The Best Patio Heater

Buying Guide

Enjoy the fresh air as you step outside to your patio or back yard where you might be entertaining friends with a barbecue and drinks or playing some relaxing games like bocce or cornhole. But if it’s cold outside, these activities are much less fun and you might find your guests shivering and asking if you can move the party inside.

This is something we deal with regularly in most climates, since the weather is constantly changing from warm to cold as seasons and weather patterns shift. To combat this occurrence of cold weather at the wrong time, we can use patio heaters to pump some heat into our favorite outdoor hangout spots.

Patio heaters are often fueled by propane or electricity to provide the much-needed heat that we want as we try to enjoy the great outdoors in our backyards.

The most common patio heater designs incorporate the use of propane as the fuel that will provide heat to the surrounding area. With your convenience in mind, look for models that use the large 20-pound propane tanks that are common on most grills, as they are readily available and easy to get refilled or replaced. The propane tank hooks up to a hose via a threaded connection and the hose pipes the gas to its necessary location where you will need to both open a valve for it to flow and then ignite it to create fire. Most patio heaters will have simple operating instructions and a built-in ignition switch. This igniter is really useful and something you might want to make sure you have included in your new heater.

The size and shape of a propane patio heater are important in how it functions and what kind of use you will get out of it. A tall propane patio heater will have the hot element at the top of a stand that is higher than most people, which keeps the extremely-hot element out of reach of children or pets, so that can be taken into account as a great safety benefit of this style of heater. The tall units will usually have a large metallic shield that reflects the heat back down to the people standing near it. Some models add neat features like built-in shelves that can hold your drinks or a more stylish facade at the bottom where your propane tank is hidden.

To counter the tall, overhead designs of many propane patio heaters, there are also small fire-pit style ones that you can sit around and roast marshmallows while enjoying an actual fire. The fire-pit style propane patio heaters come in two main configurations. In one version, the tank is hidden underneath the heating element where the flames come out, and the other version has a hose that allows you to keep the propane tank farther away from the fire pit. They both have their pros and cons, but you might find that if you’re sharing one propane tank with your grill and your outdoor fireplace, it’s much easier to have the tank sitting away from the fire-pit since you’ll be moving it back-and-forth to the grill whenever you need it over there. The benefit of having the propane tank inside of the body of the fire pit is that you cannot see it and it’s more permanently stationed there until it runs low on fuel, in which case it’s generally very easy to remove them from the bottom cavity of the unit.

Electric patio heaters are another useful way to bring heat to the outdoors. These will often be smaller, and therefore more well-suited for small patios or even semi-indoor rooms like porches and sunrooms. Electric heaters will need a source of electricity from the nearest plug and they use either heated coils or a ceramic element that creates the heat which is blown into your area with an internal fan. Electric patio heaters are easy to use and don’t require ever filling up a propane tank, so owning one is more straightforward and doesn’t require the same amount of upkeep. However, a propane heater will put out much more heat than an electric one, so be aware of the tradeoff.

• Propane is not the only fuel that can power patio heaters. If you have a liquid natural gas (LNG) line, you can use that to more permanently hook up your patio heater to operate from that fuel source.
• Be very careful with your placement of these outdoor heaters as they can be fire hazards if placed too close to flammable objects. Read the manual thoroughly before installing one.
• Check your propane tank by weighing it to see how much fuel is left. Plan ahead so you don’t run out of propane at a bad time!