viv, heating, UVB, thermostat, decor
Advanced options
The animal is the cheapest line: a GBP 50 leopard gecko or GBP 60 corn snake sits in GBP 400-700 of kit. The electricity is the pet: heat mats, ceramic emitters, basking bulbs and UVB run half the day on thermostats: reptiles are the only pets with a standing charge. Lifespans surprise buyers: leopard geckos 15-20 yrs, corn snakes 15-20, bearded dragons 10-15, royal pythons 20-30: same commitment maths as our tortoise page, scaled down.
What The Reptile Cost Calculator Works Out
- Running cost per year: electricity plus food, substrate and supplements. Electricity is watts x hours a day x 365, divided by 1,000 for kilowatt-hours, at the current Ofgem price cap unit rate. A 100W rig on for 12 hours draws about 440 kWh, roughly GBP 120 a year, which usually beats the food bill.
- 12-year cost of ownership: setup plus 12 years of running costs. A GBP 50 leopard gecko or GBP 60 corn snake sits in GBP 400 to GBP 700 of vivarium, heating, UVB, thermostat and decor, and the twelve-year total lands at GBP 4,000 to GBP 6,000 for an animal whose price suggested a rounding error.
- Setup cost: the vivarium and kit. Terrestrial species need length more than height so a thermal gradient fits (warm basking end, cool retreat), and the thermostat is the one item never to economise on.
- Electricity unit rate (advanced): edits the default price cap unit rate for your tariff. Vivariums heat hardest through the months when tariffs are dearest, so winter bills run above the annual average.
- Thermostat duty cycle (advanced): the share of the "hours on" that the heat source is actually drawing power. A well-set thermostat in a heated room might run 50% to 70% of the time; the simple mode assumes the label wattage for every hour, so this is the figure to trim for a realistic bill.
- Years to budget for (advanced): changes the ownership horizon. Leopard geckos and corn snakes live 15 to 20 years, bearded dragons 10 to 15, royal pythons 20 to 30: spans that outlast childhood enthusiasms and feature accordingly in the rehoming statistics.
- UVB bulb replacements (advanced): tubes degrade invisibly and need changing every 6 to 12 months at GBP 20 to GBP 40 each, a recurring line the setup receipt omits. For diurnal species such as bearded dragons, UVB is metabolic-bone-disease prevention in a lightbulb's disguise.
- Exotics vet pot (advanced): an annual amount set aside for a vet line that resists insurance convention. Exotics vets are scarcer and dearer per consultation, and essential for animals whose stoic biology hides illness late.
- Price of the animal and number of vivariums (advanced): adds the animal to the one-off cost and multiplies every line for a collection. The share cards show how small the setup is against the running total, and how much of the running total is electricity, typically 25% to 40%.