Has anyone had air conditioning installed in their house?

[twiddlingthumbs69]

If so, how much was it, who installed it, how much disruption did it cause, how many wall units did you have and does it work well?

Any tips to be aware of?

seriously considering as, although I have a portable AC unit, it’s only sufficient for one room.

I don't yet, but I am very much considering it. I am looking at a split unit and have narrowed it down to one external fan that will power two internal coolers. That way I can do the living room and the bedroom. I want one that heats as well so that I can use it in the winter to heat just those rooms too.

Daikin are my favoured make currently.

Yes, that’s exactly the set up I’m looking at. Hopefully someone can give us some advice

We were going to but it came in about £5 k for two rooms. Also the unit outside was big and we could only have it positioned at the front of the house. Paid and got some expensive fans instead. Plus we just drop the shutters on the windows when the sun is on them

I’m considering the same, too - especially if we can find one external fan to power two internal units, as our bedroom is above the living room. My office is on the other side of the house where we don’t have space to house the external units and still allow us to use the path. But I can happily decamp to the living room on hot days, as I have had to today. We’ve got temps of a shade under 30 degrees upstairs now. It’s not sustainable any longer as this trend will clearly continue.

Yes, I had aircon installed in all our bedrooms when we did a whole home renovation which completed in Feb 2025 - and boy do I feel smug now. Feel free to MP me.

Is it noisy?

What structures have to be installed and where?

Could a different solution involve shutters and fans etc.?

I had one installed last September. In our bedroom only. It’s v quiet. You need a unit outside. Had a portable before. Ours is Mitsubishi.

It’s like night and day. Can sleep and wake refreshed.

Think it cost between 1-2k inc installation?

Im used to work for an AC company, we installed and repaired pretty much every brand of unit and the systems can be tailored to you needs much more than you think
Firstly, all domestic installations are VAT free so dont let them overcharge you
Secondly, all AC units also heat and its generally much more fuel efficient
@HappiestSleepingDaikin are by far the worst units, constant PCB issues and a nightmare to claim under warranty, generally poor quality, I know plenty of engineers that will refuse to install Daikin because they're constantly getting called back to the job
Also, you absolutely do need to have them serviced, atleast yearly, the crap that builds up in them is vile. Not only does it stop the units working properly, its really not the sort of stuff you want blown all over you.
Id highly recommend Midea, great quality and have a 10 year warranty subject to servicing. Mitsibishi Electric are definitely the best but much more expensive

Midea also do a multi split system for up to 5 indoor units with 1 outdoor

My parents have heat pump room heaters that double as AC. Will they turn the things on?

It’s absolutely worth it!!

I have two units, one in the living room and one in the master bedroom. It’s enough to keep the whole house from overheating. Eg upstairs there’s currently 20 C in the master bedroom and 23 C in other bedrooms.

I got energy-saving Mitsubishi units. Don’t go for the cheap option as you will pay the difference in electricity bills anyway.

I just found a local air con installer on google maps and he ordered the units, then came to install them. It took him a full day for two units and he came back the next morning to test them and leave all instructions etc.

For each set there is one unit inside and one outside. The guy drilled a hole through the wall to connect them. It’s worth considering where you would place them, it might be tricky in a terraced house as you would see the outside units from your garden. I’m in a semi so just have them on the side of the house, out of sight.

I paid £3500 for the two units and labour. I also had to get an electrician to install two 9amp breakers outside by the units, which are connected to the fuse box. You will need a spare fuse in your fuse box for the air con ideally. The electrician charged something like £400. I’m in south west London.

You can use air con for heating in winter and apparently it’s cheaper than heating with gas and radiators. It’s perfect when you want the living room to be warm for an hour in the morning while you’re getting ready for work - very useful when I’m dressing my toddler in the morning. Central heating takes ages to raise the temperature and with air con it’s a matter of minutes.

I haven’t regretted getting air con for a second. My husband was very sceptical but now even he keeps saying it was a great idea. I’m 8 months pregnant now and this air con is literally saving my life. I wouldn’t get any sleep without it. I’m shielding at home in 20 C

Yes we had it installed a few years ago in our 2nd floor bedrooms. It works like a dream. My baby sleeps in the same bed clothes and bag he used in winter, we keep it at 20degrees. We have 2 bedrooms on the second floor and they share the same external thing. We have Panasonic. It cost £5.5k. We had a garden room made a few years ago and stupidly got underfloor heating but decided against air con. We’re now getting it installed as we have gym equipment as well as a home office out there… needless to say it’s impossible to work out at the moment.

How loud are these from the outside?

@PaleBlueEnglishRose- I can’t parse your photo, is the box on the wall or the ceiling?

we don’t sleep in the air con though… I’m fine with a fan on the 1st floor.

My Mitsubishi ones are just humming quietly, definitely not noisy

We had 4 internal units installed 4 years ago - they all connect to one external unit (we're in a conservation area, and could install a single external unit without planning permission). It was £6k including installation, which took 2-3 days. You also need a modern consumer unit (fuse box) - we had to have ours replaced, as the previous one didn't have any spare slots (and used fuse wire).

There's a low rumble from the external unit, but quieter than the traffic on the road. The internal units are much quieter than a fan. We do run them through the night, and if anything they're too quiet!

They also heat, though we haven't tried heating the whole house with them when it's properly cold (we already had central heating, which as it's gas, is cheaper to run).

Is there a lot of pipework involved, and if so, do you find it intrusive? What about electric cabling?

I really want it installed in our house, but I don't think we have enough external wall space in the rooms, to be able to mount the units 😟

Yes. Two units, one in bedroom and one in lounge. Total cost including electrics under £4K. Worth every penny; I am disabled and can't regulate my body temperature. One line of external trunking (nothing inside) and external hardware behind chimneybreast so not visible from road.

We have it, in two bedrooms but the outside unit would support another two rooms. It’s very quiet on the outside, no real noise inside. We sleep with it on all night

I am tempted!

How big are the units that are on the outside of the house?

Almost no visible pipework inside - ours mostly runs though the loft. There's some outside, but down the side of the house, which isn't somewhere we spend any time.

The outside unit is pretty large (1m by 1m by 30cm ish). It's also down the side of the house (not somewhere we spend any time).

One of our units has to be pumped. The pump we had initially was somewhat noisy. It broke, which turned out to be a blessing in disguise, as its replacement is much quieter.

One piece of advice: when choosing units, get ones which can officially cool more space than you have. We did that at home. Sadly my employer went for the minimum, so we're all working at home this week.....

Excellent replies and very informative, thank you. I’m in a 3 bed semi so having the external one on the outside wall wouldn’t be a problem. Only thing that does concern me a bit is, downstairs we are completely open plan with the stairs open as well. I’m assuming in that case two down and one up would be prudent.
Interesting on price as well. £5k+ is not totally out of budget and for comfort it’s got to be worth the price.

Did anyone use a national firm to install or were they more local to you?

Can anyone recommend a company in London? We had one quote but it was £££££

We've had Daikin units for almost a decade now. No problems at all. We chose a local company who included free servicing for the first 2 years and promptly went bust just after installation was completed! Another local company has serviced them ever since. The units have a quiet setting which we use overnight - the auto setting can be loud as it goes max fan to try and cool quickly! There are 5 fan speeds but we use auto to cool the room before bed and the quiet one overnight. The aircon and water softener are the best things we've done!

Mine was approximately £1.1k per room. 5 rooms total. Worth every single penny.

We've got LG wall units and whisper-quiet external unit. Can control the units individually via an app. Also handy in winter as they double as heaters, so you can warm eh your home office without having to put central heating on everywhere