Is Your House Warmer Upstairs Than Downstairs?

GrahamF · 2025-11-06T15:35:37Z

We are running our heat pump with weather compensation and a room thermostat set at 20C in the hall. In the last 24 hours, the temperature has mostly been very close to 20C. It dropped to 19.7C after the overnight hot water cycle and had just a few blips as high as 20.5C. We have a wide staircase and quite a large landing. We leave all the bedroom doors open all the time, including at night. All the bedrooms have wide open TRVs. The bedroom radiators do not have FRVs and the lockshield valves may be fully open. We are finding that all the upstairs rooms are running at about 21.5C - i.e. 1.5C warmer than the downstairs thermostat. We all know that hot air rises, so maybe this is just a natural result of convection? I am wondering whether the upstairs radiators may have more water flow than they need. Therefore, I am considering installing FRVs in the bedrooms as a way to gently reduce the upstairs temperature and hopefully energy consumption. I am interested to find out whether other people's systems have a similar temperature difference between upstairs and downstairs.

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JamesPa

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10/11/2025 10:22 am

Posted by: @toodles

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@jamespa (Thinks) I wonder if this is a reason for people living in ‘upside down’ houses? The sleeping areas are downstairs and living spaces upstairs. Toodles.

I suspect its mainly that you get the views.

Upstairs too warm is going to become something of a problem as insulation gets better, particularly given the trend for open plan. Over on Buildhub there are several threads where people have built with passivhaus levels of insulation and are contemplating not putting heating upstairs and/or having problems with the upstairs being too warm. MVHR could stir it up of course.

4kW peak of solar PV since 2011; EV and a 1930s house which has been partially renovated to improve its efficiency. 7kW Vaillant heat pump.

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