Gas vs Electric Dryer: The Full Yearly Math

The headline numbers

Start with the household in the calculator's defaults: five loads of laundry a week, fifty-two weeks a year, which is 260 loads. A typical full-size electric dryer draws 5.0 kilowatts, and a normal cycle runs 45 minutes, or 0.75 hours. Multiply those together — 5.0 kilowatts times 0.75 hours — and one load uses 3.75 kilowatt-hours. Over 260 loads that becomes 975 kilowatt-hours in a year. At $0.17 per kilowatt-hour, the electricity alone costs $165.75 a year, or $0.64 per load. That is the electric dryer's whole fuel bill, because electricity is its only fuel.

The gas dryer splits its fuel bill in two. It burns 0.22 therms of natural gas per load for heat, which over 260 loads is 57.2 therms; at $1.50 per therm, that gas costs $85.80 a year. It also draws 0.5 kilowatts of electricity for the drum motor, fan, and controls: 0.5 kilowatts for 0.75 hours is 0.375 kilowatt-hours per load, 97.5 kilowatt-hours over 260 loads, and $16.58 at the same $0.17 per kilowatt-hour. Add the two halves and the gas dryer costs $102.38 a year, or $0.39 per load. Subtract from the electric total, and gas saves $63.37 a year, or about $0.24 per load. That figure is the whole argument in one line, and everything else in this guide is about when it holds, when it shrinks, and what it leaves out.

How the saving moves with your household

The defaults describe one household; yours will differ, and the saving moves a lot. Drop to 3 loads a week and the picture shrinks: 156 loads a year cost $99.45 for electric and $61.43 for gas ($51.48 for gas plus $9.95 for electricity), so the saving is $38.02. Go the other way, to 8 loads a week, and the electric total climbs to $265.20 while gas reaches $163.80, so the saving grows to $101.40. Large families, in other words, gain the most from gas, because every extra load is another 3.75 kilowatt-hours that gas replaces with 0.22 therms plus a small electric draw.

Rates move the saving just as sharply. At $0.30 per kilowatt-hour, a rate many households now pay, the electric dryer costs $292.50 a year while gas costs $115.05, and the saving jumps to $177.45 — because the electric dryer's whole bill is electricity, while only a small part of the gas dryer's bill is. Stretch the cycle to 60 minutes instead and each load uses more of everything: electric reaches $221.00 a year and gas $107.90, for a saving of $113.10. And if gas itself gets dearer, the gap narrows: at $2.00 per therm, gas costs $130.98 a year against the same $165.75 for electric, so the saving falls to $34.77. Gas still wins in every branch above, but by very different amounts — run your own rates in the calculator to find your figure.

What the fuel math leaves out

Fuel is only half the decision, and the honest version of this guide says so plainly. This comparison does not include the purchase price of either dryer, which varies by model and can favour either side. More importantly, it does not include installation: a gas dryer needs a gas supply line and venting to the outside, and if your laundry room has no gas connection, running one can cost far more than $63.37 a year of fuel saving. An electric dryer needs only a suitable electrical outlet, which most laundry rooms already have. So the right question is not just "which is cheaper to run" but "how many years of fuel saving does the installation cost take to repay" — at the default saving of $63.37 a year, a $500 gas-line job takes about eight years to repay, and a $1,000 job takes about sixteen. If you already have a gas connection, that question disappears and the fuel saving is close to pure gain.

There are smaller caveats too. The model assumes each dryer draws its stated power for the full cycle, which overstates energy for machines that cycle their heater on and off, and it assumes the same cycle length for both dryers, while real models dry at different speeds. Gas use per load also varies with load size, fabric, and venting. And the calculator compares fuel cost only, not emissions: a home on clean grid electricity may favour electric on emissions even where gas is cheaper to run. None of this overturns the headline — gas wins on fuel at every rate combination in the branches above — but it does mean your real gap will differ from $63.37, and the calculator, not this guide, should supply your number.

The practical answer

If your laundry room already has a gas connection, the fuel math points to gas: $63.37 a year at the defaults, more if you dry a lot or pay a high electricity rate, less if gas is dear where you live. If it has no gas connection, get a quote for the line first and divide it by your yearly saving from the calculator — that payback period, not the fuel figure alone, is the decision. And if you are replacing a dryer that still works, remember that the cheapest dryer of all is the one you already own: a new machine saves at most $63.37 a year in fuel at the defaults, so replacing a working dryer purely for fuel savings rarely pays. Use the gas vs electric dryer calculator to put your own loads, cycle length, and rates into the same math, and let your number — not this guide's — decide.