Baths vs Showers – Which Is Better for You and Your Wallet?

• Ah, the question longer than time itself.

• The short answer is, it depends. But we will go into more detail to explain why.

• In order to understand, you need to consider how big your bath is and how you heat your water.

• Boilers can range from 24 kW to 42kW

• Electric showers can range from 7kW to 11kW

• At the time of writing, gas costs 7p/kW

• At the time of writing, electricity costs 27p/kW

How much does it cost to have a bath?

• A bath will generally be filled from a basin tap connected to your main hot water supply.

• Baths can be anywhere from 50 litres to 200 litres.

• Say your bath is 100 litres, at 10 l/min, 10 mins to fill the bath.

• Assuming you have a smaller boiler of 24kW ((24/60)*10)*0.07=£0.28

• Assuming you have a smaller boiler of 42kW ((42/60)*10)*0.07=£0.49

How Much does it cost to have a shower?

• It depends if your hot water is supplied by your boiler, or if you have an electric shower for example.

• It depends how long you spend in the shower.

• A good flow rate is considered to be between 10 - 15 litres per minute.

• At 10 l/min you will be using 80 litres over 8 minutes.

The Average Shower is 8 minutes

• The average shower lasts 8 minutes, so:

• Assuming you have a smaller boiler of 24kW ((24/60)*8)*0.07=£0.22

• Assuming you have a smaller boiler of 42kW ((42/60)*8)*0.07=£0.39

If you spend longer in the shower

• If you take longer in the shower than it takes to fill up your bath, it will cost more.

• Let's just say that you're going to spend the same time in the shower than it does to fill up your bath:

• Assuming you have a smaller boiler of 24kW ((24/60)*10)*0.07=£0.28

• Assuming you have a smaller boiler of 42kW ((42/60)*10)*0.07=£0.49

How Much does it cost to have an Electric shower?

• The average shower lasts 8 minutes

• Lower range at 7kW ((7/60)*8)*0.27=£0.25

• Higher range at 11kW ((11/60)*8)*0.27=£0.40

So? Which one wins?

• Depends on the size of your bath

• Depends if you are using gas to heat your water

• Depends if your shower is an electric shower when your bath uses gas

• We haven't considered water in this article. But if you are metered, then, clearly, if you use more water in your shower than you would do filling your bath, the shower will be more expensive.

• Some might argue that bathing in your dirty suds defeats the object of being clean.