Almost Everything You Need To Know About Buying a Propane Water Heater

If you are getting ready to invest in a new propane water heater, you’re going to find yourself inundated with more options than you ever thought could ever possibly be available on the market today!

Propane appliances for water heating are incredibly popular right now. Homeowners are looking to put these systems in their brand-new homes, but are also swapping out old units that use oil or electricity in a renovation as well. The tough part of successfully pulling off this kind of project is choosing the perfect propane water heating appliance, but hopefully, we are going to be to shed a little bit of light on that subject for you right now!

Let’s dive right in.

What Kind Of Capacity Do You Need?

It is going to be absolutely impossible for you to choose the right propane water heater for your specific needs without first figuring out the kind of capacity you need your new water heater to be able to handle at any one particular point in time.

There are a couple of different ways to figure out the kind of capacity you should look for in one of these solutions, but the easiest way is to consider the “gallon usage” that the average person uses in a home every day and then work off of those figures.

For a home with between one and two people regularly using the hot water, you’ll need a gallon capacity of between 23 and 36 gallons on a daily basis. Up the household size to between two and four people, and you’ll need 36 to 46 gallons of hot water on a daily basis. When there are more than five people in your home, you’ll want to look at propane water heater solutions that can effortlessly produce 56 gallons of hot water a day whenever you need to take advantage of it.

After understanding how many gallons of hot water you use on average, you can then decide whether or not you want to go with an appliance that uses a tank system or newer technology that provides you with a tankless or hybrid solution.

Determining The Tank Style Of Your New Appliance

As we have highlighted above, there are really three different types of propane water heater options available on the market today as far as tank settings are concerned.

Tank Models

Conventional tank water heaters are going to be able to store water that is constantly heated on a regular, 24/7 basis. The solutions are rather inexpensive up front, can be located in a closet, basement, or garage, and usually have a capacity of between 20 gallons and 80 gallons as a general rule.

On the flipside, you’ll be paying a lot more in propane fuel costs when you decide to go with this kind of conventional water heater. Because the appliance needs to run around the clock you’re going to consume a lot more fuel than you may have otherwise, and different brands will have different fuel efficiency ratings – forcing you to really try and find the perfect solution for you.

Tankless Models

Tankless water heater solutions today are able to heat cold water with a propane heating module as it passes through the water heating coils, allowing you to heat water on demand without having to routinely keep the water warm around-the-clock. These kinds of systems can provide you with “unlimited” hot water, something that tank water heaters cannot – just because as cold water fills the tank, it takes a longer amount of time to warm it back up again.

These kinds of solutions are considerably more expensive up front than conventional propane water heater solutions. However, they are usually a lot more efficient and can reduce your energy consumption and your propane costs by as much as 30% or more off of your traditional bill. They have to be hung on a wall (to free up floor space) and will require proper ventilation for efficient and safe use. These types of heater definitely eat up a lot less space than any other water heater solution regardless of how it is powered.

Hybrid models

Hybrid propane water heater solutions use a combination of heating your water with a propane heating element and pulling in ambient air that extracts the available heat. This allows you to pump more hot water in a faster stream – guaranteeing that ALL of your faucets gain access to hot water on demand whenever you want to take advantage of it.

These are incredibly expensive solutions that may not be practical for all installations, and can often require a lot of maintenance and upkeep that you may not be all that interested in performing regularly.

Always Choose Options From Well-Known Water Heater Manufacturers

At the end of the day, you’ll want to do absolutely everything you can to choose your next propane water heater from the most well-known manufacturers available on the market right now.

These brands are going to offer you better warranties, usually better prices, and will also stand behind their products and their reputation – by producing top-quality options you know you are going to be able to rely on.

From time to time you may find “offbrand” options that are considerably less expensive. However,  you always have a trade-off when you cut costs in the manufacturing and engineering side of things. Well-known manufacturers produce equipment that you know you are going to be able to rely on, or that you will have recourse with. At the end of the day, they give you a lot of extra confidence that you likely wouldn’t have had otherwise.

When you get right down to it, choosing the best propane water heater is a lot easier than most people make it out to be. Hopefully, you’ll be able to take advantage of all the insight we’ve been able to share. We want you to have confidence moving forward, to know that you have invested your money wisely on a propane heating appliance that is going to provide you with on-demand hot water, efficiently and inexpensively for years and years to come!