Gas vs Electric Stove Cost Calculator: Which Is Cheaper?

How the cost per hour works

Gas and electricity are sold in different units, so the first step is putting them on the same footing: dollars per hour of cooking. A therm of gas is 100,000 BTU, so a burner rated at 9,000 BTU an hour burns 9,000 divided by 100,000, which is 0.09 therms an hour. At $1.50 a therm that is 0.09 times $1.50, which is $0.135 an hour. An electric burner rated at 1,500 W draws 1.5 kW, so at $0.17 a kWh it costs 1.5 times $0.17, which is $0.255 an hour. The difference is $0.12 an hour in gas’s favour. Multiply by the hours you cook — 1 hour a day is 365 hours a year — and gas is $49.28 a year against $93.08 for electric, a saving of $43.80. Then add the stoves themselves: year 1 is gas $49.28 plus an $800.00 stove, which is $849.28, against electric $93.08 plus a $700.00 stove, which is $793.08 — electric wins year 1 by $56.20, because the $100 cheaper stove outweighs the first year’s $43.80 of fuel saving. The payback is the $100 premium divided by the $43.80 a year saving, which is 2.28 years.

The worked example, line by line

Setup: gas burner 9,000 BTU/hr at $1.50/therm, electric burner 1,500 W at $0.17/kWh, 1 hour a day, stoves $800.00 vs $700.00.

Line 1 — gas therms per hour. 9,000 / 100,000 = 0.09 therms.

Line 2 — gas cost per hour. 0.09 × $1.50 = $0.135.

Line 3 — electric cost per hour. 1,500 / 1,000 = 1.5 kW; 1.5 × $0.17 = $0.255.

Line 4 — saving per hour. $0.255 − $0.135 = $0.12.

Line 5 — hours a year. 1 × 365 = 365 hours.

Line 6 — yearly totals. Gas $0.135 × 365 = $49.28; electric $0.255 × 365 = $93.08; saving $43.80.

Line 7 — year-1 totals. Gas $49.28 + $800.00 = $849.28; electric $93.08 + $700.00 = $793.08; electric wins by $56.20.

Line 8 — payback. $100.00 / $43.80 = 2.28 years.

Every branch, checked

2 hours a day: 730 hours a year, so the saving doubles to $0.12 times 730 = $87.60 a year — gas $98.55 against electric $186.15 — and the payback halves to $100.00 divided by $87.60, which is 1.14 years. Cook more and gas pays for itself faster, because the saving is a fixed amount per hour.

0.5 hours a day: 182.5 hours a year, so the saving halves to $0.12 times 182.5 = $21.90 a year — gas $24.64 against electric $46.54 — and the payback stretches to $100.00 divided by $21.90, which is 4.57 years. Cook less and the $100 premium takes much longer to earn back.

Gas at $2.50/therm: the gas burner now costs 0.09 times $2.50, which is $0.225 an hour, against $0.255 for electric. The saving shrinks to $0.03 an hour, which is $10.95 a year at 1 hour a day, and the payback stretches to $100.00 divided by $10.95, which is 9.13 years. Year 1 is gas $82.13 plus $800.00, which is $882.13, against electric $793.08 — electric wins year 1 by $89.05. Dear gas nearly erases the advantage.

Gas at $1.00/therm: the gas burner costs 0.09 times $1.00, which is $0.09 an hour, against $0.255 for electric. The saving grows to $0.165 an hour, which is $60.23 a year at 1 hour a day, and the payback shrinks to $100.00 divided by $60.23, which is 1.66 years. Cheap gas is the best case for a gas stove.

The honest flip: cheap electricity and dear gas

There is one realistic case where electric wins outright, and it needs both prices to move: gas at $2.00 a therm and electricity at $0.10 a kWh — the kind of prices found where gas is dear and power comes cheap. Gas then costs 0.09 times $2.00, which is $0.18 an hour, while electric costs 1.5 times $0.10, which is $0.15 an hour. Electric wins by $0.03 an hour, which is $10.95 a year at 1 hour a day. Year 1 is gas $65.70 plus $800.00, which is $865.70, against electric $54.75 plus $700.00, which is $754.75 — electric wins year 1 by $110.95. The flip needs both halves: dear gas alone leaves gas ahead by $0.03 an hour, and cheap electricity alone leaves gas ahead too — only the two together hand the win to electric, and from then on the gap only grows.

Induction: the third option

Gas and coil are not the only choices. An induction burner heats the pan directly with a magnetic field instead of heating a coil or burning gas, so far less heat escapes into the kitchen — roughly 90% of its energy reaches the food, against roughly 40% for gas. It also heats faster, so a pot reaches a boil in less time and the burner runs for fewer minutes per meal. That does not automatically make induction cheaper to run: it still buys electricity at your local price, and an induction stove usually costs more to buy than either of the stoves on this page. What induction changes is the cooking, not the arithmetic — the same cost-per-hour math applies, with a smaller burner size and a shorter cooking time. If your kitchen already has an induction stove, enter its wattage and your hours here and the calculator still works; the efficiency note above is qualitative, and the exact saving depends on how much faster you actually cook.

Rounding convention, stated plainly: the per-hour costs are kept to three decimals — gas $0.135 and electric $0.255 at the defaults — because rounding them to cents first would hide the $0.12-an-hour difference that drives the whole comparison. Yearly totals are the unrounded per-hour costs times the hours a year, then rounded to cents — so gas is $0.135 times 365, which is $49.28, and electric is $0.255 times 365, which is $93.08. The payback is the unrounded premium divided by the unrounded yearly saving, then rounded to two decimals.

Output · formula · meaning

Who uses this

• The 1-hour-a-day cook: cooks about an hour a day and learns gas saves $0.12 an hour and $43.80 a year — but electric wins year 1 by $56.20, because the stove itself costs $100 less.
• The heavy cook: cooks 2 hours a day and learns gas saves $87.60 a year, and the $100 premium repays in 1.14 years — heavy cooking is where a gas stove earns its keep.
• The cheap-gas household: pays $1.00 a therm and learns gas costs only $0.09 an hour — a $60.23-a-year saving and a 1.66-year payback, the best case for gas.
• The renter picking a stove: cares about year 1, not year 5, and learns electric wins year 1 by $56.20 at the defaults — and by $110.95 where gas is $2.00 a therm and power is $0.10 a kWh.

Accuracy & limitations

The math is exact for the numbers you enter: the gas cost is the burner size divided by 100,000 times the gas price; the electric cost is the watts divided by 1,000 times the electricity price; the yearly total is the hourly cost times the hours a year; year 1 adds the stove price; the payback is the price premium divided by the yearly saving. But the inputs carry the assumptions. The burner sizes are maximum ratings — a burner turned down to a simmer uses far less than its rating, so the real hourly cost is usually lower than the rated one, for both fuels. The model counts the fuel and the stove price only: it does not count installing a gas line, a range hood, cookware, or maintenance, and it does not count the value of cooking with a flame or the speed of induction. The prices are yours to set — read both off your own utility bills, because national averages hide the $0.10 power regions and the $2.50 gas regions where the answer changes. The induction note above is qualitative, not a second calculator: it describes roughly 90% against roughly 40% efficiency, not a cost figure. No studies or statistics are cited on this page, because none are needed: every figure is arithmetic on the numbers you enter.