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Most people don't think about their fridge from one day to the next. It's just there, sitting in the corner of the kitchen. The same goes for the dishwasher, washing machine and tumble dryer.
We normally only replace our white goods when they give up the ghost, years after the manufacturer’s warranty ran out. With few moving parts, the typical fridge-freezer has a lifespan of 17 years, but many people hold onto theirs for much longer.
But while you might be feeling smug that your fridge or tumble dryer has been running for longer than Strictly Come Dancing has been on the telly, that doesn’t mean it’s offering you good value for money.
The energy use of older appliances is staggering. Even factoring in the cost of a new model, you could still cut your bills and do your bit for the environment by upgrading to a more energy-efficient version.
“Paying upfront may not seem worth it, especially when balancing all your other bills, but future-proofing your high-energy appliances now offers the best long-term potential savings,” says Sergey Ogorodnov, CEO and co-founder of UK energy start-up Voltaware.
You can check how much energy an appliance is using cheaply and easily by purchasing an electricity power consumption monitor for as little as £7. Simply plug the meter into the wall with your appliance attached to see how much electricity it uses.
And if you’re worried about being wasteful by getting rid of a machine that’s working perfectly well, there are plenty of easy recycling schemes – many of which will collect from your home.
You can try Recycle Now to find out more or check with the retailer you buy your new white goods from – often they’ll pick up the old one for free and recycle it for you.
We run our fridge-freezers 24 hours a day, seven days a week, which means they put a steady drain on our electricity bill.
An outdated refrigerator from the mid-90s could easily use well over 1,000 kilowatt hours (kWh) of energy per year - more if it’s a larger model.
In January 2024, Ofgem set the cost of each electricity unit at 28.62p per kWh. So, at the time of writing, running that old fridge-freezer over the course of the year will cost you £286.
By contrast, if you buy the most efficient fridge-freezer with an energy rating of A, usage could drop to 206 kWh per year. This would cost less than £60 a year to run - a saving of £226 over your clunky old model.
If you've decided to upgrade from an older model, you're then faced with a tough decision: do you buy something more energy-efficient, but with a higher upfront price tag, or spend less and but cost yourself more in electricity per year?
One way to check each appliance on a like-for-like basis, to see if your investment could pay off over time, is to use the YourEko Energy Savings Tool. This compares the efficiency of like-for-like models on the market and calculates how much energy you can save by being more eco-friendly.
We’ve made the assumptions of cost based on the current energy price of 28.62p per kWh.
So, if you want a highly-efficient fridge-freezer with an energy rating of A, you‘ll pay more for the privilege, with prices starting from over £1,000.
After nine years, an A-rated fridge-freezer costing around £1,150 would have cut a total £1,274 off your electricity bill, compared to running a cheaper, less energy-efficient model.
A D-rated fridge-freezer costing £699 would consume more electricity, but still outperform an older, less-efficient model. After 13 years, it would have more than paid for itself, cutting £764 off your power bill.
Energy ratings on dishwashers are based on the amount of water used and energy consumed over 100 cycles.
You’ll have probably seen the advice about filling a dishwasher, making sure that it’s full before starting a wash – but not so much that the water can’t pass around each dish, making it impossible to get a good clean.
Martha Stewart has a great page on how to properly stack your dishwasher to get the maximum cleaning power without having to do more washes than is necessary – as long as you start by never blocking the sprayer arm, you’re onto a winner.
You may have also heard that you’re not supposed to rinse dishes before putting them in the dishwasher – well, researchers at the University of Bonn have proven that’s the case once and for all. They reviewed studies from around the world to find how different cultures used their machines.
The upshot was using a dishwasher over handwashing crockery can cut costs by 50-60%, so you can use your machine to save time and know that you’re even being more environmentally friendly.
Dishwashers from the 1990s used over 600kWh per year, meaning they cost around £172 to run, whereas modern options often consume under 150kWh, coming in around £45 per year.
So, if you’re upgrading from a much older model, you’ll pay off the difference in just under five years, thanks to lower water usage and energy efficiency in newer models.
In terms of energy efficiency, a full size A-rated dishwasher costing £549, and used three times a week, would pay for itself within 16 years, saving £563 on energy bills compared to less-efficient models.
If used five times a week, it would reduce the time needed to pay for itself to just 12 years.
Over the years, washing machines have become much more efficient – in the mid 1990s, the average household would have used around 400kWh in energy to run them, assuming three washes per week.
That’s dropped to just 65kWh for modern machines, as tub sizes have become larger, and the efficiency of the machines has soared.
There’s also a difference between current machines of different energy ratings, with cost savings to be found.
If you’re upgrading from a much older machine (perhaps one that’s been kicking around since the mid-2000s) to an A-rated model, you’ll be saving around £100 per year... so the cost of purchase will be realised in just four years.
On top of that, you’re getting a larger drum (for more washing per cycle) and the ability to run at lower temperatures to make the most of modern detergent.
Some even have WiFi capabilities, meaning you can connect them to your smartphone and get notified when the wash is done – helping remove the dreaded realisation that you’ve forgotten to hang out yet another wash.
A £400 washing machine that can hold loads up to 10kg, with an energy rating of A, would pay for itself within 12 years, assuming three washes a week. In that time, it would save £415 on electricity bills compared to poorly-rated models, YourEko calculations show.
If used four times a week it would save its purchase price in just 10 years, saving £422 of electricity.
Research from consumer champion Which? found that the average annual running cost of a condenser tumble dryer (the most expensive type) is £150, but this ranges from just £117 for the cheapest to £200 for the most expensive.
Heat pump dryers are far more energy efficient and cost just £59 a year to run, on average.
Tumble dryers still, inexplicably, use the old energy label scale of A+++ to G, which can be confusing when buying with a washing machine, as the latter uses the A-G scale.
It’s harder to compare modern tumble dryers with older models, as the technology inside has changed dramatically, and the energy use is dependent on the dampness of the clothes.
As washing machine spin cycles have become more powerful, tumble dryers need less energy to work and are therefore more cost-effective, so updating both at once can be a smart idea.
However, if you are still using an old condenser tumble dryer, you could realise savings of up to 66% with a new heat pump model, meaning you could save enough money to pay off a new tumble dryer in 2-3 years.
Buying an energy-efficient tumble dryer offers the biggest potential savings of all. A £469 heat pump tumble dryer with an 9kg drum capacity and energy rating of A+++ would save £524 in just four years, compared to lower-rated models, covering its cost already.
This assumes it’s used twice a week. If used three times a week, it could save £567 in the first three years. Of course, if you want to help the environment too, drying clothes on racks or outside can save £60 a year on your tumble dryer costs.
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