Review · Compact ceramic
A shoebox-sized ceramic heater that lets you ask for 70°F and switch itself off three hours later. At this size that is unusual.
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The Honeywell HCE220B UberHeat Plus is a 1,500 W ceramic heater the size of a shoebox, with two heat settings, four preset temperatures (65, 70, 75 and 80°F), a 2/4/8-hour auto-off timer, a tip-over switch, two independent overheat mechanisms and a cool-touch housing. It weighs 2.8 lb.
Almost every heater in this size and price class ships with a thermostat that is a dial marked from a snowflake to a flame. You turn it up until the heater runs, then back it off until it clicks out, and tomorrow when the weather changes you do it again. It works, it saves money compared with no thermostat at all, and it never tells you what temperature you actually asked for.
The HCE220B publishes four preset comfort levels — 65°, 70°, 75° and 80°F. That is not a full range and we will come back to that, but it is a number you chose rather than a position on an arc, and on a heater this cheap it is genuinely unusual.
It also publishes a 2, 4 or 8 hour auto-off. A timer on a small heater matters more than it does on a large one, because small heaters live on desks and bedside tables and are exactly the ones people leave running. A heater that stops by itself after four hours has saved you four hours of running, and running hours are the only variable that changes your bill.
Honeywell publishes three things by name, and the middle one is more than most makers offer:
Top pick · A thermostat with numbers on it, on a small heater
A shoebox-sized ceramic heater that publishes four preset temperatures and a 2/4/8-hour auto-off — specificity almost nothing else this size offers.
| Published specification | |
|---|---|
| Rated power | 1,500 W maximum at 120 V |
| Heat settings | 2 (high and low) |
| Thermostat | Four preset comfort levels — 65°, 70°, 75° and 80°F |
| Auto-off timer | 2, 4 or 8 hours |
| Safety | Tip-over switch; 2x overheat protection (high-temperature sensor plus a thermal cut-off fuse); cool-touch housing |
| Size | 8.5" x 4.5" x 8.86", 2.8 lb |
| Warranty | 3-year limited |
| Heat type | Ceramic (PTC) |
| Maker’s coverage claim | None published — the coverage figure above is ours |
| Safety listing | Honeywell does not publish a UL or ETL mark for this model; it does publish two independent overheat mechanisms. Check the rating plate. |
Who it is for
A small office, a bedside table or a desk, where the heater needs to hold roughly a known temperature and switch itself off after a few hours.
What it is not for
A large or drafty room, and not a nursery — no child lock is published and the presets are reachable by anyone who can reach the unit.
Sources for this entry
This is the part that surprises people. The HCE220B is 8.5 by 4.5 by 8.86 inches and weighs less than three pounds, and it draws the full 12.5 A of any other plug-in heater. Small does not mean low-powered in this category — the wattage is set by what a wall outlet can deliver, not by the size of the box.
| Heater | Draw at 120 V | 15 A circuit (12 A limit) | 20 A circuit (16 A limit) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1,500 W | 12.5 A | Over the limit | Fits |
| Maximum continuous | — | 12 A = 1,440 W | 16 A = 1,920 W |
Draw computed as watts / 120 V. The continuous limit is 80% of the breaker rating, which follows from the NEC's requirement to size a circuit at 125% of a continuous load (NFPA 70, 210.19(A)(1) and 210.20(A)).
Which means the circuit arithmetic is exactly the same as it is for a 30-inch tower: 12.5 A against a 15 A circuit's 12 A continuous allowance, so it is over the limit on its own before the desk lamp and the computer are counted. A heater being small is not a reason to relax about what else is on the breaker. The full arithmetic.
| Room size | Watts needed | BTU/h | Plug-in heaters |
|---|---|---|---|
| 100 sq ft | 1,000 W | 3,412 | 1 |
| 150 sq ft | 1,500 W | 5,118 | 1 |
| 200 sq ft | 2,000 W | 6,824 | 2 (different circuits) |
Computed as square feet x 10 W x insulation factor x (ceiling / 8 ft), for an average heated room — 10 W/sq ft, 8 ft ceiling. Heater count assumes the 1,500 W plug-in ceiling.
About 150 sq ft at 10 watts per square foot with average insulation and an 8-foot ceiling. Honeywell publishes no coverage figure, so that number is ours. In practice this unit is bought as a personal heater rather than a room heater, and at that job the presets matter more than the coverage does.
| Wattage | Per hour | 1 h | 4 h | 8 h |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1,500 W | 27.5¢ | $0.28 | $1.10 | $2.20 |
Computed at 18.34¢/kWh — the U.S. residential average for June 2026 (EIA, Electric Power Monthly, Table 5.6.A, released August 26, 2026). Your rate is on your own bill; substitute it and the arithmetic still holds. Figures assume full output for the whole period.
27.5 cents an hour at full output, identical to every other 1,500 W heater here. Where this one can genuinely cost less is the combination of a preset it will hold and a timer that ends the session: set 70°F and a four-hour auto-off and the element runs for a fraction of those four hours rather than all of them.
The rate behind every figure on this site
18.34¢per kilowatt-hour
U.S. residential average for June 2026. EIA, Electric Power Monthly, Table 5.6.A, released August 26, 2026.
This is the most recent month EIA has published. Residential rates move seasonally and vary enormously by state — from roughly a dime per kilowatt-hour in parts of the South to more than 40¢ in Hawaii — so treat it as a national reference point, not as your rate.
Four fixed temperatures is better than an unmarked dial and worse than a real set-point. If you want 68°F you are choosing between 65 and 70 — one of which will feel slightly cool and the other slightly warm, and there is nothing in between. In a small room, where a 1,500 W heater overshoots quickly, that granularity is more noticeable than it would be in a large one.
If setting an exact number matters to you, a unit with a true digital thermostat is the upgrade — the thermostat roundup has units that set to the degree. If it does not, four presets and an auto-off will do the job for a third of the price.
And what we did not do: we have not tested these units, owned them, measured them or run them in a room. Everything above is compiled from published manufacturer specifications and live retail listings, with the electrical load, room coverage and running cost computed by us from the published wattage. The full method.
1,500 watts maximum at 120 V, with two heat settings. That is the ceiling for any U.S. plug-in heater, so it produces the same heat as a full-size unit — about 5,118 BTU per hour — despite weighing 2.8 pounds.
Four presets: 65, 70, 75 and 80°F. It is not a full range — if you want 68°F you are choosing between 65 and 70 — but it is a number you selected rather than a position on an unmarked dial, which is unusual at this size and price.
Yes, two ways. It publishes an auto-off timer with 2, 4 and 8 hour options, and it has 2x overheat protection — a high-temperature sensor and a thermal cut-off fuse — plus a tip-over switch that cuts power if it is knocked over.
Honeywell does not name a UL or ETL mark for this model in its published specification. It does publish a tip-over switch, two overheat mechanisms and cool-touch housing. Check the rating plate on the unit, particularly if a lease or insurer requires a listed heater.
Honeywell's UberHeat line continues as the UberHeat 5 (HCE210) and the UberHeat Plus (HCE220). The Plus reviewed here is the closer successor on features — it adds four preset temperatures and a 2/4/8-hour auto-off that the HCE200W did not have.
Shoebox-sized, 1,500 W, with a published tip-over cutoff — and a dial you cannot set to a number.
Desk-side picks with a low setting, plus the circuit-load problem an office heater creates.
For rooms under 150 sq ft, where 1,500 W is oversized and the thermostat is what actually matters.
The only feature that actually cuts the bill, because it is the only one that turns the heater off.
Tip-over, overheat, cool-touch and child lock — four mechanisms, four different failures prevented.
The default type, and usually the right one. Four picks, and the rare coverage claim that survives the math.