Space heater marketing makes bold promises: this technology heats better, that one is more efficient, this one saves money on your bills. It leans on words like ceramic, infrared, micathermic, and convection as if they were different amounts of warmth. Here's the physics that the marketing would rather you didn't apply: an electric resistance space heater converts essentially all its electricity into heat, so two heaters drawing the same wattage put out essentially the same amount of heat. A 1500-watt heater is a 1500-watt heater. What you're actually choosing between is not how much heat, but how it's delivered, controlled, and how safe it is.
Why wattage, not technology, sets the heat
Electric heating is close to 100% efficient at turning electricity into heat — there's nowhere else for the energy to go — so the heat output is set by the power drawn, and most plug-in space heaters top out around the same standard maximum wattage. This means the "more efficient, warmer" claims between same-wattage electric heaters are largely marketing: they're all turning the same watts into the same heat. The differences in the technologies are about how the heat is distributed and felt — how quickly, how directionally, how evenly — not about producing more warmth from the same power or magically costing less to run for the same heat. Same watts in, same heat out.
Why the heat-output claims persist
Because "produces more heat" and "more efficient" sell better than the honest "delivers the same heat differently," and because the technology names sound like they ought to mean different amounts of warmth. So marketing competes on implied heat superiority that the physics doesn't support, and buyers pay for warmth claims that all same-wattage heaters meet equally. The real decisions — thermostat, safety, type of warmth — get less attention than they deserve.
The takeaway
Stop comparing space heaters on claims of superior heat or efficiency — at the same wattage they all produce essentially the same warmth, because electric heating is nearly fully efficient and the watts set the output. Choose instead on what actually varies: a good thermostat (the real route to lower running cost), solid safety shutoffs, the type of warmth that suits how you'll use it, plus size and noise. The technology names are mostly about delivery and feel, not amount. Buy the controls and safety, not the heat-output marketing, because the heat is the same.