What Temperature to Set Your Thermostat in Winter: 68°F, Then Lower at Night

Set your thermostat to about 68°F in winter while you are home and awake. If you heat with a furnace or boiler, set it 7–10°F lower while you sleep or are away. The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) says that setback can save as much as 10% a year on heating and cooling.² Two exceptions: a heat pump does best at one steady setting, and a home with older adults should stay at 68°F or warmer.

Below: what DOE and ENERGY STAR say, what a night setback saves in 20 US cities, and the floors for heat pumps, pipes and health.

Winter thermostat settings at a glance

What DOE and ENERGY STAR actually say

Many top results credit “68°F” to DOE, and that was its wording for years. Archived copies of its Energy Saver thermostat page say “around 68°F” while awake through January 2023;³ by January 2024 the sentence read “around 68°F to 70°F,” and it stayed that way until the page went offline. It returned 404 when we checked on October 7, 2026, so we cite the archived copy of July 1, 2026.² DOE’s video still says about 68°F,⁵ and a live DOE Office of Indian Energy article repeats the rule: 7–10 degrees lower for 8 hours a day while you are away or asleep.⁴

ENERGY STAR’s heating and cooling guide (2009) gives a schedule: below 70°F at 6 a.m. and 6 p.m., and a setback of at least 8°F at 8 a.m. and 10 p.m.⁷ Today it points to certified smart thermostats, which can learn your schedule and drop to energy-saving temperatures when you are asleep or away.⁸

A setback saves because a cooler house loses heat more slowly. DOE calls the idea that the furnace “works harder” to warm back up a misconception.² It adds a detail most guides skip:

The percentage of savings from setback is greater for buildings in milder climates

How much a night setback saves where you live

DOE gives no numbers by climate, so we estimated them. Heating need tracks heating degree days (HDD): each degree the day’s average falls below 65°F adds one.¹⁶ The 65°F base is the usual stand-in for a house kept near 68–70°F; turn the thermostat down 8°F and the house needs heat as if the base were 57°F. NOAA’s 1991–2020 normals publish HDD at both bases for each station,¹ so for 8 hours a night:

Share saved ≈ (8 ÷ 24) × (HDD at 65°F − HDD at 57°F) ÷ HDD at 65°F

Dollars use the example home and prices from our heat pump vs. furnace cost guide: 12 million Btu of heat per 1,000 HDD, a 95% efficient gas furnace, and EIA’s 2025 residential gas price for each state.¹⁵

DOE’s milder-climate point holds: the share saved runs from 7.8% in Fargo to 15.7% in Atlanta and 25% in Phoenix, where 8°F wipes out most of the heating need on many nights. Dollars don’t follow. Phoenix saves a quarter of a $198 bill, about $50; Minneapolis saves 8.5% of $1,031, about $87. Boston saves the most, about $193, because Massachusetts gas is the priciest in the table.

These are upper-end estimates: a real house cools slowly after the setback starts, and the model ignores the extra cold of night hours. Use the table to compare climates, not to forecast a bill. The last column shows what each degree lower all day saves: about 4% in Chicago, 3% in Fargo, 6% in Atlanta.

How low to go at night

From 68°F, DOE’s 7–10°F setback means 58–61°F; ENERGY STAR’s “at least 8°F” means 60°F or lower. Neither names one sleeping temperature. The “65°F at night” some blogs credit to DOE is not on its page, and we found no US agency source for the 60–65°F “sleep range” either. Pick the lowest setting you sleep comfortably at, within these floors:

• Older adults: the National Institute on Aging advises at least 68°F (see below).
• Renters in New York City: the city’s heat law makes landlords keep apartments at 68°F or more from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m. when it is below 55°F outside, and at least 62°F overnight, from October 1 to May 31.¹⁰ Other cities set their own rules.
• Foggy windows: a cooler room raises relative humidity, so air at 40% in a 68°F room reads about 53% at 60°F. If your glass fogs overnight, see what humidity to keep in winter.
• Hard freeze coming: skip the setback (see below).

Heat pumps: keep one steady setting

Setback advice is written for furnaces and boilers. For an air-source heat pump, ENERGY STAR says the opposite:

heat pumps do not save energy by turning it down when you’re away or asleep

Its heat pump page says to pick a comfortable temperature, leave it there, and use “heat” rather than “auto” mode.⁶ DOE’s archived page explains: setting back a heat pump in heating mode can make it run inefficiently and cancel the savings, so a moderate, steady setting is most cost-effective. Some thermostats made for heat pumps use special algorithms to limit backup electric resistance heat, which makes a setback pay.² Carrier tells heat pump owners to follow the setback guidance for their own system and thermostat rather than applying 7–10°F automatically.¹⁴

Backup cost is the reason. Electric resistance heat makes one unit of heat per unit of electricity, two to three times the cost of heat pump heat, as our heat pump vs. furnace estimates show. Our guide to heat pumps in cold weather covers balance points, defrost and the backup switchover setting. If you want a schedule anyway, ask your installer whether your thermostat recovers without backup heat. We give no wiring or control-board steps here.

Electric baseboard, radiant floors and boilers

Electric baseboard heat can be set back like a furnace, but DOE notes it needs a line-voltage thermostat for 120- or 240-volt circuits, and only a few companies make programmable ones.² Replacing one is a job for a licensed electrician.

Steam and radiant floor heat can take several hours to respond; DOE says some thermostats now learn when to start so the house is warm on time.² With these systems, a shorter, shallower setback is the practical choice.

When you are away, or a hard freeze is coming

Leaving for a trip, the floor is 55°F. The Red Cross says to leave the heat on at no lower than 55°F,¹¹ IBHS advises at least 55°F even when no one is home,¹² and State Farm agrees.¹³ DOE’s video says “around 55 degrees.”⁵ Some online answers go as low as 50°F; we found no US source for that.

A deep freeze changes the night setting too: the Red Cross advises keeping the thermostat at the same temperature day and night to protect pipes.¹¹ Our guide to what temperature pipes freeze at explains why 20°F outside is the alert point and how often your ZIP code gets there; on those nights, hold your daytime setting. For a trip longer than a week in subfreezing weather, IBHS suggests shutting off the water at the main valve.¹² Furnace blowers and heat pumps both stop in a power outage; our generator size calculator sizes a backup unit.

The other thermostat in the house needs no winter change: our water heater temperature guide explains why 120°F suits most homes year-round.

Health floors: older adults and others at risk

Set your heat to at least 68°F.

NIA warns that even mildly cool homes, 60 to 65°F, can lead to hypothermia in older adults.⁹ That overlaps the range many guides suggest for sleeping, so if an older adult lives with you, keep the house at 68°F or more and use small setbacks, if any.

For babies, neither the American Academy of Pediatrics nor NIH’s Safe to Sleep campaign names a room temperature. Both warn that overheating raises SIDS risk; AAP advises dressing a baby in one layer more than you wear.^19,20

Your next step

Note how your home is heated, then set a schedule: about 68°F awake, 7–10°F lower overnight for a furnace or boiler, one steady setting for a heat pump, never below 55°F, and no setback on a hard-freeze night. More in our heating and cooling guides; our methodology page explains how ZIP codes are matched to NOAA stations.