Best Combi Boiler - Prime Time Boilers

Looking to upgrade your heating, but confused about which is the best combi boiler? Installing a new boiler isn’t cheap. So, you need to make sure that you pick the right installer, and the most suitable boiler for your property.

What Is A Combi Boiler

First, how do you determine you have a combi boiler?

There are several types of boiler setups, including:

Combi
System
Regular

Determining if you have a combi boiler is simple. Do you have a hot water storage tank, or cylinder connected to your boiler? If the answer is no, that’s a sure sign you have a combi. Combination boilers heat water on-demand. So, there’s no reason to store up water as you would with a regular or system boiler.

The Best Combi Boiler Brands

Now you’ve determined you’ve got a combi, there’s one more important consideration. Which are the best combi boiler brands? The problem with trying to determine the best combi boiler for your property, is that every property is different. One 3-bedroom property might have two showers, whereas another may have just one. You might have 5-bedrooms and 15 radiators, whereas another 5-bed could have 20+ radiators.

You get the point. No property is the same. And even when they are, the heat demand from the people inside can vary a great deal. Regardless of your property, our suggestion? Stick to only the best boiler brands on the market.

Why Use Premium Boiler Brands?

I know what you’re thinking – boiler engineers make more money off certain brands, and those are the ones they recommend. It’s the opposite that’s true. The more popular the boiler, the more expensive they are. But, the margin at local plumbing merchants is smaller, so boiler engineers make less.

So, why do we bother with these brands?

Well, it’s a combination of things:

Years of experience with all types of boilers in their range; a proven track record of reliability
Length of warranty
Support from technical staff
Availability of spare parts
Price is low on the list of priorities when you’re searching for the best combi boiler.

You could end up buying an inferior product, but saving yourself around 10% in comparison to something of high quality.

The problem? The boiler is only a small part of the overall boiler installation cost.

Most of the price is made up of:

Parts such as the flue, flue extensions, flue elbows and copper pipe
Gas main upgrades (where applicable)
Labour

And, what do you get in return? A budget boiler, known for its unreliability, with an incredibly short warranty.

Whenever looking for a new boiler, you should only use one from the best boiler brands offering large warranties, such as:

Ideal Boilers
Vaillant
Worcester Bosch

The Best Combi Boilers

We’ve already established that the best combi boiler, is property dependent. But, what ranges of combi should you be looking at, and why?

Ideal Vogue

Ideal Boilers are a British manufacturer, now producing over 10,000 units per year.

Their range is split into three core categories:

Logic Plus
Logic Max
Vogue Max

The Logic is at the low-end. It’s high-quality, but cheap. Problem? It only comes with a 7-year warranty. The Logic Max is the upgraded Logic, complete with a 10-year warranty. But due to the small difference in price, we like the Ideal Vogue Max. Ideal Boilers, with their Vogue Max, are one of the few boiler manufacturers to be offering a 12-year warranty.

Vaillant EcoTec

The Vaillant EcoTec is a sub-section of Vaillant’s range. And, it’s more complex than the entire Ideal Boilers range.

The EcoTec range includes boilers such as the:

Exclusive
Plus
Pro
Pure

The majority of the EcoTec range has a warranty of 5-years attached as standard. This can be increased to 7 or 10 years using a Vaillant Advanced Installer (like us), or upgrading using their warranty package. Like the Ideal Vogue, the EcoTec is A-Rated. And, that means you’re getting over 89% efficiency. So? When compared to a G-Rated boiler, this could lead to cost savings of up to £320 per year; gas and electricity combined.

Boiler Highlights

Worcester Bosch Greenstar I
Even if you’re not in the heating trade, it’s likely you already know of Worcester Bosch. They’re arguably the most popular and well-known brand, offering some of the best combi boilers. Their range is extensive, the warranty is long, and all their boilers are efficient.

With Worcester, the most popular range comes in the form of the Greenstar I.

The 25i and 30i for instance, are two of the best combi boilers for 2-4 bedroom properties. There’s certainly no denying that Worcester Bosch are one of the more expensive boilers on the market. So, why do customers choose them over the likes of Ideal and Vaillant? Well, it’s quite simple.

The price difference between Ideal and Worcester whilst reasonable, isn’t enough to sway customers who already know of and love Worcester. Many of our customers have boilers that are 15+ years old (that are also Worcester), and simply want to get the modern equivalent installed.

Then we come to Vaillant. Unfortunately for Vaillant, outside of the heating trade they’re not as well known as Worcester, and only slightly more known than Ideal. The problem? They cost nearly as much as Worcester Bosch boilers, and more than Ideal.

We’ve found that when given all three choices, most of our customers choose Worcester Bosch.

Our Top Pick For The Best Combi Boiler

When asked for our opinion, we always offer Worcester Bosch as our first recommendation.

We’ve had over a decade of experience with Worcester. Not only have we completed hundreds of successful installs, we regularly service the boilers we’ve installed.

And that means we get to see the condition they’re in over time. Which? confirmed Worcester Bosch as the top of the their “Best Combi Boiler” charts in 2017, for the 7th year running. And, that’s thanks to their 92% overall rating from consumers.

Combined with a warranty that’s up to 12-years when using an accredited installer, we think this is the brand that offers the best: