How to choose the right size dryer

You’ve just hauled 12kg of damp laundry out of the washing machine ready for drying, but your old vented dryer has other ideas - beeping in protest as you play the guessing game of what 5kg feels like. Now you’re stuck juggling damp loads, turning a simple task into an all-day chore resulting in a steamy wet laundry room. Surely there’s a better way? Indeed there is.

When it comes to buying a new dryer, you don’t want to be frustrated at its inability to handle the volume of wet laundry your household generates. At the same time, you need it to fit in its designated spot. Here’s how to choose the right dryer capacity for your household, while keeping energy efficiency and running costs in mind.

Before diving into sizes, it's important to understand the main types of clothes dryers available in Australia. Older style vented dryers use hot air to dry clothes and expel moist air outside - or inside your laundry if, like many people, you don’t have adequate ventilation set up. Heat pump dryers, on the other hand, use newer heat pump technology to recycle warm air and remove moisture more efficiently, so they don’t need external venting or an exhaust fan.

Using significantly less energy than vented dryers, heat pump dryers typically have between 8 and 10-star energy ratings compared with vented dryers’ 2 star ratings.

Heat pump models usually cost more upfront than vented dryers, but their lower running costs can offset this higher purchase price over their lifetime (or much sooner if you use a dryer multiple times a week).

The lower temperatures of heat pump dryers mean they have a gentler drying action which can be better for fabric - but it does mean they take longer than vented models to dry clothes. The technology also makes heat pump dryers too heavy to be wall mounted, though they can usually be stacked on top of front load washing machines if you don’t have a lot of floor space in your laundry.

Perhaps most importantly though, if you’re reading this article, heat pump dryers come in larger capacity options than vented dryers, making them the better choice for drying bigger laundry loads.

Some items, like silk, wool, lycra, neoprene, leather and viscose, shouldn't really be machine dried, so it's worth checking the fabric care label before you toss something new in for the first time. Fortunately, many of these, like activewear and swimwear, air dry fairly quickly on a line, hanger or drying rack.

If you do want to machine dry certain delicate fabrics, though, they should be dried separately from the rest of the damp laundry, using a special drying rack that fits inside a heat pump dryer, on a delicates or low-heat cycle. You can only dry a few things at a time this way, so if you have a lot of delicate items and there's no urgency, air drying can be the better option.

If you need a dryer to fit beneath a laundry benchtop, you should measure the depth of the benchtop and also allow a couple of centimetres for power leads and drainage hose at the rear before you choose a new dryer.

Appliances Online has filters that let you refine search results by depth, capacity and a range of other factors, so you can select a dryer that won’t protrude from under your benchtop. If floor space is an issue, remember that although you can’t wall mount heat pump dryers, they are usually stackable on top of front load washing machines, with an appropriate stacking kit.