Pellet stove running costs: what it really costs to run

At typical UK pellet prices a stove costs roughly 55p to 70p an hour in fuel at medium output, plus a few pence of electricity. That has stayed cheaper per useful kilowatt-hour than mains electricity through 2026, but the saving depends heavily on efficiency and how much of your home you heat.

What a pellet stove costs per hour

Start with the fuel. Wood pellets in the UK typically cost around £8.99 for a 15 kg bag, or less if you buy by the pallet. A stove running at medium output burns roughly 1 kg of pellets an hour, so the fuel cost works out at about 55p to 70p an hour. On the lowest setting that falls considerably: the La Nordica Viviana Plus burned just 0.4 kg an hour in our test, roughly 25p an hour in fuel. On full output a powerful stove like the 15.3 kW Piazzetta P958 can burn up to 3.4 kg an hour, so the cost scales with how hard you run it.

Add the electricity. Unlike a wood burner, a pellet stove uses a small electric auger, a combustion fan and an igniter, so it draws mains power, typically 20 to 100 watts in normal running plus a brief burst at start-up. That adds only a few pence an hour to the bill, but it is a genuine running cost, and it means the stove will not run in a power cut without a battery backup. Over a season the electricity is a minor line item next to the pellets, but it is worth knowing it exists.

Pellets versus gas and electricity

The headline reason people choose a pellet stove is running cost, and through 2026 the comparison has favoured pellets over electric heating in particular. The UK Department for Energy Security and Net Zero publishes quarterly domestic fuel price statistics, and across that period wood pellets have stayed cheaper per useful kilowatt-hour than mains electricity, and broadly competitive with mains gas once you account for stove efficiency. That is why a correctly sized stove can pay back its higher purchase price over several winters, especially if it replaces electric heating in the rooms you use most.

The picture is most favourable when you heat one or two rooms you actually occupy rather than the whole house. A pellet stove in the living room lets you turn the central heating down and heat the space you are in cheaply, which is where the real saving lives. If you tried to heat an entire large house from a single stove you would lose much of the advantage, which is one reason a Thermo stove plumbed into radiators, like the Piazzetta P958, suits whole-house heating better than asking a room stove to do an impossible job.

How efficiency changes the bill

Efficiency is the lever that quietly changes your running cost. A stove that converts 90.5% of the pellet's energy into useful heat, like our overall winner the MCZ Suite Comfort Air, wastes far less up the flue than an 87.4% stove like the Ecoteck Francesca. Over a full heating season, for the same heat delivered into the room, the more efficient stove burns measurably fewer bags of pellets. The difference between 87 and 90 percent sounds trivial, but spread across a winter of daily use it adds up to real money.

This is why we measure each stove's seasonal efficiency rather than trusting the headline number, and why a higher purchase price can be the cheaper choice over time. A £2,899 stove at 90.5% efficiency may cost less to own over ten years than a £1,349 stove at 87.4% if you run it hard every winter. Our buying guide explains how to read the EN 14785 efficiency figures, and the coverage scale on our best pellet stove page colour-codes every stove by its measured efficiency band.

The hidden costs to budget for

Beyond pellets and electricity, a few costs are easy to overlook. An annual service and flue sweep by a competent engineer costs roughly £99.95 and is essential for safety and warranty, not optional. Consumable parts such as door seals, the ignition element and the room sensor wear over the years and need occasional replacement, typically a modest sum spread over the stove's life. And pellet storage matters: pellets must be kept dry, because damp pellets swell, jam the auger and burn poorly, so budget for a dry, sealed store if you buy in bulk.

None of these is large, but together they are real, so include them when you compare a pellet stove against gas or electric heating. The honest summary is that a pellet stove offers low fuel cost and good efficiency, offset by maintenance and the small electricity draw. For a household that heats the rooms it uses and keeps the stove correctly serviced, it remains one of the more economical ways to heat a UK home, provided you bought the right stove in the first place. See our pellet stove vs wood burner comparison if you are weighing the two fuels.