After living through Spanish summers in a flat without air conditioning, these are the heatwave habits I still swear by
When Britain starts melting, I always feel I’ve got one slight advantage: I used to live in Madrid, where summer regularly hit 40C-plus and air con wasn’t always part of the deal.
You learn very quickly what actually works when it’s that hot — and what doesn’t.
Some of it is obvious, like drinking more water and keeping the sun out. Some of it is trial and error. And some of it is the sort of thing you only start doing when you’re genuinely desperate to cool down.
But after living through Spanish summers in a flat without air conditioning, these are the heatwave habits I still swear by now the UK keeps lurching towards 30C and beyond.
Don’t open every window and hope for the best
This is the biggest thing I learnt in Madrid: once your home is already baking, you’ve left it too late.
In really hot weather, the trick is to air the house when the air outside is cooler than the air inside — usually early in the morning and later at night. Once the temperature starts climbing, shut things back down.
That means closing curtains, blinds and shutters in any room getting direct sun , especially south-facing ones. It can feel completely wrong if you’re desperate for a breeze, but if the air outside is hotter than the air in your house, all you’re doing is letting the heat in.
Go downstairs if you can
It sounds basic, but it makes a huge difference.
If you’ve got more than one floor, the downstairs is often the place to be. Heat rises, and upper bedrooms can become unbearable by late afternoon, while the lower part of the house can still feel vaguely survivable.
When I lived in Spain, people were ruthless about this. If one room was cooler, that was where you sat. You didn’t try to heroically carry on sweating upstairs just because that’s where the sofa was.
My least glamorous cooling trick genuinely works
This is one of those things that sounds ridiculous until you’re overheated enough to try anything.
If you cool your lower body quickly with cold water — whether that’s a bidet, a cool rinse, or even a cold flannel applied strategically — it can make your whole body temperature feel as if it’s dropped in seconds .
It’s the same principle as running cool water over your wrists or feet, but stronger. It’s not elegant. It’s not Instagrammable. But if you’re melting and need quick relief, it really does help.
A cool bath helps — but so can a warm one
If you’re absolutely roasting, a cool bath or shower is the obvious answer and it does work.
But one of the more surprising things I’ve found is that a warm bath can help too, especially before bed. Not because it cools you down in itself, but because when you get out into a slightly cooler room, the contrast can make the air feel dramatically fresher.
The key word here is warm , not boiling. You’re not trying to recreate a spa steam room in a heatwave.
Hydration is boring advice because it’s true
I know “drink water” is the least thrilling heatwave tip on earth, but it matters.
When I lived in Madrid, hydration wasn’t a wellness thing — it was just survival. If you’re sweating more than normal, you need to keep drinking throughout the day rather than waiting until you feel awful.
I always keep a bottle near me in hot weather, and I’m much more conscious of alcohol and too much caffeine too, because both can leave you feeling worse when you’re already dehydrated.
Cooling bedding can help — but only up to a point
I’m slightly sceptical of anything marketed as a miracle cure for hot weather, but I do think some cooling bedding and sleep products can make a difference at the margins.
Emma, Simba and Bedsure all do ranges of cooling products designed to help keep your temperature down at night, and I can absolutely see why people swear by them. If your room is just a bit too warm and you run hot anyway, a cooler-feeling pillow, topper or blanket can help take the edge off.
But I do think there’s a limit. If you’re already boiling, the bedroom is stifling and there’s no airflow at all , it can feel a bit like trying to solve a house-fire situation with a slightly colder pillowcase. Nice? Yes. Enough on its own? Probably not.
My best heatwave buy is technically for my dog
The thing I keep stealing in hot weather isn’t some luxury cooling blanket — it’s my dog’s cooling shee t that cost about a fiver from a pet shop.
Don’t worry, he’s not deprived of it — we have two.
But it’s honestly brilliant. Somehow it stays cool in a way wet towels and all the other soggy, clammy heatwave ideas just don’t. It doesn’t leave you feeling damp, it doesn’t warm up instantly, and if I’m really overheating I will absolutely lie on the dog’s cooling mat with no shame whatsoever.
Handheld fans are romantic in theory — less so in reality
I love the idea of a handheld fan because it reminds me of the Madrid metro, where there was always someone fanning themselves in a way that looked incredibly chic.
The reality is less glamorous.
After a while, vigorously fanning yourself just starts to feel like cardio, which is not what anyone needs when it’s 34C and the train’s delayed.
A small electric handheld fan is much better in my opinion because it does the work for you. I’ve got a Groov-e one that comes out every single time I’m on public transport or stuck in a boiling waiting room at this time of year, and I’m very fond of it.
But they’re not a miracle cure either. If the air around you is already hot and stale, a fan can just end up blowing warm air back at your face , which can make everything feel stuffier.
If you do want a fan, the running costs are thankfully not terrifying
If I was spending money on one thing in a heatwave, it would probably be a fan rather than going straight to air con — partly because they’re much cheaper to run.
I’ve looked at everything from the premium Dyson options to more straightforward pedestal fans and the newer smart circulator ones, and the good news is that even the pricier models are still relatively cheap to have on overnight compared with portable air conditioning.
For example, Dyson says its Cool CF1 uses 30 watts at maximum speed , which works out at roughly 0.8p an hour on current electricity prices, or about 6p for an eight-hour night .
If you go for a bigger tower fan such as the Dyson AM07 , that’s more like 56 watts — so around 1.5p an hour , or roughly 12p overnight .
A more traditional pedestal fan, like the sort Swan sells, is usually in a similar ballpark rather than wildly expensive to run. A typical 50W to 60W standing fan works out at about 1.3p to 1.6p an hour , so around 10p to 13p if you leave it on through the night.
And if you like the idea of a quieter smart fan, the SwitchBot Standing Circulator Fan is one of the cheaper ones to run. Reviews put it at 24W , which is only about 0.6p an hour — so roughly 5p for eight hours .
That’s why I think fans are worth being realistic about. They can make you feel much cooler, and they don’t cost a fortune to keep going. But they’re still moving hot air around rather than actually lowering the room temperature, so if your bedroom is already boiling and there’s no airflow at all, even a good fan can start to feel like it’s just wafting warm soup at you.
Fans cool
This is the bit worth remembering before you panic-buy anything in a heatwave.
A fan doesn’t lower the temperature of a room. What it does is move air over your skin so you feel cooler .
Sometimes that’s enough. Sometimes, especially at night, it absolutely is not.
If your bedroom has spent all day absorbing heat and now feels like a loft conversion in hell, a fan can help make it more bearable — but it won’t actually chill the room down.
Portable air con is the dream — but it’s the expensive dream
I completely understand the urge to buy air con the minute your bedroom becomes uninhabitable.
And to be fair, portable air conditioning does do something a fan can’t: it can actually bring the room temperature down.
But there are a few catches.
First, it’s much more expensive to run than a fan. A standing or tower fan is generally pretty cheap to leave on overnight. Portable air con is not. Depending on the unit, you can easily get into the territory of tens of pence per hour , and much more over a run of hot nights.
Second, portable units are often noisy, bulky and need proper venting out of a window, which is not always as straightforward as it sounds in a British bedroom.
So yes, air con can be brilliant — but I’d treat it as the bigger, pricier option rather than the automatic answer.
The biggest lesson I learnt in Spain cost absolutely nothing
The truth is that most of the habits that got me through 40C Madrid summers were free.
Shut the sun out before it gets in. Open the house at the right time. Move downstairs if that’s the coolest place. Drink more water than you think you need. Cool your body, not just the room.
And if all else fails, do not underestimate the power of sitting in the darkest part of the house with a cold flannel, a fan pointed in your general direction, and absolutely no intention of moving until September.
