Gated: Aptly named, these airers resemble fences and fold out to stand in a concertina. These are normally the cheapest clothes airers and are popular with students because they’re functional and don’t take up much space in storage. However, this design hasn’t made it into our best buy roundup because they tend to be flimsy and unstable. We dried a small cotton load on each airer, representing a week's worth of washing for a single person. Some look like a tower, which typically affords more drying space for the room they take up, but they can be less accommodating of larger items such as dresses, towels and bedsheets. Hanging corners: These are a great addition to provide extra space for items to dry – some airers can hold up to four items on each corner. But do heated airers use a lot of electricity? Our tests found they use significantly less of it to dry clothes when compared with drying pods.

While heated airers use less electricity per hour than a tumble dryer, they take longer to dry the clothes. So, if you're drying big loads regularly, it will cost you more to run a heated airer annually than a tumble dryer.Others resemble your typical clothes horse, often with foldable wings for extra drying space. They have a larger middle section, which is good for bigger items such as jeans and bedding, but overall have less drying space than tower models.

The high wings at each side of the airer allow you to hang even the longest garments. There is also a handy accessory for hanging small items without the need for pegs. With the additional (non-heated) extension bars you get extra drying capacity than with standard clothes airers, which can be a huge help when drying larger garments or for those busy homes that tend to have extra-large laundry loads! Inside the box, you will also find 2 sets of 6 detachable pegs to make hanging smaller garments easier. This unit can also be used even when only half open for those smaller laundry loads. Free Cover Included Heated clothes airers we tested typically took between four to six hours to dry a small (2.15kg) cotton load.Key specs – Type: Winged; Open dimensions: 143 x 60 x 100cm (HWD); Closed dimensions: 104 x 60 x 9cm (HWD); Drying space: 13.5m; Weight: 2.8kg; Guarantee: 3 years The best heated airers and drying pods dried small loads in a comparable time to tumble dryers; the worst took over six hours. Energy use We also measured the total drying space and volume of the airer, so we can let you know which ones give you the most drying space without taking over an entire room in your home. Heated: Whilst they are much more expensive than your standard clothes airer, heated airers can hugely cut down on drying time. These resemble tiered or winged airers, and are plugged into the mains to heat up each drying rung. Additionally, they’re less expensive to run than tumble dryers and are gentler on your clothes. You might also be interested in our radiator airers. They hook over the top of the radiator and protrude outwards with a number of rails on them, so you can hang things in the direct heat of the radiator while still allowing air to pass through them. Hanging clothes and towels directly on the radiator doesn’t give you that air flow, so these hangers are a great idea.