Top 5 Tiny House Heating Options for Winter Living - Off Grid & On Grid

We're sharing the best options for heating a tiny house, the pros and cons of each heat source, and the product links below if you want to learn more!

Thumbnail photo by Donald Lebel from Domaine Floravie. Domaine Floravie is an incredible tiny house resort on the shore of the St Lawrence River near Rimouski, Quebec. To learn more, visit their website here:

Choosing a heating option for your tiny house can be overwhelming. There are so many options out there! To start, you'll want to ensure you have a well insulated tiny house, and an HRV system (heat recovery ventilation) to ensure you're always getting fresh air in your house without losing precious heat energy.

Next, you'll want to use a BTU (British Thermal Unit) calculator to enter the climate and volume details for your tiny house so you can find out how big or small your heating system needs to be. At this point, it's a good idea to also decide if you want to be on the grid, off the grid, or have the ability to do both.

Once you have this information, you can start considering options like a wood stove or fireplace, a propane heater, electric baseboard or wall heater, a solar air heater, or in-floor radiant heat.

We've included links below for the heating systems we've seen used in tiny houses we've visited over the past few years. We're not sponsored by any of these companies.

EcoSolaris Solar Air Heater

Martin Propane Heater

Dickinson Marine Propane Fireplace

Envi Electric Panel Heater

Cubic Mini Woodstove

Morso Wood Burning Stoves

Electric Ceramic Wall Heater

Nu Electric In-Floor Heating

Lunos HRV (heat recovery ventilation)

Thanks for watching!

Mat & Danielle

PS thank you to all of our Patrons who support us so generously and a very special thank you to our backbone supporters: The Burgess Family!

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VIDEO CREDITS
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Music & Song Credits:
All music in this video was composed, performed, and recorded by Mat of Exploring Alternatives.

Editing Credits:
Mat and Danielle of Exploring Alternatives

Filming Credits:
Mat of Exploring Alternatives

[woomeebly]

Is that your house? I clicked because of the thumbnail. Its gorgeous. Saved to my happy campers playlist.

[jocelynelangis]

The main thing really is to put good insulation in the house. This is basic. After that it seems that we have a pretty good choice of options. Thanks for sharing those options.

[djc]

Please do more videos like this going over tiny home feature options! Like toilets, water systems, electric systems, other utilities. Thanks! Love the video

[HARE]

Thanks, Matt. This was very helpful and informative.
Every year my Korean wife and I spend some time in Korea, where they use radiant floor heating exclusively. It is super comfortable and trouble free. Wish we had it here in our house in Texas. Yes, we do occasionally have cold winters here in Texas!
Happy Camping

[cliffp.]

Very informative, precise, concise, organised and presented. I say that often and I mean every time, as I'm learning new things with each video.

[timothyoborsky]

One common cold weather feature for homes large and small a double door entry. Small space large heat loss out of doors just a thought. Perhaps a small three season porch turned mud room come cold weather.

[offgridjack]

If you have a propane heater, like the ones that hang on the wall, just leave the pilot light on and watch how much that makes a difference in the chill in your tiny house. Especially when you are gone.

[alexfaith]

This world needs to be more simple :) Love these videos

[cmc]

Great information!! Love my off the grid wood stove, your right about putting wood on at night!!
A lot of alternatives, good options!!
Thank you!!

[claudiaw]

Thanks for one of the best summaries I've seen of all the options!

[roypowell]

One thing that has been forgotten in the modern age is that heating with fire is best when there is a heat sink to soak up the heat while the fire is going, then give off the heat when the fire is out. 60+ years ago, fireplaces were made of large amounts of rock, brick, or cement. Today, lighter weight heat shields can be used as the heat sink that stores heat while you are awake keeping the fire going, then keep the space warm after you have banked the fire and gone to bed. I used to keep a 2000 SQ FT home heated all night with a good sheild that was placed behind my wood burning stove.

[alternatenutters]

We realize your reference here is to tiny houses on wheels and you have done an excellent job of covering the serious contenders, however for those who may be living in a somewhat larger tiny space, there is another option. We live off grid in a 400 sq ft cabin in Alberta and our main source for heat, hot water and cooking is our old kitchen cook stove, running on wood and coal. We supplement in the porch with propane heat at night, when the temps drop below -20 C but the cook stove heats the cabin very well and will produce significant heat for 10 hours on one fill of coal. There is never any need to stoke it through the night and our coal consumption is approx 2 tons / year, depending on the severity of winter. Current pricing here is $80 / ton, so a very affordable option for low budget living. Perhaps another option to consider for those headed down the tiny living road.
Thanks for all you do, we look forward to your every posting.

[CanMan-pdvh]

All the Heat recovery ventilation units i've seen are huge ! good to see a smaller sized unit.

[tomtompkins]

Your presentation put out a lot of very important information that will help people decide on what heating system to use thank you

[watcher]

Thanks for this nice comparison.
In the propane section you mention the extra task of changing bottles, procuring them and such. But that also applies to wood-burning of course. That's even more work since you have to keep filling the fire with wood, going outside to get more and such. Also the cleaning of the ashes the next day is an additional task with wood-burning.

[Marimilitarybrat]

I would really appreciate a similar presentation on options for heating water. I don't live in a tiny home but I live in a small, 1, 200ft hundred-year-old house in northeast Florida. Tiny homes inspire me to simplify and economize my lifestyle.

[sbrichcreek]

This was a great video. Please make another about toilet options and/or plumbing options in general. Thank you!

[canneux]

Very useful video. Very well explained when starting to plan. Thanks to Mat and Danielle.

[rosemarywilliams]

so much useful information. thank you for the video😊

[angela_burch]

Really great ideas and info. Thanks for sharing! 😊