Austria 2026 heat-pump market index: what EPREL shows

Austria’s EPREL heat-pump universe in one chart

Austria’s current EPREL heat-pump universe contains 60,989 listed models from 777 manufacturers (market_index_snapshot / Househeating Pulse · Market Index v1, computed from EPREL Public API). Average declared SCOP across the full Austrian listing set is 4.55, with average declared power of 9.3 kW and average outdoor sound power of 61.3 dB (market_index_snapshot / Househeating Pulse · Market Index v1, computed from EPREL Public API).

That is a large market by listing count, but it is not evenly spread. The live EPREL catalog and the broader market index snapshot show a familiar pattern: a long tail of brands sits under a handful of very large registrants.

A quick structural view:

The result is breadth first, not simplicity. Buyers scanning Austria’s market through EPREL are looking at tens of thousands of entries, including air-water units, air-air units, ground-water units and heat-pump water heaters, each with very different efficiency and acoustic profiles.

Is the market concentrated or fragmented?

Both. Austria has 777 manufacturers in the registry (market_index_snapshot / Househeating Pulse · Market Index v1, computed from EPREL Public API), which is fragmented on brand count. But the top layer is concentrated by listing volume.

The top five brands account for 51.93% of Austrian listings combined: 24.05% for Daikin Europe N.V., 9.14% for Mitsubishi Electric Europe B.V., 8.54% for JOHNSON CONTROLS HITACHI AIR CONDITIONING EUROPE SAS, SUCURSAL EN ESPAÑA, 5.91% for Bosch Thermotechnik GmbH, and 4.29% for Ariston SpA (brand_share / EPREL Public API · brand-share aggregation).

The top 10 brands account for 60.88% combined (brand_share / EPREL Public API · brand-share aggregation). So nearly three in five Austrian listings come from just 10 manufacturers, even though hundreds of brands are present.

The average SCOP values among those leading brands range from 4.18 for Johnson Controls Hitachi to 4.69 for Bosch (brand_share / EPREL Public API · brand-share aggregation). That spread matters because Austria’s volume leaders are not identical on declared seasonal performance, even before any filtering by type or output. The manufacturer index and leaderboards hub are useful for checking whether a high-volume brand also appears strongly in specialist segments.

Which technologies dominate: type, refrigerant and efficiency mix

By count, Austria is overwhelmingly an air-source listing market. Air-water models total 30,452, or 49.93% of all Austrian listings; air-air models total 21,065, or 34.54%; heat-pump water heaters total 9,228, or 15.13%; ground-water models total 213, or 0.35%; and water-water models total 31, or 0.05% (market_index_snapshot / Househeating Pulse · Market Index v1, computed from EPREL Public API).

Among types with recorded values, water-water has the highest average SCOP at 6.15 and the lowest average outdoor noise at 42.0 dB (type_efficiency / EPREL Public API · type aggregation). But that sits on just 31 listings, so it is a niche, not the market centre (type_efficiency / EPREL Public API · type aggregation). Air-water remains the dominant Austrian universe and therefore the main practical comparison set.

Refrigerants show an even sharper concentration. R32 listings total 13,935, equal to 22.85% of all Austrian models (market_index_snapshot / Househeating Pulse · Market Index v1, computed from EPREL Public API). R290 listings total 537, or 0.88% (market_index_snapshot / Househeating Pulse · Market Index v1, computed from EPREL Public API). R410A appears in multiple declared code variants: R410A at 1,896, R410a at 49 and R410 at 10, for a combined 1,955 listings, or 3.21% (market_index_snapshot / Househeating Pulse · Market Index v1, computed from EPREL Public API). The broader natural refrigerant share is 3.27% of Austrian listings (market_index_snapshot / Househeating Pulse · Market Index v1, computed from EPREL Public API).

That means Austria’s EPREL stock is not yet dominated by natural refrigerants. It is still clearly led by higher-GWP R32 inventory, while R290 inventory remains visible but minority. For context on refrigerant families, GWP and phase-out dates, the site’s refrigerants reference is the fastest lookup, while the legal backdrop comes from the EU F-gas regulation and EPREL’s own public portal.

Efficiency classes are top-heavy. APPP accounts for 23,466 listings, or 38.48%; AP for 16,845, or 27.62%; APP for 8,924, or 14.63%; A for 6,228, or 10.21%; B for 1,796, or 2.95%; C for 3,532, or 5.79%; D for 193, or 0.32%; E for 3, or 0.00%; and F for 1, or 0.00% (market_index_snapshot / Househeating Pulse · Market Index v1, computed from EPREL Public API). The top tier, APPP alone, covers 38.48%, while the top three tiers combined—APPP, APP and AP—cover 80.73% (market_index_snapshot / Househeating Pulse · Market Index v1, computed from EPREL Public API). Lower tiers A to F together account for 19.27% (market_index_snapshot / Househeating Pulse · Market Index v1, computed from EPREL Public API). Buyers who want to inspect the upper tail directly can filter the catalog to APPP models or APP models.

The premium end: top-scoring models and what they cost in performance terms

The top 15 Austrian models by SCOP all sit in energy class APPP and range from 6.88 to 7.00 SCOP (top_models / EPREL Public API via Househeating Pulse catalog). Capacity spans from 5.0 kW to 46.0 kW, showing that very high SCOP is not confined to one size band (top_models / EPREL Public API via Househeating Pulse catalog).

A ranking snapshot:

Across all 15 top-SCOP entries, every listed outdoor noise value is 0 dB in the corpus (top_models / EPREL Public API via Househeating Pulse catalog). That is almost certainly a registry artefact or missing-field issue rather than a real acoustic reading; the registry does not provide enough information here to compare these premium models by noise. Readers wanting a cleaner acoustic ranking should use the quietest-models leaderboard instead.

The premium end also leans heavily toward air-water entries in this top list, with a smaller water-water presence (top_models / EPREL Public API via Househeating Pulse catalog). The dedicated top SCOP leaderboard and top SCOP air-water ranking make that easier to inspect than a raw EPREL export.

What the data says about buyer economics in Austria versus nearby markets

For running-cost logic, Austria looks comparatively favourable. The Austrian household electricity price is €0.3272/kWh and household gas price is €0.1221/kWh, giving an electricity-to-gas ratio of 2.68 (price_ratio / Eurostat household band DC (electricity) / D2 (gas), latest semester). That sits below the roughly 3.7 break-even threshold referenced in the brief, and below several nearby benchmarks.

In DACH specifically, Austria’s ratio of 2.68 is lower than Germany’s 3.16, while Switzerland is not present in the corpus and therefore cannot be compared here (price_ratio / Eurostat household band DC (electricity) / D2 (gas), latest semester). Among nearby comparison markets included in the data, Austria is also below Czechia at 3.35, and below Poland at 3.71, but above Italy at 2.00 and Slovenia at 2.44 (price_ratio / Eurostat household band DC (electricity) / D2 (gas), latest semester).

For households comparing technologies, that ratio does not by itself prove a specific bill outcome. Actual economics still depend on SCOP, flow temperature, building demand and control quality. But Austria’s position is plainly less hostile than a market already at or above 3.7. The country comparison dashboard and the payback calculator are the right next steps for a site-specific estimate, while Eurostat’s own energy price tables remain the primary statistical source.

What Austrian buyers and installers can infer from the listing universe

Three points stand out.

First, Austria’s EPREL market is broad, but the volume centre is narrow. Just five brands hold 51.93% of listings and 10 brands hold 60.88% (brand_share / EPREL Public API · brand-share aggregation). That means shortlist-building can be efficient even in a market with 60,989 models and 777 manufacturers (market_index_snapshot / Househeating Pulse · Market Index v1, computed from EPREL Public API).

Second, the registry mix is modern in efficiency-class terms but still transitional in refrigerants. APPP, APP and AP together make up 80.73% of listings (market_index_snapshot / Househeating Pulse · Market Index v1, computed from EPREL Public API), yet natural refrigerants account for only 3.27% overall and R290 only 0.88% (market_index_snapshot / Househeating Pulse · Market Index v1, computed from EPREL Public API). So Austria’s offer base is already skewed to high labelled efficiency, but not yet overwhelmingly to low-GWP refrigerants.

Third, premium declared performance exists, but it is not synonymous with the biggest brands. The top 15 SCOP models range from 6.88 to 7.00 and include specialist names such as Risch, Waterkotte, Master Therm, Hoval, Kermi, Walter Bösch and NIBE rather than the largest-volume registrants alone (top_models / EPREL Public API via Househeating Pulse catalog). For installers, that is a reminder that the Austrian listing universe is tiered twice: concentrated at the mass-market level, but still open at the technical frontier.

Sources

• Househeating Pulse · Market Index v1, computed from EPREL Public API — snapshot 2026-05-08
• EPREL Public API · brand-share aggregation — snapshot 2026-05-08
• EPREL Public API · type aggregation — snapshot 2026-05-08
• IPCC AR6 GWP table; EU Reg. 2024/573 phase-out schedule; EPREL declared codes — snapshot 2026-05-08
• EPREL Public API via Househeating Pulse catalog — snapshot 2026-05-08
• Eurostat household band DC (electricity) / D2 (gas), latest semester — snapshot 2026-05-08

Continue reading

• How to compare heat-pump SCOP without fooling yourself — What seasonal efficiency does and does not tell you across types and climates
• R290 vs R32 heat pumps — A practical look at GWP, safety class and where each refrigerant shows up in EPREL
• How to read an EPREL heat-pump listing — The key fields, common data gaps and how to sanity-check a model page
• Air-to-water vs ground-source heat pumps — A buyer-focused comparison of the main hydronic formats