Three averages, $57 apart
| Source | Range | Average |
|---|---|---|
| Fixr, January 2026 | $2,800 to $7,500 | $4,800 |
| This Old House, April 2026 | $1,600 to $10,000 | $4,799 |
| Bob Vila, January 2024 | $2,818 to $6,822 | $4,743 |
Three publishers, two years apart at the extremes, and $57 between the highest and lowest average by our subtraction. The first two are one dollar apart.
What makes this interesting rather than suspicious. If these were simply copied from each other the ranges would match too, and they do not: This Old House's low end is $1,200 below Fixr's and its high end is $2,500 above. Our reading, marked as ours: the averages are converging on something real, and the ranges differ because each publisher draws its boundaries in a different place. Budget against $4,800 and read the next section to find out where in the range you actually sit.
What decides your number: the fuel
Every source names fuel type as the biggest driver, and here they are close again:
| Fuel | Fixr | This Old House |
|---|---|---|
| Electric | $1,800 to $7,300 | $2,000 to $7,000 |
| Gas | $3,800 to $10,000 | $3,800 to $10,000 |
| Oil | $6,700 to $10,000 | $6,750 to $10,000 |
| Propane | $3,700 to $14,200 | not listed |
Gas, which both call one of the most common choices, is identical on both, $3,800 to $10,000. Oil is within $50 at the bottom and identical at the top. Electric is the cheapest on both. Propane is the outlier that only Fixr prices, and at $14,200 it tops everything else here.
This Old House adds that natural gas furnaces can cost an average of $6,900, which is well above the $4,799 average they publish for all furnaces.
The sizing table two publishers share
Both Fixr and Bob Vila publish a table matching home size to furnace size and cost. The cost column is identical in both, row for row:
| Home size | Cost installed (both sources) | BTUs, Fixr | BTUs, Bob Vila |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1,000 sq ft | $1,200 to $2,000 | 30,000 to 60,000 | 30,000 to 50,000 |
| 1,500 sq ft | $1,800 to $3,000 | 45,000 to 90,000 | 45,000 to 75,000 |
| 2,000 sq ft | $2,400 to $4,000 | 60,000 to 120,000 | 60,000 to 100,000 |
| 2,500 sq ft | $3,000 to $5,000 | 75,000 to 150,000 | 75,000 to 125,000 |
| 3,000 sq ft | $3,600 to $6,000 | 90,000 to 180,000 | 90,000 to 150,000 |
| 4,000 sq ft | $4,800 to $8,000 | 120,000 to 240,000 | 120,000 to 240,000 |
| 5,000 sq ft | $6,000 to $10,000 | 150,000 to 300,000 | 150,000 to 300,000 |
Our arithmetic, marked as ours, and it is worth knowing. That cost column is not a measurement. It is the home's square footage multiplied by $1.20 at the low end and $2.00 at the high end, exactly, on every single row of both tables. Check any row: 2,000 square feet times $1.20 is $2,400, times $2.00 is $4,000.
So the table tells you nothing the multiplication does not, and it takes no account of fuel type, which the same two pages call the biggest cost factor. A 2,000 square foot house is quoted $2,400 to $4,000 here, while the fuel tables above put a gas furnace at $3,800 to $10,000. Those barely overlap, for the most ordinary combination in American housing.
Our conclusion: use the fuel table, not the size table. The size table is a rule of thumb dressed as data.
A discontinuity in the BTU column
Look at the right-hand columns again. Fixr's upper BTU figure is consistently 60 BTU per square foot. Bob Vila's is 50 BTU per square foot up to 3,000 square feet, and then jumps to 60 from 3,500 upward, with no explanation given.
Bob Vila's own text says homes typically require 30 to 60 BTUs per square foot, and then gives the worked example of a 1,500 square foot home needing 45,000 to 75,000 BTU. That example uses 30 to 50, not 30 to 60, contradicting the sentence it sits in.
Why this matters more than the money. A 2,000 square foot house is told it needs up to 120,000 BTU by one source and up to 100,000 by the other. That is a different furnace, and an oversized furnace is not a harmless error: Fixr is explicit that a furnace that is too large cycles on and off rapidly, which tanks efficiency and can lead to premature breakdowns.
Fixr also notes what neither table includes: climate zone changes the BTU requirement substantially for the same square footage.
Heating and cooling are usually replaced together to share the labor, and our whole system page prices the pair. Keeping the furnace alive in the meantime is the maintenance page.
The alternative worth pricing at the same time
A heat pump does heating and cooling from one machine, which is why it belongs in this decision rather than after it. Our heat pump page puts a central one at about $8,000, and our central air page prices the cooling half on its own if you are replacing both.
What we would ask for in a quote
- Fuel type and the unit price separately from labor. The fuel table above is the one with real spread in it.
- The BTU rating, and how it was arrived at. If the answer is square footage times a number, that is the rule of thumb, not a load calculation.
- Efficiency rating. Every source treats it as a major driver; it is the main reason two gas furnaces differ by thousands.
- Whether the quote is a replacement or a first installation. The sources above price replacement.
If the furnace is not working at all, our furnace will not turn on page has the free checks, and if it runs but blows cold our cold air page narrows it down. If your furnace is still working and you are weighing repair against replacement, the figures on this page are the number to compare against, and our air conditioner repair page sets out the same arithmetic for the cooling side. The ducts the furnace blows through are priced separately again, on our air duct cleaning page. Each fuel has its own page now: gas, electric, propane and oil. Our heat pump vs furnace page compares the two machines directly, our furnace vs boiler page explains why that comparison is usually settled by the ducts you already have, and our lifespan page has how long each is expected to last. If your house is heated by water rather than warm air, the equivalent job is on our boiler replacement page, and the smaller faults on our boiler repair page, where the published averages turn out to mix repair with routine service.
Sources
- Fixr, Furnace Replacement Cost, updated January 28, 2026 (the $2,800 to $7,500 range, average $4,800, prices by fuel type and by home size with BTU ratings)
- This Old House, How Much Does a New Furnace Cost? (2026), updated April 3, 2026 (the $1,600 to $10,000 range, average $4,799, unit costs by fuel type)
- Bob Vila, New Furnace Cost, updated January 31, 2024 (the $2,818 to $6,822 range, average $4,743, the home-size table with BTU ratings)
Price figures are national US ranges from the sources above as of the date shown. Your local price depends on labor rates, permits and site conditions. Read how we get our numbers.