It is hard to imagine life without hot water; we rely on it for a variety of tasks around our house. Most homes rely on a traditional water heater for this purpose, but a more efficient alternative is a tankless or instantaneous water heater.

Traditional water heaters work by heating up water contained in a tank for later use whenever needed. There are a few downsides to this method of delivering hot water. For example, since the water in the tank needs to be kept hot at all times to be available for use, this is an energy drain. There might be extended periods of time where no hot water is being used, but the water heater needs to still run to keep the water at the required temperature.

A tankless water heater, on the other hand, will only turn on whenever a hot water tap is turned on. This way energy is used only at the time hot water is needed. The downside with tankless water heaters are that they will cost more to purchase, but this cost will be offset by the energy savings over time.