$159.00 AUD
$46.95 AUD If you have an aquarium, chances are you will need to purchase an aquarium heater at some point, especially when winter weather rolls in.
Not all aquarium heaters are the same, so it is important to choose the right one for your needs. There are several factors to consider when selecting an aquarium heater, including the size of your aquarium, the wattage you’ll need, the type of fish you have, and of course your budget.
An aquarium heater is a device used to heat water in an aquarium. The heater may be used to maintain a constant temperature in the aquarium or to raise the temperature of the water. As we know, fish use water to regulate their own body temperature. With a number of aquarium fish being tropical, they require constant warm water. When cooler temperatures in our environment roll around, keeping the water temperature warm keeps them healthy and stress free.
Before you can work out what the right heater is, having the answers to these two things is very important. So you’ll need to ask yourself and work out:
Both of these things will need to be answered before you can work out which size heater is going to work best for your aquarium.
It is important to know how many litres your tank is not just so you can work out your aquarium heater size, but being accurate when adding or dosing items like medications and de-chlorinators for your fish.
To work out how big your tank is you can simply do the following for your tank:
Multiply in centimetres the width by the height by the length then divide by 1000.
Also keep in mind that you will be best to measure to the waterline rather than the top of the tank when working out how much water is in the tank.
We've made this easy for you to calculate simply with our Aquarium Calculator.
Having an accurate litre volume for your tank will go a long way in helping you know which heater is going to be able to perform best for your aquarium.
Now that we have the tanks’ size in litres, we’re able to understand the wattage that we require for an aquarium heater. Wattage is a power consumption and some heaters are more efficient than others but just so we can use a practical guide of generally needing 1 watt per litre
If your tank is 300 litres then as a starting point you will want at least a 300 watt heater but this is not all to consider.
When working out what size heater is going to be most effective, we need to also consider your room temperature. The coldest point of the room can be found at 5am in the morning as a guide.
When you're selecting a heater, knowing the coldest point the room gets is important as if it's more than 5 degrees colder than your set heater temperature, going off the products guide isn’t going to be as effective.
For example if you set the heater at lets say 27 degrees and the ambient room temperature gets more than 5 degrees cooler than the heater setting, it is going to struggle and be too small. Getting a higher heater that will easily reach your required water temperature should be considered.
When it comes to selecting a specific type of heater to use, there are a number of pros and cons that might make certain heaters more appropriate to your aquarium. We’ll take a look at popular types below.
Electronic heaters use a microchip controlling the switching of heating the electronic coil. Electronic heaters are a more recent advancement in heaters and seem to present a more accurate reading and switching on and off. Traditionally, heaters have used two elements that expand and contract depending on temperature. Over time due to the constantly heating and cooling they can tend to lose their accuracy over time.
Unbreakable aquarium heaters are extremely practical, especially when children will be involved in caring for an aquarium, because unexpectedly, they don’t break! If water levels drop to a certain level, these heaters won’t shatter. They simply turn themselves off and turn back on when the water level comes back up, an extremely smart & useful piece of equipment to have in your setup.
Inline heaters are the perfect solution for people who don’t want to use so much equipment inside their tanks. These heaters are different in that they aren’t on display, and are hidden underneath the aquarium. Inline heaters are used in combination with canister filters. With water passing through a heating element and back through the canister hose, heated water passes into the tank. These are effective in reducing clutter inside your tank.
Another super useful accessory you should consider when getting a heater for your tank is a temperature alert. Although we don’t want to think about the worst happening, aquarium heaters can fail. When your heater dies, it often means your fish die along with it. For a small investment, temperature alerts are a great preventive measure. An alarm will go off when something goes wrong, and you can be right on it and stop a fish tragedy from happening.
With a couple of considerations and research, choosing the right heater for your aquarium doesn’t need to be difficult. With a huge variety of aquarium heaters on the market and stocked here at The Tech Den, you can find the perfect aquarium heater for your fish tank. We hope this guide has helped you with your research on selecting the right heater for your tank.
