer and enter that.

Does the Heat Setting Save Money?

Yes. Since the heater uses most of the power, a warm setting uses noticeably less energy per minute than hot.

The warm setting may take a little longer to dry your hair, which eats into the saving, but it is often kinder to hair too. The cool shot uses very little power because the heater is off. The setting percentages in the calculator are examples, as different models split their power differently.

Worked Example: Long Hair, Dried Every Day

Example: someone with long hair uses a 2,200 W hair dryer on the warm setting for 15 minutes every day, at the 26.32p price cap rate.

• Power on warm: 2.2 kW x 60% = 1.32 kW
• Per use: 1.32 kW x 15 minutes = 0.33 kWh, which is 8.69p
• Per week: 7 uses = about 61p
• Per year: 364 uses x 0.33 kWh = 120.1 kWh, which is £31.62

So even daily drying of long hair costs about 61p a week in this example. Towel drying well before using the dryer can take several minutes off each use, which is a free saving.

Tips to Save on Hair Drying

Cutting drying time is the simplest way to cut cost.

• Towel dry or use a microfibre wrap before using the dryer.
• Use a concentrator nozzle to aim the air where it is needed.
• Use the warm setting where you can, and finish with the cool shot.
• Clean the filter at the back so air flows freely.
• Let hair partly air dry when you have time.

For other small appliances, the electricity cost calculator works out the cost of any device from its wattage and hours.

Hair Dryer Running Cost FAQs

Checked October 2026. Sources: Ofgem energy price cap. Heat setting power shares are examples.