Pound-for-Pound

Fire & Heat showdown

The Best Patio Heaters of 2026: Propane vs Electric, What Each Costs to Run, and Which Ones Are Allowed Under Your Roof

By The Smith Family, reviewed by Brad Smith · Independent, no paid placement · Updated October 25, 2026Prices checked September 2026

Some links here are affiliate links — if you buy through them, we may earn a commission at no extra cost to you (sometimes with a discount for you). It never changes which products we recommend — and we name the SKIPs to prove it.

An empty patio is expensive real estate. You paid for the pavers, the furniture, the screen cage and the pool it wraps around, and from the first cool evening in October the whole thing sits there unused because nobody wants to sit in it. A patio heater is the cheapest square footage you will ever add to a house — and the category is sold on three numbers that do not survive a thermometer: the reach on the box, the “far infrared” on the electric ones, and the idea that propane is the cheap fuel.

We read eight heaters with every recent critical review, priced each one per hour on the propane a homeowner actually buys (which is not the propane the government prices), pulled the reach figures from the only instrumented test we could find, and read the manufacturers’ own manuals for the rule on roofs and pergolas that every blog gets wrong. This is a pound-for-pound roundup routed by class — mushroom, pyramid, tabletop, plug-in electric, hard-wired electric — because the first decision is not which brand, it is which kind.

Quick comparison

The columns that decide a patio heater are not the ones you will see elsewhere. Two of them are new to this category as far as we can tell: the reach the maker claims next to the reach a thermometer measured, and the run cost on both ways of buying propane. The rest is fuel, output, warranty and the owner rating — with the caveat that every star average on this page pools variants and, on most, foreign cards.

Model	Best for	Fuel	Rated output	Reach (claimed)	Reach (measured)	Run cost per hour	Warranty	Owner rating	Price
Amazon Basics 46,000 BTU Propane Patio Heater	Best overall	Propane, 20-lb cylinder	46,000 BTU/hr	18-ft diameter (listing)	5–6 ft comfort radius for this class at 25°F (TechGearLab); Wirecutter dismissed it without testing	$1.76 on a refilled cylinder · $3.55 on an exchange cylinder	Not published on the listing	4.4★ / 11,078	Check price →
Hiland (AZ Patio Heaters) HLDS01 48,000 BTU Patio Heater	Wirecutter's pick	Propane, 20-lb cylinder	48,000 BTU/hr	Not stated on the listing	5–6 ft comfort radius for this class at 25°F (TechGearLab); Wirecutter: 'more than eight times as much heat as an electric patio heater'	$1.84 on a refilled cylinder · $3.71 on an exchange cylinder	1 yr parts; rust, weather and insect damage excluded (AZ Patio Heaters)	4.1★ / 349	Check price →
Pamapic 89" 48,000 BTU Pyramid Patio Heater	Best pyramid	Propane, 20-lb cylinder	48,000 BTU/hr	Not stated on the listing	4 ft comfort radius for the pyramid class at 25°F (TechGearLab) — the smallest of every model they tested; BHG felt 'substantial, comfortable heat within 10 minutes'	$1.84 on a refilled cylinder · $3.71 on an exchange cylinder	1 yr — 'only available for purchases on PAMAPIC's official store'	4.4★ / 1,777	Check price →
Cuisinart 11,000 BTU Tabletop Patio Heater	Best tabletop	Propane, 1-lb bottle (20-lb cylinder with an optional adapter hose)	11,000 BTU/hr	30 sq ft (listing) — about a 3-ft radius, one of the few honest reach claims in this category	Owners: 'the heat output is decent if you are sitting next to it'; about 2 hours per 1-lb bottle	$2.55 on 1-lb bottles at $5 each · $0.42 on a refilled 20-lb cylinder through an adapter	1 year, defects in material and workmanship, original consumer purchaser only (Cuisinart COH-500 manual)	4.4★ / 197	Check price →
Dr Infrared DR-238 1,500 W Carbon Infrared Patio Heater	Best electric plug-in	Electric, 120 V plug-in (12.5 A — a full 15 A circuit)	1,500 W (about 5,100 BTU/hr) — 900 / 1,200 / 1,500 W settings	Not stated on the listing; Bob Vila lists it at 5,200 BTU	3 ft at 24°F (TechGearLab: 'a close proximity heat machine'); Infratech rates 1,500 W at 5 × 5 ft average, 3 × 3 ft in the cold	$0.28 at the EIA's 18.34¢/kWh	Not published on the maker's product page	4.3★ / 6,091	Check price →
Bromic Tungsten Smart-Heat 6000 W Electric Patio Heater (BH0420033)	The outdoor-room pick	Electric, 220–240 V hard-wired (about 25 A)	6,000 W (about 20,500 BTU/hr), dual quartz elements	Bromic rates its electric line to 160 sq ft	Owners: two units 16 ft apart at 8 ft 'overlap perfectly' on one card; 'mounted at 9 feet and heat coverage is minimal' on another	$1.10 at the EIA's 18.34¢/kWh	Not readable — bromicheating.com returned no text to our reader; Wirecutter: 'very few models … guaranteed for more than a year'	4.5★ / 64	Check price →
SereneLife 900 W Infrared Outdoor Electric Patio Heater (37-in)	The SKIP	Electric, 120 V plug-in	900 W (about 3,100 BTU/hr) — the 37-in model; the 47- and 57-in sizes on the same listing are larger	15 sq ft (listing) — about a 2-ft radius	Owners: 'can only feel the heat if you're right next to it', 'must be within a few feet of it'	$0.17 at the EIA's 18.34¢/kWh	Not published on the listing	4.1★ / 357	Check price →
Ninja Fireside360 Outdoor Heater & Fire Pit	The one that is both	Propane, 20-lb cylinder (concealed)	80,000 BTU/hr marketed — 31,000 flame + 49,000 heater, per the owner’s guide	360° “HeatZone” circle (listing states no diameter)	No instrumented test published; owners compare its output to a 20-in wood fire pit	$3.06 on a refilled cylinder · $6.18 on an exchange cylinder at full output; $1.88 / $3.79 in heater-only mode	Not published on the Amazon listing (checked September 2026)	4.4★ / 251	Check price →

Prices move constantly — any Amazon price shown is as of the date noted and subject to change; tap through for today's number.

The pattern worth seeing: the three propane standing heaters are within two thousand BTU of each other and cost within ten cents an hour of each other to run. Everything you pay above the cheapest of them buys a warranty, a table, a burner material or a shape — not heat. And the electric column is not a cheaper version of the propane column; it is a different product that makes a tenth of the heat for a fifth of the money.

How far the heat actually reaches

Every listing in this category claims a reach. A 50,000 BTU mushroom’s listing said a 20-foot diameter; the Amazon Basics says 18 feet; the 1,500-watt electrics are routinely listed at 10 feet. The only source we found that measured heaters side by side with an instrument — TechGearLab, seven heaters over six weeks of a South Lake Tahoe winter, an infrared thermometer, a mechanical engineer consulted on the results — got these numbers at an ambient temperature of about 25°F:

Two things reconcile that with the 20-foot claims. First, temperature: The Spruce’s tester felt a 50,000 BTU mushroom at 12 feet in gusty fall weather, and at 45°F you can feel a radiant heater a long way off. At 25°F the same heater is a six-foot circle. Second, definitions: Schwank, a commercial maker, is the only company we found that publishes what “coverage” means — it is measured to a 63°F boundary, and its own diagrams show the effective area at roughly two-thirds the size of the total area for the same unit. A 20-foot claim and a 6-foot experience can both be true; only one of them keeps you warm.

The electric number has a manufacturer behind it. Infratech, the premium hard-wired maker, publishes coverage for its 1,500-watt, 120-volt unit in three columns: 5 by 5 feet average, 3 by 3 feet cold, 7 by 7 feet protected. That is the same wattage as every plug-in on Amazon — physics is brand-agnostic — and it matches the 3 feet TechGearLab measured on the Dr Infrared. A 1,500-watt heater warms the two chairs in front of it. It does not warm a patio, and it cannot be made to: 1,500 watts is 12.5 amps, the practical ceiling of a 15-amp household circuit. Past that you are hard-wiring 240 volts, which is the Bromic section below.

What it costs to run — and the exchange-cage trap

No patio heater listing prints this, so here it is, and it reverses the thing everyone assumes. Propane holds 91,452 Btu per gallon (the EIA’s figure) and weighs 4.24 pounds per gallon, so a 48,000 BTU heater burns about 2.2 pounds an hour — Cuisinart’s own manual publishes 1.77 pounds an hour for its 38,200 BTU unit, which is the same arithmetic within a tenth of a percent.

The trap is how you buy it. A refill station fills your cylinder to its 20 pounds at a per-gallon price, typically $3 to $4.50. An exchange cage sells you a pre-filled cylinder at a flat price — and those cylinders are routinely short-filled to about 15 pounds. U-Haul, which runs refill stations, says exchange programs “only fill 20 lb. tanks to about 15 lbs.” and that refilling gets you “up to 33% more propane.” A $25 exchange for 15 pounds is $7.07 a gallon.

Now compare the fuels on what they actually deliver. Per 100,000 Btu of heat, refilled propane is $3.83, plug-in electricity is $5.38, and exchange-cage propane is $7.73. If you swap cylinders at the grocery store, your propane heater is the most expensive heat on the patio per Btu — more than the electric heater everyone assumes is the pricey option. Refill and propane wins. And the tabletop on one-pound bottles is off the chart: about two hours a bottle, so at $5 a bottle it costs more per hour than a full-size mushroom on a refill while making a quarter of the heat. Run it off a 20-pound cylinder with the adapter hose or accept that fuel is the real price of it.

Per evening, electric still wins every time — three hours on a plug-in is under a dollar — because it makes about 5,100 Btu an hour, a tenth of a standing heater. The honest sentence is: electric is cheap because it does less. Put your own numbers in:

Best overall: Amazon Basics 46,000 BTU

The reference standing heater, and since 8 October the best overall here. Forty-six thousand BTU, one-touch ignition, a water-box base and a tank chain in the box, wheels — and 4.4★ across 11,078 ratings, the deepest owner base of any propane heater on this page. At our read it was in stock, sold and shipped by Amazon.com, which puts Amazon’s own returns desk behind the heater most likely to need it.

Why it took the belt. This page’s first winner, EAST OAK’s 50,000 BTU mushroom — The Spruce’s and Business Insider’s best overall — sold out: its Amazon listing read Currently unavailable with no seller offering it, and every 50,000 BTU variant on EAST OAK’s own store read sold out the same day. We scanned the field before replacing it. The other standing heaters with a real owner base either had no credentialed test behind them and no warranty document from their maker, or, like the Hiland below, sold from a listing down to one unit. Among the mushroom heaters a credentialed outlet has tested, the Amazon Basics is the one Amazon still shows plainly In Stock — Wirecutter’s pick, the Hiland, is down to one unit on a listing whose reviews stop in 2021 — and Popular Mechanics assembled it “in just about 15 minutes” and found that “while the construction might be basic, the patio heater itself is still quite effective at generating heat and keeping bodies warm.”

Read that base for what it is. It pools two colours and two finishes and runs back to 2014 with Canadian cards mixed in, so the star is a long-run average, not a verdict on this year’s unit. And Wirecutter has no opinion on it: the Amazon Basics and the Pamapic “suddenly and conveniently appeared on Amazon” and Wirecutter “dismissed them all without calling them in for testing.” That is a fact about Wirecutter, not the heater — The Spruce and BHG tested both.

Not for you if a fussy igniter would ruin it. Four of the ten newest critical reviews are lighting: “only worked twice,” “stopped working after 1 use,” “doesn’t light without a lighter,” and one owner who gave up on the replacement and lights it by hand. Light it the day it arrives and run it for an hour inside Amazon’s return window. Also not for you if you are sitting low: one owner’s word is “wayyyyy too tall” — a mushroom radiates down from seven feet, which is fine for standing and a dining table and less so for a sofa. A missing standoff bolt on one unit let a gust crush the reflector; check the hardware count before the first windy night. And the warranty is the one thing we could not read: the listing says only that a manufacturer’s warranty can be requested from customer service.

Winner

Our top pick

Amazon Basics 46,000 BTU Propane Patio Heater

Best overall · The reference standing heater — 46,000 BTU, wheels, a water-box base and one-touch ignition at 4.4★ across 11,078 owners, the deepest owner base of any propane heater we card, pooled across colours and finishes and across a decade of reviews

Your pick if you want the safe, boring, deep-base answer — 11,078 owners over twelve years at 4.4★, and Amazon's own returns desk behind it; its critical tail is ignition, so light it in the return window.

4.4 · 11,078 owner ratingsacross Amazon · October 2026 · listing-wide base · global base

Check price at Amazon →

Picked before we checked what this link pays us.

Pro review Popular Mechanics

“While the construction might be basic, the patio heater itself is still quite effective at generating heat and keeping bodies warm.”

Amazon Basics 46,000 BTU Propane Patio Heater

Best overall

Your pick if you want the safe, boring, deep-base answer — 11,078 owners over twelve years at 4.4★, and Amazon's own returns desk behind it; its critical tail is ignition, so light it in the return window.

4.4 · 11,078 owner ratingsAmazon · October 2026 · listing-wide base · global base

Pro review “While the construction might be basic, the patio heater itself is still quite effective at generating heat and keeping bodies warm.”— Tom Price (tested by test editor Bradley Ford), Popular Mechanics

Pros

• Eleven thousand owners — the deepest owner base of any propane patio heater we card
• One-touch ignition, a water-box base and a tank chain in the box; wheels for moving it
• Cheapest way into a real 40,000-plus BTU standing heater, sold and shipped by Amazon with Amazon's own returns desk
• Popular Mechanics tested it and named it best value in its September 2026 guide; Wirecutter did not test it

Cons

• Ignition is the complaint: 'worked twice', 'stopped working after 1 use', thermocouples and regulators that fail — the newest critical cards are almost all about lighting it
• Wind tips it, and one owner's missing standoff bolt let a gust crush the reflector
• Too tall for seated use, one owner's words — it heats from seven feet up
• The star average pools colours, finishes and reviews back to 2014, with Canadian cards mixed in

What owners complain aboutDefect reports

Ignition — it lights twice and then it doesn't. 'This heater only worked twice originally' (Aug 2026), 'Stopped working after 1 use' (May 2026), 'Now it doesn't light without a lighter' (Jul 2026), 'Thermocouples go bad within two years. Regulators fail' (Mar 2026). Second theme: wind and hardware — a missing standoff bolt, then a gust that crushed the reflector; bolts that fall off the reflector.

10 most recent critical cards read 2026-10-08 (Mar → Oct 2026, of 950 critical): 4 of 10 are ignition or a unit that will not light, 1 a regulator that will not turn up, 3 packaging or missing hardware (one missing standoff bolt let a gust put it over and crush the reflector), 1 too tall, 1 no text; 10/10 Verified Purchase, 0 Vine · critical reviews read October 2026

Check price at Amazon →

✓ Safety: no active recallCPSC SaferProducts API queried 2026-09-05 by ProductName= (the substring-matching endpoint): "patio heater" returns two records, both old (2018 Hampton Bay fire-pit table heat shield; 2005 Coleman regulator); "outdoor heater", "infrared heater" and "pyramid heater" return zero; the brand name returns zero patio-heater records. No residential standing, pyramid or electric patio heater has been recalled 2023–2026. The only class-adjacent recall is Harbor Freight's One Stop Gardens tank-top heaters (21-168, 2021), a different product. Propane: outdoor use only; the two Amazon Basics manuals disagree on clearances (36 in top / 24 in sides on the US-spec 62699; 39 in / 20 in on the EU-spec HL-02A), so keep the larger figure.

Wirecutter’s pick: Hiland HLDS01 48,000 BTU

Wirecutter’s top pick since at least the February 2026 update — “the most powerful outdoor patio heater,” “if you’re simply looking for sheer heat output, get the AZ Patio Heaters HLDS01-W-xx, also sold as the Hiland HLDS01-W-xx.” An open tank door so you swap the cylinder without lifting the housing, a height-adjustable table, and a maker, AZ Patio Heaters, that publishes real clearance figures and sells its anti-tilt switch as a serviceable part.

We carded it and could not crown it, and the reason is the Amazon listing, not Wirecutter. The listing we could wire reads 4.1★ across 349 ratings with 11% one-star, its visible reviews run from 2012 to 2021 with nothing newer, its critical tail (bent doors, missing latches, a connector that never worked) is entirely from 2021 and 2022, and the listing that showed seven in stock in September was down to one at our 8 October read. A four-year-old base on a heater you buy new is not evidence about the heater you will receive. Wirecutter’s pick is the HLDS01 family; this is one variant of it on a stale page.

Not for you if you live where things rust or spiders live — which is everywhere. AZ’s warranty is one year, and it expressly excludes “damage or repairs related to insects, birds, or animals of any kind,” “damage due to weather conditions,” and “rust or weather damage.” The two ways a propane heater actually dies — a spider in the pilot orifice and a rusted base — are both written out. It also disclaims the warranty on anything bought from a non-authorized seller, so confirm the seller before you buy it here.

Hiland (AZ Patio Heaters) HLDS01 48,000 BTU Patio Heater

Wirecutter's pick

Your pick if you trust Wirecutter's heat-output ranking over an Amazon base that went quiet in 2021 — and you buy it from an authorized retailer, because AZ voids the warranty otherwise.

4.1 · 349 owner ratingsAmazon · September 2026 · global base

Pro review “If you're simply looking for sheer heat output, get the AZ Patio Heaters HLDS01-W-xx, also sold as the Hiland HLDS01-W-xx.”— Thom Dunn, Wirecutter (The New York Times)

Pros

• Wirecutter's top pick for sheer heat output (February 2026); CNN Underscored and others recur on the HLDS01 family
• Open tank door — swap the cylinder without lifting the housing
• AZ Patio Heaters publishes real clearance figures and sells its anti-tilt switch as a serviceable part
• Wirecutter: 'Like AZ/Hiland, East Oak provides reliable customer support'

Cons

• The Amazon base is stale and thin — the visible reviews run 2012 to 2021, nothing since, and 11% are one-star
• One-year warranty that excludes 'damage or repairs related to insects, birds, or animals' and 'rust or weather damage' — the two ways these actually die
• Stock was single-digit at the read ('Only 7 left'); AZ disclaims the warranty on non-authorized sellers
• A flimsy base that bends, and start-up trouble, in the critical tail

What owners complain aboutDefect reports

It arrives bent — 'Everything was bent, and damaged. Rivets where broken on the latch' (Jan 2022), 'both are dented and damaged. One of them is missing the latch' (Nov 2021), 'Damaged on delivery, second delivered was damaged as well' (Nov 2021). Second theme: ignition and the tank connector — 'trouble starting this every time… this weekend, September 2022, I took it to the dump', 'the connector to a propane tank doesn't work'. Third: three-plus-hour assembly.

10 most recent critical cards read 2026-09-05 — and the newest is November 2022 (Nov 2021 → Nov 2022): 6 of 10 arrival damage or missing latch/hardware, 2 ignition or connector failure, 2 assembly; 10/10 Verified Purchase, 0 Vine. A tail this old is itself the finding: nobody has reviewed this listing critically in nearly four years. · critical reviews read September 2026

Check price at Amazon →

✓ Safety: no active recallCPSC SaferProducts API queried 2026-09-05 by ProductName= (the substring-matching endpoint): "patio heater" returns two records, both old (2018 Hampton Bay fire-pit table heat shield; 2005 Coleman regulator); "outdoor heater", "infrared heater" and "pyramid heater" return zero; the brand name returns zero patio-heater records. No residential standing, pyramid or electric patio heater has been recalled 2023–2026. The only class-adjacent recall is Harbor Freight's One Stop Gardens tank-top heaters (21-168, 2021), a different product. Propane: outdoor use only; the AZ manual carries the ANSI shelter clause and 24 in top / 36 in side clearances on the HLDS01-CGT (36 / 36 on the WHSQ); wind under 10 mph.

Best pyramid: Pamapic 48,000 BTU

The flame tower every roundup tests and BHG crowned best overall after three months: “It emits heat 360 degrees around the unit, and we were able to feel substantial, comfortable heat within 10 minutes.” Forty-eight thousand BTU behind a quartz glass tube, a cover and wheels in the box, pulse ignition, and 4.4★ across 1,777 ratings pooled over five colours at five prices, with Canadian and Mexican cards in the mix.

Here is the honest reading of a pyramid, and it is the thing to decide before you buy one. In the only instrumented comparison we found, the pyramid class “provided much more ambiance than actual heat, warming the smallest radii of all models” — about 4 feet against 5 to 6 for the mushrooms, at a peak surface temperature 160°F lower for a rating only a tenth lower. Its one real advantage is geometry: a vertical column radiates on the plane you sit and stand on, where a mushroom radiates down from seven feet, so a pyramid feels more even at a table. Its owners say both halves of that: “provide plenty of heat for our purposes,” and, in the critical tail, “most of it goes out the top.”

Not for you if it will ever be windy. Two of the ten newest critical reviews are the same story: “the first mildly windy day it blew over. Even with the cover on, the glass shattered,” and “blown by the wind even with the full gas tank in it and all the glass shattered… tucked in the corner of my house protected by two sides.” The tube is a standard replacement part across a dozen brands for a reason. Also not for you if you want a warranty through Amazon: Pamapic’s own page says the one-year warranty “is only available for purchases on PAMAPIC’s official store.” Buy it for the flame column. Know what it is.

Pamapic 89" 48,000 BTU Pyramid Patio Heater

Best pyramid

Your pick if you want the flame column in your yard and you know what you are buying — a four-foot circle of warmth on a seated plane and the best-looking object on this page, whose glass tube is a consumable the moment it tips.

4.4 · 1,777 owner ratingsAmazon · September 2026 · listing-wide base · global base

Pro review “For those looking for a budget option, we were incredibly impressed with the performance of the Pamapic Pyramid Patio Heater during three months of testing.”— BHG testing team, Better Homes & Gardens

Pros

• BHG's best overall after three months of testing; Bob Vila's best ambiance is the 41k sibling
• Radiates on the seated-and-standing plane instead of down from seven feet — the pyramid's one real advantage
• Cover, wheels and pulse ignition in the box; 'assemble in about 1 hour' is what the fresh cards say too
• Four colours, and owners two and a half years in still report it working

Cons

• The glass tube shatters when it goes over, and it goes over in wind: two of the ten newest critical cards are 'blew over the first windy day, glass shattered' — one 'tucked in the corner of my house protected by two sides'
• Less usable heat than a mushroom at the same BTU — 'most of it goes out the top', 'doesn't put out as much heat as other style patio heaters'
• Assembly misalignment, bent doors and damaged panels on arrival
• The one-year warranty reads as official-store only, and the star average pools four colours and Canadian cards

What owners complain aboutDefect reports

It blows over and the glass shatters — 'the first mildly windy day it blew over. Even with the cover on, the glass shattered' (Mar 2026); 'blown by the wind even with the full gas tank in it and all the glass shattered… tucked in the corner of my house protected by two sides' (May 2026). Second theme: less heat than it looks — 'most of it goes out the top', 'doesn't put out as much heat as other style patio heaters'. Third: arrival and assembly — bent door, damaged panels, misaligned screw holes.

10 most recent critical cards read 2026-09-05 (Feb → Aug 2026): 2 wind tip-over with a shattered tube, 2 poor heat output, 3 arrival damage or assembly, 1 dead on arrival, 1 melted control knob, 1 return service; 9/10 Verified Purchase, 0 Vine · critical reviews read September 2026

Check price at Amazon →

✓ Safety: no active recallCPSC SaferProducts API queried 2026-09-05 by ProductName= (the substring-matching endpoint): "patio heater" returns two records, both old (2018 Hampton Bay fire-pit table heat shield; 2005 Coleman regulator); "outdoor heater", "infrared heater" and "pyramid heater" return zero; the brand name returns zero patio-heater records. No residential standing, pyramid or electric patio heater has been recalled 2023–2026. The only class-adjacent recall is Harbor Freight's One Stop Gardens tank-top heaters (21-168, 2021), a different product. Propane: outdoor use only; manual clearance 36 in top and sides; the quartz tube is the failure mode in a tip-over — anchor the base and keep it out of the wind.

Best tabletop: Cuisinart 11,000 BTU

Bob Vila’s best tabletop, and the tabletop pick that recurs across every roundup we read: 11,000 BTU on a one-pound bottle with an anti-tilt shutoff, a burner guard and a dial, at 4.4★ across 197 ratings on a young base that starts in 2025 and pools two colours. Its listing claims 30 square feet — about a three-foot radius — which makes it one of the few honest reach claims in this category, and about the same circle Infratech rates a 1,500-watt electric at in the cold.

What it can do: warm the hands and faces of four people at one table, under a ceiling too low for an 87-inch standing heater. What it cannot do: warm anyone standing, or anyone at the next table, and the critical tail says exactly that — “did not keep any of us warm around a 6 feet round table.”

Not for you on one-pound bottles. About two hours a bottle, and the owners are blunt: “will drink up a can of gas in 15 min,” “burns through one pound bottles of propane fast.” At $5 a bottle that is about $2.55 an hour for a quarter of a mushroom’s heat, the worst fuel economy on this page by a wide margin. Cuisinart sells the answer — an adapter hose to a 20-pound cylinder, which drops it to about 42 cents an hour on a refill. Buy the hose with the heater. Some owners also found it hard to light or keep lit, and a few received it bent or without hardware.

Cuisinart 11,000 BTU Tabletop Patio Heater

Best tabletop

Your pick if you want warm hands and faces for four people at one table under a ceiling too low for a standing heater — and you will run it off a 20-lb cylinder with the adapter, because 1-lb bottles make it the most expensive heat on this page.

4.4 · 197 owner ratingsAmazon · September 2026 · listing-wide base · global base

Pro review “While its output doesn't match full-size towers, the Cuisinart Portable Tabletop Patio Heater delivers a reliable, easy-to-use heat source for compact spaces and quick outdoor gatherings.”— Glenda Taylor, Debbie Wolfe and Mark Wolfe, Bob Vila

Pros

• Bob Vila's best tabletop; the tabletop pick that recurs across every roundup we read
• Its 30 sq ft reach claim is honest — the same 3-ft circle Infratech rates a 1,500 W electric at in the cold
• Anti-tilt shutoff and a burner guard; light enough to carry to the table you are actually sitting at
• Runs off a 20-lb cylinder with the optional regulator hose, which fixes the fuel cost

Cons

• On 1-lb bottles it is the most expensive heat here — about two hours a bottle, and owners say so: 'will drink up a can of gas in 15 min', 'burns through one pound bottles of propane fast'
• 'Doesn't put off much heat at all' — it warms the people at the table, not the patio; owners on covered patios were disappointed
• Hard to light for some owners ('very difficult to light so we returned it'); missing hardware and bent-on-arrival cards
• Young base: reviews start in 2025, pooled across two colours

What owners complain aboutCapability limit

Not much heat, and it eats bottles — 'Doesn't put off much heat at all' (Jul 2026), 'Did not keep any of us warm around a 6 feet round table' (Dec 2025), 'will drink up a can of gas in 15 min a small tank' (May 2026), 'Burns through one pound bottles of propane fast!' (Dec 2025). Second theme: lighting — 'very difficult to light so we returned it', 'can't keep it lit'. Third: missing hardware and bent on arrival.

10 most recent critical cards read 2026-09-05 (Feb 2025 → Jul 2026): 3 of 10 low heat, 3 bottle consumption, 2 hard to light or keep lit, 3 missing parts or arrival damage (some cards carry two themes); 10/10 Verified Purchase, 0 Vine · critical reviews read September 2026

Check price at Amazon →

✓ Safety: no active recallCPSC SaferProducts API queried 2026-09-05 by ProductName= (the substring-matching endpoint): "patio heater" returns two records, both old (2018 Hampton Bay fire-pit table heat shield; 2005 Coleman regulator); "outdoor heater", "infrared heater" and "pyramid heater" return zero; the brand name returns zero patio-heater records. No residential standing, pyramid or electric patio heater has been recalled 2023–2026. The only class-adjacent recall is Harbor Freight's One Stop Gardens tank-top heaters (21-168, 2021), a different product. Propane on a 1-lb bottle: anti-tilt shutoff and a burner guard; a tabletop still needs open air — the reach is short but the exhaust is the same.

Stock note, 25 October 2026: Amazon listed the Cuisinart 11,000 BTU Tabletop Patio Heater as currently unavailable, with no other sellers offering it. We keep it on the page while the listing may restock.

Best electric plug-in: Dr Infrared DR-238

The most-recurring electric pick in our sweep — BHG’s best for garages (“impressed with the amount of heat it emitted within seconds”), Bob Vila’s and The Spruce’s best wall-mounted — and the right answer for the situations a propane heater is wrong for: a covered patio, a screened lanai, a garage, two chairs and an outlet. Fifteen hundred watts of carbon-tube infrared on a standard 120-volt plug, wall and ceiling brackets and a remote in the box, three power levels, and 4.3★ across 6,091 ratings.

Read that rating for what it is. The listing’s size selector spans five lengths at five prices — the DR-228, DR-238 and DR-338 share one review base — and the visible cards skew hard to garages, pole buildings, greenhouses and sun rooms, which is indoor use on a heater we are ranking as a patio heater. Canadian and Mexican cards are in there too.

Not for you if you want to heat an area. You feel it only in the beam: TechGearLab’s tester was “within 3 feet of the heater” to be comfortable in sub-freezing weather, and an owner’s three-star says “won’t heat the area only if you are in direct line.” Mount it to the side of the seating rather than over the table — Infratech’s advice, because a heater over a table mostly heats the table — and treat it as a two-chair heater. And the elements burn out. Five of the ten newest critical reviews are a unit dead inside a season: “broke after 15 minutes,” “burnt out the bulb after 2 light months of use,” “lasted 3 min, glowed like the sun, and died.” One owner’s warranty repair charged return shipping. Two more things from the listing itself: the bullets say IP55 and the same page’s A+ module says IPX4, so treat it as splash-protected, not weatherproof; and at our read the buy box was Amazon Resale, not new stock — check the seller line before you pay.

Dr Infrared DR-238 1,500 W Carbon Infrared Patio Heater

Best electric plug-in

Your pick if you have a covered patio, a screened lanai or a garage, an outlet within reach, and one or two chairs to warm — no flame, no cylinder, no carbon monoxide, and about a quarter an hour to run.

4.3 · 6,091 owner ratingsAmazon · September 2026 · listing-wide base · global base

Pro review “We tested the Dr. Infrared wall-mounted heater at home for three months and were impressed with the amount of heat it emitted within seconds.”— BHG testing team, Better Homes & Gardens

Pros

• The most-recurring electric pick in our sweep — BHG's best for garages, Bob Vila's best wall-mounted, The Spruce's best wall-mounted
• Plugs into a standard outlet; wall and ceiling brackets and a remote in the box
• No flame, no cylinder, no carbon monoxide — the one class of heater the fire codes put no enclosure rule on
• About a quarter an hour to run, a fifth of a propane heater's exchange-cylinder cost

Cons

• Elements burn out — 'Broke after 15 minutes', 'Burnt out the bulb after 2 light months of use', 'Lasted 3 min, glowed like the sun, and died'; warranty repair makes you pay shipping, per one owner
• You feel it only in the beam: 'won't heat the area only if you are in direct line' — a three-foot circle in the cold
• The buy box at our read was Amazon Resale, not new stock, and the star average pools five sizes and Mexican and Canadian cards
• IP55 on the bullets, IPX4 on the same listing's A+ module — treat it as splash-protected, not weatherproof

What owners complain aboutLifespan

The element burns out — 'Broke after 15 minutes… the wire inside had become broken' (Jun 2026), 'Burnt out the bulb after 2 light months of use' (Feb 2026), 'Lasted 3 min, glowed like the sun, and died' (Feb 2026), 'stopped working after a few weeks' on a second unit whose first 'stopped working right before the manufacturer warranty ended' (Mar 2026) — and the warranty repair 'is a joke because they make you pay for shipping'. Second theme: it only warms what is in the beam.

10 most recent critical cards read 2026-09-05 (Feb → Jun 2026): 5 of 10 element or unit failure inside a season, 1 remote, 1 mounting not as advertised, 1 'does not heat small greenhouse', 1 'only if you are in direct line', 1 a returned unit resold; 10/10 Verified Purchase, 0 Vine · critical reviews read September 2026

Check price at Amazon →

✓ Safety: no active recallCPSC SaferProducts API queried 2026-09-05 by ProductName= (the substring-matching endpoint): "patio heater" returns two records, both old (2018 Hampton Bay fire-pit table heat shield; 2005 Coleman regulator); "outdoor heater", "infrared heater" and "pyramid heater" return zero; the brand name returns zero patio-heater records. No residential standing, pyramid or electric patio heater has been recalled 2023–2026. The only class-adjacent recall is Harbor Freight's One Stop Gardens tank-top heaters (21-168, 2021), a different product. Electric: NFPA's outdoor-heater fact sheet puts no enclosure restriction on electric heaters — only that they be listed and placed where they cannot be overturned, with no extension cord doing permanent duty. The manual: 15.8 in to the ceiling, 94.5 in to the floor, 39 in to anything in front. Within 20 ft of a pool, NEC 680.27(C) governs a permanently wired radiant heater (12 ft above the deck, never over the water) — a cord-and-plug unit is not on that list.

The outdoor-room pick: Bromic Tungsten 6000 W

Everything above the Dr Infrared in electric requires an electrician, and this is the unit the trade actually installs: 6,000 watts of dual-element infrared on a 240-volt circuit, about 25 amps, a stainless body with a corrosion-resistant finish, wall or ceiling mounted. Four times a plug-in’s heat, about $1.10 an hour, nothing to refill and nothing to blow out — and, unlike every propane heater on this page, rated by its maker for indoor and outdoor use, which is what makes it the defensible heater inside a screened enclosure. One owner’s two units 16 feet apart at 8 feet “overlap perfectly” across a 14-by-14 gazebo.

It is also the class consumer roundups do not test. Not one of the five publications we read put a 240-volt heater through its process, so the evidence here is thinner than anywhere else on the page: 4.5★ across 64 ratings pooled across four wattages on one listing, with the visible reviews mostly from 2016 to 2022.

Not for you unless you are building a room. It needs a licensed electrician and a dedicated 240-volt circuit before it does anything, the remote/dimmer and the mounting kit are separate purchases that several owners did not expect, and the most recent critical review is “mounted at 9’ and heat coverage is minimal” — the same distance-versus-marketing gap as every other electric, at a much higher price. Two owners describe wires shorting inside a few months. And at our read Amazon showed one left in stock: Amazon is not Bromic’s channel, a dealer is, so if this listing goes dark the answer is a dealer, not another Amazon page. Near a pool, this is the class the electrical code has an opinion about — see below.

Bromic Tungsten Smart-Heat 6000 W Electric Patio Heater (BH0420033)

The outdoor-room pick

Your pick if you are building a permanent covered outdoor room and will pay an electrician to run 240 V — four times the heat of a plug-in at about a dollar an hour, with nothing to refill and nothing to blow out.

4.5 · 64 owner ratingsAmazon · September 2026 · early data · listing-wide base

Pros

• The only premium hard-wired electric in Amazon's top 50 — the class that consumer roundups almost never cover
• Four times a plug-in's output; a commercial-grade stainless body with a corrosion-resistant finish
• Owners installing two units report even overlap across a 14 × 14 ft gazebo
• Indoor-and-outdoor rated by the maker, which is the defensible answer for a screened enclosure

Cons

• Needs a 240 V circuit and a licensed electrician; the remote/dimmer and the mounting kit are separate purchases owners did not expect
• 'Mounted at 9 feet and heat coverage is minimal' — the most recent critical card; an earlier owner called it 'the most expensive light bulb'
• Shorting and broken elements in the tail, on a thin base whose reviews mostly predate 2023
• 'Only 1 left in stock' at the read — Amazon is not Bromic's channel; a dealer may be

What owners complain aboutCapability limit

The things it does not come with — 'doesn't come with mounting hardware?', 'make sure you purchase the assembly kit, which is not identified as being necessary', a dimmer/remote sold separately that one owner says 'doesn't work at all'. Second theme: coverage for the money — 'mounted at 9 feet and heat coverage is minimal' (Jan 2026), 'Unless you are standing directly underneath it you do not feel a thing' (2017). Third: shorting — two owners with wires shorting inside a few months.

9 critical cards on the listing read 2026-09-05 (2017 → Jan 2026, the whole critical tail): 3 accessories not included, 2 minimal coverage, 2 shorting/failure, 1 burning-rubber smell, 1 Amazon shipping error; 5/9 Verified Purchase, 0 Vine · critical reviews read September 2026

Check price at Amazon →

✓ Safety: no active recallCPSC SaferProducts API queried 2026-09-05 by ProductName= (the substring-matching endpoint): "patio heater" returns two records, both old (2018 Hampton Bay fire-pit table heat shield; 2005 Coleman regulator); "outdoor heater", "infrared heater" and "pyramid heater" return zero; the brand name returns zero patio-heater records. No residential standing, pyramid or electric patio heater has been recalled 2023–2026. The only class-adjacent recall is Harbor Freight's One Stop Gardens tank-top heaters (21-168, 2021), a different product. Electric, hard-wired: the manual's clearances are 13 in to the ceiling and 96 in to the floor ceiling-mounted; IPX4 (Bromic: 'weather resistant, but not water proof'). Within 20 ft of a pool this is the class NEC 680.27(C) governs — at least 12 ft above the deck unless the inspector approves otherwise, never over the water or within 5 ft of its inside wall.

The one that is also a fire pit: Ninja Fireside360

Every other heater on this page does one thing. This one has a flame ring on top of a radiant burner and a switch that runs either, or both, off a single cylinder hidden in the cabinet — and it is the reason a lot of people end up here at all, because the alternative is buying two products and finding room for both.

The number on the box is two burners added together. Ninja markets 80,000 BTU. Its own owner’s guide splits that into 31,000 BTU of flame and 49,000 BTU of heat. Nobody publishes that breakdown, and it changes what you are comparing: as a heater it is genuinely in this field, and as a fire feature alone it is a 31,000 BTU appliance — about half the output of a $150 propane fire bowl. If you want the fire more than the warmth, buy the bowl.

It is also the only unit here certified to CSA/ANSI Z83.26, the gas-fired outdoor infrared patio heater standard, which is the clearest answer to what this thing actually is. Ninja calls it a fire pit and a heater; the certificate calls it a heater.

And the manual is stricter than the marketing. Three feet to the sides, seven and a half feet overhead, no overhead cover of any kind, and — the line that matters in Florida — a screened wall does not count as an opening. That rules out a lanai, and an eight-foot porch ceiling fails the overhead rule outright. Two national outlets photographed it under cover anyway.

4.4★ across 251 ratings across a base that pools ten colourways into one listing, with no variant selector to tell you so. The unfiltered cards are all US and all verified purchases, with no Vine.

Two things in the owner record that have to be separated, because they read as one complaint and are not. The first is the ignition, and it has a fix: owners report it only lights on a firm press until you feel a click, which the manual never says — one buyer found it by reading the reviews. The second is not recoverable. A minority of units run the flame while the radiant burner never works at all, and one owner went through two consecutive replacements with the same dead heater. Support comes up as unresponsive in several of those accounts.

Not for you if: your patio has a roof, a pergola or a screen cage — the overhead rule is 7.5 feet with no cover, and that is most Florida patios. Buy a plug-in electric and accept the three-foot circle.

Ninja Fireside360 Outdoor Heater & Fire Pit

The one that is both

Your pick if you want one cabinet instead of two and you have open sky above it — 4.4★ across 251 owners, three modes from one tank, and a 7.5-ft overhead rule that rules out every covered patio.

4.4 · 251 owner ratingsAmazon · September 2026 · listing-wide base

Pros

• Three modes from one cabinet — flame only, heat only, or both — which is the only unit here that replaces two products
• Certified to CSA/ANSI Z83.26 · CSA 2.37, the gas-fired outdoor infrared patio heater standard, rather than a decorative-appliance standard
• Sold and shipped by Amazon, and the tank hides inside the body instead of standing beside it
• Owners consistently describe real heat: one compares it to a 20-inch wood fire pit, another runs it on a paver patio all evening

Cons

• The ignition has a trick nobody documents: owners report it only catches on a firm press until it clicks, and the manual does not say so
• Heater mode fails on its own on a minority of units — owners report flame working while the radiant burner never does, including two consecutive replacements
• The manual bans any overhead cover and treats a screened wall as not an opening, so a lanai or a covered porch is out
• The 80,000 BTU headline is two burners added together; as a fire feature alone it is a 31,000 BTU appliance
• The cover is a manufacturer-only extra at about $86

What owners complain aboutDefect reports

Two separate failures that must not be reported as one: an undocumented ignition technique (press firmly until it clicks) that accounts for much of the not-staying-lit reporting, and a genuine heater-mode hardware failure where the flame works and the radiant burner does not

28 of 251 critical (11.2%); 7 of 10 sampled critical cards, with the ignition trick surfacing in the positive tail · critical reviews read September 2026

Check price at Amazon →

✓ Safety: no active recallNo active CPSC recall for this product or any SharkNinja outdoor product (checked September 2026). SharkNinja has two unrelated kitchen recalls — Foodi pressure cookers in 2025 and BL660 blenders in 2015. A 1995 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles chair recall matches the brand name only as a substring and is not related.

The SKIP: SereneLife 900 W

Nine hundred watts is about 3,100 Btu an hour — a fifteenth of a standing propane heater, a hair dryer on a stand — and this is sold as a “patio heater” with a remote, a weighted base and an IP65 badge. To its credit, the listing’s reach claim is honest: 15 square feet, roughly a two-foot circle. To the owners’ credit, they confirm it: six of the ten newest critical reviews say the same thing in different words — “can only feel the heat if you’re right next to it,” “must be within a few feet of it to feel the heat” — and two of those sent it back. A rusted grille guard after one season outdoors, missing hardware and a unit dead after three uses round out the tail.

The rating that sits on it — 4.1★ across 357 ratings with 11% one-star — pools three sizes at three wattages, and on the top sort the five-star cards are mostly the bigger 47- and 57-inch units while the one- and three-star cards are mostly this 37-inch one. BHG’s best-electric pick is the SereneLife at $250 to $275, which is not this $99 heater; it is a larger one that shares its star. The buy box at our read was Amazon Resale. If you want a plug-in, the Dr Infrared above makes two-thirds more heat at a similar price. If you want a warm patio, none of the 120-volt electrics do that, and this one does it least.

SereneLife 900 W Infrared Outdoor Electric Patio Heater (37-in)

The SKIP

Sold in 3 heater lengths (three wattages)s on this listing: 37 in, 47 in, 57 in — this card is the 37 in. Check the size before you add to cart.

Your pick if nobody on a patio. Nine hundred watts is a hair dryer's worth of heat on a stand, and the listing's own reach claim — fifteen square feet — is the one honest number on it.

4.1 · 357 owner ratingsAmazon · September 2026 · listing-wide base · global base

Pros

• Weighted base and a 360° tip-over switch; quiet
• Costs almost nothing to run — because it makes almost no heat
• BHG's best electric pick — for the larger sizes that share this listing's star average

Cons

• 900 W is about 3,100 BTU — a fifteenth of a standing propane heater — and its own listing says 15 square feet
• Six of the ten newest critical cards say the same thing: no heat unless you are right next to it; two returned it
• The buy box at the read was Amazon Resale, and the star average pools three sizes at three wattages plus Canadian cards
• Rusted grille guard after one season outdoors; missing hardware; dead after three uses, in the tail

What owners complain aboutCapability limit

No heat unless you are beside it — 'can only feel the heat if you're right next to it. definitely doesn't work as described' (Mar 2026), 'Must be within a few feet of it to feel the heat' (Feb 2026), 'The heating area is very small and doesn't project much heat out besides right in front of it' (Jun 2026, returned), 'It doesn't put out much heat even on the highest setting' (Mar 2026). Second: rust on the grille guard after one season, missing hardware, dead after three uses.

10 most recent critical cards read 2026-09-05 (Dec 2025 → Jun 2026): 6 of 10 no usable heat (2 returned it), 1 rusted grille guard, 1 missing hardware, 1 dead after three uses, 1 assembly; 10/10 Verified Purchase, 0 Vine · critical reviews read September 2026

Check price at Amazon →

✓ Safety: no active recallCPSC SaferProducts API queried 2026-09-05 by ProductName= (the substring-matching endpoint): "patio heater" returns two records, both old (2018 Hampton Bay fire-pit table heat shield; 2005 Coleman regulator); "outdoor heater", "infrared heater" and "pyramid heater" return zero; the brand name returns zero patio-heater records. No residential standing, pyramid or electric patio heater has been recalled 2023–2026. The only class-adjacent recall is Harbor Freight's One Stop Gardens tank-top heaters (21-168, 2021), a different product. Electric, freestanding: a 360° tip-over switch and a weighted base; keep the cord off a permanent extension.

Under a roof, a pergola, or a Florida screen enclosure

This is the question that autocompletes — “patio heater under pergola,” “patio heater covered porch,” “patio heater screened porch” — and the answer on most sites is a flat “never under a roof.” The manufacturers’ own manuals say something more useful, and they all say the same thing.

The shelter clause. The EAST OAK, Pamapic, AZ Patio Heaters/Hiland and Fire Sense manuals each print this paragraph, which is the ANSI Z83.26 definition of “outdoors” for a gas patio heater: an appliance may be installed with shelter no more inclusive than (a) walls on all sides but no overhead cover; (b) a partial enclosure with an overhead cover and no more than two side walls, parallel as in a breezeway or at right angles; or (c) an overhead cover and three side walls, as long as 30 percent or more of the horizontal periphery of the enclosure is permanently open. An open-sided pergola with a solid roof, a two-walled covered porch and a breezeway are all inside the envelope. The same manuals also print “heater is outdoors (outside any enclosure)” on the pre-use checklist, which is the consumer simplification of the clause above, not a contradiction of it.

What still governs is clearance, and the roof material. The published figure is a surface-temperature test on ordinary combustibles: 36 inches above and beside the Pamapic; 24 inches above and 36 beside most Hiland models, 36 and 36 on others; the two Amazon Basics manuals disagree with each other (36 top / 24 sides on the US-spec unit, 39 / 20 on the EU-spec one), so keep the larger number. Bromic states the exception the others imply: material “with a low heat tolerance (such as plastic, vinyl siding, canvas…) may be subject to degradation at lower temperature.” A canvas pergola shade, a vinyl soffit and screen mesh are not what the number was tested on.

Electric is the class with no enclosure rule. NFPA’s outdoor-heater fact sheet carries ventilation and enclosure language for propane and none at all for electric — only that an electric heater be listed by a qualified testing laboratory, placed where it cannot be overturned, and not run on a permanent extension cord. Bromic rates its electric heaters for indoor and outdoor use. If the space has a roof and more than two walls, electric is the answer the rules support.

The Florida screen cage is the unresolved case, and we are going to say so. A pool enclosure is a roof plus four screened walls. Read literally, that fails the shelter clause on wall count. Whether insect screen counts as a “side wall” is a question no manufacturer manual, no NFPA document and no fire-marshal bulletin we could find has answered; the clause was written for solid walls. Florida does not use the International Fire Code — the Florida Fire Prevention Code is NFPA 1 with state amendments, enforced by the local fire official — and its relevant rule, NFPA 1 10.10.6.1, bans gas heating devices on balconies and under overhangs for other than one- and two-family dwellings, and limits propane above the first floor of an apartment or condominium to one pound. So a condo lanai is a hard no for propane. A single-family home’s own cage is your decision and your inspector’s, made without a manufacturer’s blessing. Our reading: an electric heater inside the cage, a propane heater on the open deck outside it, and never a cylinder stored in the garage.

Near the pool

Most of our readers’ patios wrap a pool, and the electrical code has a rule for that nobody quotes. NEC 680.27(C), Deck Area Heating, applies to a pool deck, covered or not, where electric comfort heaters are installed within 20 feet of the inside wall of the pool: nothing over the water or within 5 feet horizontally of the pool’s inside wall, and a permanently wired radiant heater — the Bromic class — mounted at least 12 feet above the deck unless the inspector approves otherwise. Most lanai soffits are 8 to 10 feet, which is why a hard-wired heater near a pool is an inspector conversation before it is a purchase. The code names only unit heaters and permanently wired radiant heaters in that 5-to-20-foot band; a cord-and-plug unit like the Dr Infrared is not on the list, which the handbook commentary reads as exclusion. Propane heaters fall outside Article 680 entirely; their manuals’ only water instruction is to keep the heater “away from windows, air intake openings, sprinklers and other water sources.”

What to know before you buy

• Three numbers on the box to distrust. The reach (measured results run roughly 40 to 70 percent of the claim, and listings use radius and diameter interchangeably). “Far infrared” on any heater that glows — a filament hot enough to glow orange peaks around 2 to 3 microns, medium-wave; a true far-infrared emitter would be too cool to see, so the reddish glow is unavoidable on any electric heater strong enough to warm you outdoors, and both premium makers describe it as a feature. And “IP65 weatherproof”: the IEC standard behind an IP rating tests dust and water jets and explicitly excludes UV ageing, corrosion and icing — the things that actually kill a heater left out all winter. Bromic, at ten times the price, rates its own unit IPX4 and says “weather resistant, but not water proof.”
• The pyramid’s glass tube is a consumable. One tube size is sold as fitting Fire Sense, Hiland, AZ Patio Heaters, Costco and a dozen other brands, and a reseller’s honest line is “one tip-over or impact and it shatters.” Some “quartz” tubes are borosilicate or plain glass, which chip and crack under thermal shock. If you buy a pyramid, price the tube.
• “Won’t stay lit” is usually not the wind. Owner forums rank the causes: a dirty or misaligned thermocouple first, a pilot orifice blocked by carbon or an insect second (“found a spider had blocked the orifice”), wind third. Both mushrooms and pyramids use the same flame-failure system, so this does not separate them — and remember that AZ’s warranty excludes insect damage by name.
• Register the warranty, and read the exclusions. Amazon Basics publishes no term on the listing; AZ/Hiland’s one year excludes rust, weather and animals; Pamapic’s one year reads as official-store only. Wirecutter’s line stands: very few models are guaranteed for more than a year.
• The cylinder never comes inside. NFPA 1 limits propane inside a home, including an attached garage, to 2.7 pounds a cylinder — a 20-pound cylinder cannot be stored in the house or garage, on a roof, or under the heater. When the heater winters indoors, the cylinder comes off first and stays out.
• Buy it before the cold snap, not during it. Every propane heater on this page has a critical tail led by arrival condition or a dead-on-arrival regulator, and every return window is shorter than the season. Assemble it and run it for an hour the week it arrives.

Bottom line: the box lies about reach on every class, propane is only the cheap fuel if you refill the cylinder, and the rule on roofs is in the manual everyone skips. Buy the Amazon Basics for open air, the Dr Infrared for a covered or screened space and two chairs, the Pamapic for the flame and not the warmth, the Cuisinart for one table with the adapter hose — and skip the 900-watt tube.

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