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We sifted through the dense marketplace for the perfect electric blanket and purchased 8 of the best models to put to a head-to-head test. Our team of product experts created and executed an extensive testing plan so we can confidently say which blanket is worth bringing into your home. Our carefully selected performance metrics include each blanket's heat temperature range, comfort, controls, and washability. Our testers have cozied up and have found the best products to help you stay warm during your next Netflix binge or cold night's sleep.
Editor's Note: We updated our review on December 16, 2023, to provide alternative recommendations and offer different solutions to our existing award winners.
With soft sherpa on one side and micro plush fleece on the other, the Serta Super Soft Heated electric blanket is our favorite choice for relaxing at the end of the day or making the morning a little more bearable. With the reversible sides, this blanket is cozy, and the heating wires are not easy to notice when snuggled up underneath it. The controller for this blanket is simple: an on/off button and a heat setting button that moves an LED light to see the selected number.
The Serta lacks a few things, like the ability to adjust the auto-off timer. It only has five heat settings instead of the ten featured on many other models, limiting the user to larger increments in temperature settings. If temperature range and better adjustability are a must-have, check out the top pick Degrees of Comfort Full Size Electric Blanket. This heated blanket comes equipped with 20 different heat settings and an adjustable auto timer for up to 10 hours, ideal for accommodating a wide range of preferences.
Using a thermal gun to check the temperature of the Serta Super Soft Heated blanket.
Arrived with stained controller and cord from the red dye in blanket
The Woomer Electric Heated Throw is a great middle layer to go in between you and your comforter in bed. It is soft and thin, allowing it to fit under the comforter on your bed without adding any bulk, and the 4-hour auto-off timer means no rolling over half awake to ensure it's off. It can also make a great addition to your couch for those cold movie nights. It has a wide temperature range of 74˚ to 90˚, with even heating experienced throughout the blanket. The controller has only one button with four lights indicating heat intensity.
Things to note include that the dye from the blanket stained the controller and cord, so it will potentially stain other clothes if thrown in the wash together. The controller does not have a way to adjust the auto-off timer, so you either have to turn it off yourself or wait it out. There is also no indicator to see how much time is left on the timer. If avoiding wires is a high priority, the Perfect Fit SoftHeat has you covered. The wires on this blanket are virtually unnoticeable, making it ideal for those who would otherwise avoid a heated blanket due to bulky wires.
The red flannel Woomer Electric Heated Throw blanket with its easy-to-use remote.
The Degrees of Comfort electric blanket is the most evenly heated blanket in the review. During our temperature test, it experienced the least variation in temperatures throughout the blanket on each setting, meaning that your entire body will be warm with no cool or hot spots. Along with evenly heating, this blanket has an easy-to-use controller that includes a 1-20 heating range, a preheat setting, and a 1-10 hour adjustable auto-off timer. This wide range of customization allows each user to dial in the blanket to meet their needs. The controller's shape is nice, too, allowing the user to set it on an end table or nightstand.
Two things set this blanket back, the heating wires and the maximum temperature. While the fabric is comfortable, the wires running throughout the blanket are noticeable and can take away from the experience. Then we have the temperature range, which maxed out at 84˚ and is what most blankets experience on the medium setting. It was consistently heated evenly on each setting, though it didn't heat up enough to reach the heat of the others. For those who prefer a blanket with stronger heating capabilities the Sunbeam Royal Mink Reverse Sherpa Heated Throw is a worthy alternative. The sherpa and microfleece naturally provide better warmth characteristics to go along with its four adjustable temperature controls. It is ideal for those who need a blanket with the ability to heat up hot but still provide the flexibility of lower temperature ranges.
A close-up look at the Degrees of Comfort's well-made controller.
Size Options: 50" x 60" | Auto-off Timer: 10 Hours
REASONS TO BUY
Impressive heating capabilities
Large sizes have dual controllers
User-friendly controller
REASONS TO AVOID
Not as soft as others on the list
Can feel cords more in blanket
The Sunbeam Fleece Heated Blanket electric blanket has a straightforward dial control and a cord that has a locking feature, so when it's plugged into the blanket, the cord won't fall out. This blanket's temperature is warmer than others on the list, with even its low temperature being high at 83˚ with its high temperature at an impressive 94˚.
While this blanket has a simple design and impressive heating capabilities, it doesn't feel as soft as others and feels more like an old army blanket, stiff and wiry. It also doesn't heat very evenly throughout the blanket, with up to a 10˚ measured temperature difference at different locations. However, it is the only classic fleece blanket in the lineup that produces hot temperatures, so if you are looking for a hot blanket that isn't as fuzzy and plush, this one will do the trick. If you are looking for a heated blanket with maximum comfort perhaps the Serta Super Soft Heated is a better choice. The highest-ranked blanket in our comfort category, the Serta provides quality microfleece on one side and sherpa fleece on the other. It also does a great job of keeping cords concealed, leaving you unbothered and super cozy.
Here is the easy-to-use controller of the Sunbeam Heated Quilted blanket.
Credit: Bennett Fisher
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Relaxing under the Sunbeam Heated Quilted blanket with no worries of the cord ripping out due to the plug's locking mechanism.
Credit: Bennett Fisher
Why Trust GearLab
We sorted through the top-rated electric blankets available online, purchased the top eight options, and tested them to help you decide which blanket best fits your requirements. We created an extensive testing plan and graded each blanket on how well they executed each task. An electric blanket's main job is to keep you warmer than a traditional blanket, so our first test was to see how well the blankets heated up and how well they scaled to their highest temperature setting. Then we tested for comfort by having our team look at the softness of the fabric, how easy it is to feel the heating wires, and how thick the blanket is. Next, we assessed how easy it is to use the blankets' controls. We checked to see how many buttons needed to be pressed to accomplish a task and how the control fit in our hands. Finally, we looked at the colors available for each blanket so that you can find one to best match your home.
Our testing of electric blankets is divided across five different metrics:
Temperature Range (25% of overall score weighting)
Comfort (25% weighting)
Controls (20% weighting)
Wires (20% weighting)
Color Options (10% weighting)
Our lead tester, Bennett Fisher, is a product developer focused on human-centered design and evaluates each product the way the user would, implementing ideas expressed in the book The Design of Everyday Things by Don Norman. His primary focus is outdoor products, specializing in products like sun shirts and backpacking gear, but he has worked with composites and household items. Bennett has spent the past three years developing products, sourcing fabrics, and checking the quality of samples from manufacturers, which helps him create a strict testing plan and determine if a product is worth a top spot on our list.
We like leaving a heated blanket on the office chair so it can be nice and warm in the morning.
Here is the easy to use controller of the Sunbeam Heated Quilted blanket.
All the controllers lined up side by side.
Analysis and Test Results
Before kicking off our testing, we made a list of the most redeeming qualities of an electric blanket and used those elements to formulate our test plan. We created tests to evaluate the competition on different metrics, including temperature range, comfort, controls, wires, and color options, then scored and ranked each product. The overall top-scoring models have the best balance of these qualities.
What's the Best Value?
Many of the models in the review share features and are rather close in materials and comfort, but not all cost the same. The models that stuck out to us are well made, have a valuable controller, and feel softer than the rest. The Serta Super Soft offers great performance and solid value, as does the Woomer Electric Heated Throw, which are both sometimes offered for less than their manufacturer list prices.
Temperature Range
The purpose of electric blankets is to knock the cold out of your bed or keep you nice and toasty while watching TV, and we wanted to see how well each blanket did at heating up at each temperature setting. We laid each blanket out flat for this test and turned it to a third of its max temperature. After thirty minutes of warming up, we used an infrared thermometer to test five points on each blanket; the middle and each of the four corners. Then we used the numbers to get the standard deviation and the average temperature of the blanket for each temperature setting. We used setting 3, 6, and then 10/High for our controller settings. We used the standard deviation to determine even heating of the blanket.
The Woomer Electric Heated Throw offers the most even heating and widest temperature range. It offers temperature range of 74.5˚, 84˚, and 90˚, along with a standard deviation of 2.2˚. The Degrees of Comfort blanket had the lowest standard deviation at 1.7˚ but lacked maximum temperature, capping at around 85˚.
Using a thermal gun to check the temperature of the Serta Super Soft Heated blanket.
Credit: Bennett Fisher
The warmest blanket with the highest temperature capabilities is the Sunbeam Fleece Heated Blanket with a low average temperature of 83˚, a medium temperature of 86˚, and a high average temperature of 94˚.
Each blanket was compared directly to the others to find the most comfortable model.
Credit: Bennett Fisher
Comfort
One of the most important aspects of a blanket is how it feels against your skin and how it makes you feel cozy and comfortable. To rate each electric blanket's comfort, we looked at how easy it is to feel the heating elements, how soft the fabric is, and how thick the blanket is.
This metric's winner is the Serta Super Soft Heated, which features a soft microfleece on one side and a cozy sherpa fleece on the other. Having two side options adds a nice weight and conceals the heating cords, making for a cozy blanket with or without heat.
The three settings of the Sunbeam Royal Mink are shown on the glowing controller.
Credit: Bennett Fisher
Controls
The ability to pick up the controller and easily understand how to make the blanket warmer or change the auto-off time is essential. We took our first impressions and measured the time it took us to thoroughly understand the display to compare these controls. Less is more in this metric, and we liked the most simple and straightforward controllers to select the temperature setting and start heating easily. The more buttons it took to complete a task, the fewer points awarded. We also considered intended use, handheld or on a stand, and how smooth it felt to use.
The Degrees of Comfort is a bed-sized blanket with a preheat setting, a wide range of temperate options, and an adjustable auto-off timer. It was easy to use right out of the box, and its control can be operated one-handed when placed on your nightstand.
The Degrees of Comfort controller is flat and sits well on a nightstand.
Credit: Bennett Fisher
The smaller throw blankets meant for couch use with the best controllers are the Sunbeam Fleece Heated Blanket with an on/off button and a dial, and the Serta Super Soft Heated that has an on/off button and a heat setting button that moves an LED indicator around from 1 to 5.
It's hard to detect the Perfect Fit SoftHeat's wires at all, but this blanket is also one of the least warm we tested.
Credit: Bennett Fisher
Wires
The ideal electric blanket has more warmth than a normal blanket with the same amount of perceived comfort. While all the blankets in this review have wires running throughout them to distribute heat, a few contenders were more concealed than others.
The Perfect Fit SoftHeat has some of the least noticeable wires. Even though the Perfect Fit lives up to its SoftHeat name a little too well, producing an almost unnoticeable amount of heat, its heating wires are virtually invisible and can only be felt if you are searching for them.
Color Options
Whether it's your bedroom, sitting room, office, or living room, you have already chosen a color palette for the room. We like having the option to have our blankets and accessories match a room. Models with a wider variety of color and style options score well in this metric.
Here are the models in this lineup with five or more color options; the Beautyrest Zuri, the Serta Super Soft Heated, the Woomer Electric Heated Throw, and the Sunbeam Fleece Heated Blanket.
This Beautyrest model comes in several different color options to match your home.
Credit: Bennett Fisher
Conclusion
After sifting through the available electric blankets online, we purchased, tested, and scored the top models for this review. Our expert reviewers spent weeks trying and testing these electric blankets to determine the best. This lineup shows the top blankets with the best combination of performance qualities. Take advantage of our hard work and insider details to help make your shopping experience a little easier. If you are looking for a more targeted warming experience, see our picks for hand warmers and heating pads.
