How much does a Quooker tap cost to run per day in the UK?
A Quooker tap costs about 6.3p a day just to keep its tank hot, because Quooker rates the standby loss at 10 watts and that adds up to 0.24 kilowatt hours over 24 hours at the Ofgem cap rate of 26.32p per kWh. Each litre of boiling water you draw adds about 2.6p, so a household using two litres a day spends roughly 12p a day and £42 a year.
What the tank actually draws
A Quooker is really two loads sharing one tap. Under the sink sits a vacuum insulated tank of water held at boiling point, with a heating element that does the real work whenever you draw water and a small continuous heat loss that the element keeps topping up the rest of the time. Quooker publishes both numbers on its tank specifications. The PRO3 tank, which holds 3 litres of boiling water, has a 1,600 watt element, and the larger COMBI tank has 2,200 watts because it also supplies hot water for the sink. Both are rated at 10 watts of standby, and Quooker's own comparison is that this is about the same as a Wi-Fi router.
Other boiling water taps sit in the same range. GROHE's specification sheet for the Red Duo tap with the M size boiler lists a 2,100 watt heater and 15 watts of standby, with 3 litres held at 99 degrees.
The standby figure is the one to watch, because it never stops. Ten watts running for 24 hours is 0.24 kilowatt hours, and at the Ofgem cap rate of 26.32p per kWh that is 6.3p a day whether anyone makes a cup of tea or not. Quooker's energy page describes it as 10 watts each day, which mixes up power and energy. The tank draws 10 watts all the time, so the energy it uses in a day is those 10 watts multiplied by 24 hours.
Work it out for your own boiling water tap
Type in the wattage from the plate on the back, then your own unit rate. The numbers update as you type.
Where the 3p a day figure comes from
A lot of advice online still says a Quooker costs about 3p a day on standby. That only works at an electricity price of 12.5p per kilowatt hour, well below today's cap rate. At 26.32p the same 0.24 kilowatt hours costs 6.3p, so a page quoting 3p is working from a tariff you cannot buy any more, and over a year the gap between the two is the difference between about £11 and £23.
What a day costs once you start drawing water
Every litre you take from the tank is replaced by cold mains water, and the element has to bring it back to the boil. Lifting a litre from 15 degrees to 100 takes 0.099 kilowatt hours, which is exactly what the same litre needs in a kettle, so each litre you draw adds about 2.6p to the standby.
| Boiling water drawn a day | Energy a day | Per day | Per month | Per year |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| None, standby only | 0.24 kWh | 6.3p | £1.92 | £23.06 |
| 1 litre, about four mugs | 0.34 kWh | 8.9p | £2.71 | £32.55 |
| 2 litres, drinks plus a pan of pasta | 0.44 kWh | 11.5p | £3.50 | £42.04 |
| 4 litres, a busy family kitchen | 0.64 kWh | 16.7p | £5.09 | £61.02 |
| GROHE Red at 15 W standby, 2 litres | 0.56 kWh | 14.7p | £4.46 | £53.57 |
The tank recovers quickly after a heavy draw. Emptying a PRO3 completely means 3 litres of fresh water to heat, which needs about 0.3 kilowatt hours and takes the 1,600 watt element around eleven minutes before any losses, at a cost of 7.9p.
| Appliance | Typical draw | Usage we assume | Per hour (UK) | Per usage (UK) | Per month (UK) | Per hour (US) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Boiling water tap | 10 W | per 24 hours kept hot, before any water is drawn | 0.26p | 6.3p | £1.92 | 0.18 cents |
Rates: Ofgem cap 1 October to 31 December 2026 at 26.32p per kWh (source), EIA residential average June 2026 at 18.34 cents per kWh (source). Checked 2026-09-22.
Quooker against a kettle
The heat that goes into the water is the same either way. A litre boiled in a kettle and a litre drawn from the tank both need 0.099 kilowatt hours, so the running cost difference between them comes down to what each one wastes.
The tap wastes its standby, 0.24 kilowatt hours a day. The kettle wastes whatever you boil and then leave in it. A mug needs 250 millilitres, but plenty of people fill the kettle to the top every time, and a full 1.7 litre kettle takes 0.168 kilowatt hours against 0.025 for the mug, so that habit pours away 0.143 kilowatt hours with every cup.
Put those side by side and the answer depends on the person holding the kettle. If you fill it to the line you need, the kettle is cheaper by the whole standby, about £23 a year. If you fill it to the top for a single mug two or more times a day, you are throwing away more heat than the tank loses, and the Quooker becomes the cheaper way to make tea.
The COMBI tank and your hot tap
The COMBI tank also feeds the ordinary hot tap at 40 to 60 degrees, and Quooker says that mixing gives you about 15 litres of hot water at 60 degrees on demand. That water is heated by electricity at 26.32p a kilowatt hour. If your house has a gas boiler, the hot water it sends to the same sink is heated by gas at 7.97p, so washing up from the COMBI rather than the boiler costs about 3 times as much for the same bowl of water.
Quooker rates the COMBI at just over 510 kilowatt hours a year on the tapping pattern set by the energy label regulation, which assumes you use it for warm water as well as boiling. At the current cap that is about £134 a year, so a COMBI used as the main hot tap in a gas heated home is a much bigger line on the bill than a PRO3 used for drinks and cooking.
Switching it off
Turning the tank off saves the standby and nothing else, because whatever heat leaks out while it is off has to be put back when you switch it on again. A cooling tank leaks heat more slowly than a hot one, so switching off always saves a little, but over a night the saving is a fraction of the 2.1p that eight hours of standby costs. It is not worth reaching under the sink for.
A holiday is a different matter. Two weeks away is 3.36 kilowatt hours of standby, about 88p, spent keeping water hot for nobody. Reheating a full PRO3 tank from cold when you get home costs about 7.9p, so switching it off at the socket before you leave is a clear saving.
Keeping the running cost down
- Draw only what you are going to use. The tap makes it easy to fill a mug or a pan to the exact level, and that precision is the one real saving it offers over a carelessly filled kettle.
- Run the washing up from the boiler's hot tap if you have gas and a COMBI tank, because gas heat costs about a third of what the tank's electric heat costs.
- Switch the tank off at the socket for any trip longer than a few days.
- Fill pans for pasta and vegetables from the boiling tap rather than bringing cold water up to the boil on an electric hob, since the tank's element sits in the water and loses very little heat to the kitchen.
Is it worth having on running cost alone
On electricity alone a Quooker costs about £23 a year more than a kettle used carefully, and less than a kettle filled to the top for every mug. That gap is small enough that the running cost should not decide the purchase in either direction. The price of the tap itself and the cost of its replacement filters are the numbers worth comparing before you buy, because over the life of the tank they will be far larger than anything the meter records.
Common questions
Is a Quooker tap cheaper to run than a kettle?
Usually not. The water costs the same to heat in either, about 2.6p a litre, and the tap adds 0.24 kilowatt hours a day of standby on top, which is £23 a year. The tap only comes out ahead for someone who fills the kettle to the top for a single mug two or more times a day, because that habit pours away more heat than the tank loses.
Do Quooker taps use a lot of electricity?
Very little once the tank is hot. The standby loss is 10 watts, about the same as a Wi-Fi router, which comes to 87.6 kilowatt hours and £23.06 a year. The 1,600 watt element in a PRO3 tank only works hard for a few minutes after you draw water, while it brings the cold refill back up to boiling.
Should I turn my Quooker off when I go on holiday?
Yes, for anything longer than a few days. A fortnight away costs 3.36 kilowatt hours, about 88p, to keep a tank hot that nobody is using, and reheating a full tank from cold when you get back costs about 7.9p. Switching it off overnight saves less than 2.1p and is not worth the trip under the sink.
How many watts does a Quooker tap use?
There are two figures and both matter. The heating element is 1,600 watts in the 3 litre PRO3 tank and 2,200 watts in the 7 litre COMBI, and it only runs while the tank is reheating. The rest of the time the tank holds its temperature on 10 watts of standby, which is the number that sets the daily cost.