It’s only a matter of finding a clothes dryer that fits your needs. So how do you do that? Well, first, you need to understand the basic types of dryers you’ll find on the market.

How to Find the Best Portable Clothes Dryer for Your Home

Even though using a dryer at the laundromat isn’t that expensive, the cost adds up quickly. After all, most people have to do multiple loads of laundry every week. But as we have established, a portable dryer could be a more affordable option.

If you’re in the market for a dryer, there are two basic kinds you’ll want to consider. On the one hand, you have portable clothes dryer racks, which are your standard metal laundry stands. With that type of product, the drying process will be lengthy, but at least your electrical bill will be minimal. Best of all, you’d be able to fold the rack and put it away when you’re not using it.

Features to Look Out for When Shopping for Electric Clothes Dryers

If you don’t have the space or patience to wrangle a traditional laundry rack, you could get an electric dryer instead. Those units are typically tumble or spin dryers, and they can even be a part of a portable washer and dryer combo. Oftentimes, those kinds of products require full laundry hookups. So if you don’t have any space to spare near a drain, you might want to opt for a product that doesn’t require a water hose.

Notably, when shopping for an electric dryer, you’ll want to keep the voltage of the appliance in mind. Typically, the units you’ll find online and in stores are either 110–120V or 220–240V. So your choice may depend on the kind of electric outlets you have in your home.

Additionally, you’ll notice that some of the products on the market are somewhere between a traditional rack and an electric dryer. For example, Panda’s portable clothes dryer comes with a tent that fully covers the pole rack and the heater under it, trapping the hot air inside. You can hang your clothes, close them in the tent, and set the timer for the heater.

If you tend to do larger loads of laundry, hybrid drying racks come in different sizes as well. While the one from Panda could only fit about 20 pounds of clothes at most, this one from MANATEE could dry as much as 33 pounds. Needless to say, the weight capacity of the product is another thing you’ll need to factor in before buying a portable electric clothes dryer.

What Portable Dryer Holds the Most Clothes?

Now, it’s time for the question of the day. How many clothes can you actually fit into one of these portable clothes dryers? More importantly, which of them can give you the most bang for your buck in that regard?

Since we already mentioned some numbers, let’s start there. When we say a dryer can handle about 20 pounds of clothes, what does that mean? Well, that can comfortably fit several pairs of jeans or some shirts and a few pairs of underwear. Granted, that’s not a lot, but it’s still perfectly adequate for a single person living alone.

Of course, centrifugal portable clothes dryers generally have a greater weight capacity. Rather than pounds, most of those products express their capacity in cubic feet. Small apartment units move in the 2.6–3.6 cubic feet range. A drum that size should be able to handle about 16 pounds of clothes.

Just remember that overloading centrifugal appliances could cause them to underperform. So when in doubt, make sure to leave some space for air to pass through the clothes. Alternatively, just get a narrow laundry rack or a hybrid portable clothes dryer instead.