Electactic 21" Electric Fireplace Insert Review: cheap, cozy heat without the chimney drama

I’ve been wanting a fireplace vibe in my living room for a while, but I rent and there’s no way I’m running gas lines or dealing with real wood. So I grabbed this Electactic 21" electric fireplace insert and used it for a couple of weeks in a small living room and once in a bedroom to see if it’s just a flashy lamp or if it actually heats and looks decent. Short version: it does the job, with some minor annoyances.

The unit is basically a freestanding log set with a fake ember bed and a screen behind it where the flames are projected. You just plug it into a normal outlet, no special setup, no venting, no chimney. I used it both inside an old non-working fireplace opening and just freestanding against a wall to see the difference. It definitely looks better inside an opening, but it’s usable either way.

In daily use, I mostly ran it on low heat (750W) in the evenings and used just the flame effect the rest of the time. I also played around with the brightness levels, flame speed, and the remote to see what’s actually useful versus just marketing fluff. Some of the features are genuinely handy; others you’ll probably set once and forget.

If you’re expecting this to feel like a real wood-burning fireplace, you’ll be disappointed. If you just want something that makes the room feel warmer and less dead, this is pretty solid for the price. It’s not perfect, but for a plug-in heater that looks like logs instead of a boring metal box, it holds up pretty well.

Price-wise, this Electactic insert sits in the lower to mid range for electric fireplaces. You’re not paying the premium of built-in units with mantels, but you’re getting more than a barebones heater. For the cost, you get: 1500W heater with two levels, remote control, adjustable flame brightness and speed, safety features like overheat protection, and a design that actually looks like a fireplace instead of a metal box. That’s a pretty solid feature set for the money.

Compared to a basic ceramic space heater, you’re obviously paying extra for looks and ambiance. If you only care about raw heat per dollar, then a plain heater will usually be cheaper and just as effective, if not more. But if you want something that improves the look of a dead fireplace opening or makes a bedroom corner feel less empty, that extra cost feels justified. It basically doubles as decor and a heater, and that’s the real value here.

There are some trade-offs that keep it from feeling premium: the slightly plasticky materials, no true thermostat, some fan noise, and the fact that the fake logs look clearly artificial when it’s off. Those are the corners that are cut to keep the price down. For me, none of those were deal-breakers, but if you’re picky about realism or silence, you might have to go up a price bracket.

Overall, I’d call the value good but not mind-blowing. You get what you pay for: a functional, decent-looking electric fireplace insert that heats a small room and makes it feel cozier, without any major flaws. If that’s what you’re after, the price feels fair. If you want ultra-realistic flames and furniture-grade materials, you’ll need to spend more and look at a different category.

The version I tried is the Traditional Brown 21" model. The general look is classic: resin logs with an ember bed and a dark frame. When it’s on, especially in the evening with the room lights dimmed, it gives a convincing enough fireplace feel. The flame effect is projected behind the logs using a rotating mechanism and lights, which is standard for this kind of product. At a normal viewing distance on a couch, it looks quite good, and the moving flames plus glowing logs do the job.

Up close, you can definitely tell the logs are fake. They’re resin, and when the unit is off, they look a bit plastic, like what you’d expect from a budget electric fireplace. They’re not terrible, but they’re not going to fool anyone in daylight. Some reviewers mentioned the lighter, aspen-style logs on other color versions looking very fake when off, and I get that. If you care a lot about daytime aesthetics, the darker Traditional Brown is more forgiving because it hides some of that artificial look.

One thing I liked is the 5 levels of flame brightness and adjustable flicker speed. On the slowest, dimmer setting, it looks more relaxed and natural. On the fastest, brightest setting, it starts to look a bit like a cheap electric effect, so I kept it around the middle. Being able to slow the flame down is actually a big improvement over older units I’ve tried that had frantic flames that felt more like a screensaver than a fire.

Design-wise, my only real complaint is that the back of the unit is just standard appliance plastic and metal. If your fireplace opening is shallow or you plan to use it freestanding where the back might be visible from certain angles, it can look a bit odd. It’s clearly designed to sit inside an opening or against a wall, not to be admired from all sides. Overall though, for something that lives low to the ground and mostly seen from the front, the design is decent and fits well in a bedroom or living room without drawing weird attention.

The main materials here are resin logs with an ember bed, a metal/plastic housing, and a simple flame screen. When you handle it, it doesn’t feel like a premium piece of furniture; it feels like a well-made appliance. The logs are lightweight resin, and they’re attached firmly enough that I didn’t feel anything wobbling or rattling when moving the unit around. The outer casing has a polished finish, but it’s not fancy metalwork, more like a clean, basic surround.

In terms of durability, nothing on it feels like it’s about to snap off, but also nothing feels overbuilt. The side control panel buttons have a standard click, not mushy, and the remote is very lightweight, almost toy-like, but it works. This is pretty typical for this price range. It’s ETL certified and has overheat protection and safety shutoff, which matters more to me than whether the plastic feels premium. I ran it for multiple evenings on high, and there was no weird hot plastic smell or warping anywhere on the exterior.

One thing to know: the logs and embers look their best when lit. When the unit is off, you can see the fake factor more clearly—especially if you get one of the lighter log styles mentioned in Amazon reviews. With the brown version, the darker color hides that a bit better. If you’re picky about daytime aesthetics, you might want to position it slightly recessed into a fireplace opening so the details are less in-your-face.

Overall, I’d call the materials and build quality “good enough for daily use”. It’s not fragile, but it’s also not something you want kids climbing on or moving constantly. For a stationary heater that mostly sits in one place and gets turned on and off with a remote, the materials are fine and match the price and category.

On the performance side, this thing is basically a 750W/1500W space heater with a fake fire in front. In my roughly 250–300 sq ft living room, running it on high (1500W) for about 20–30 minutes took the edge off a cold evening pretty well. It’s not going to heat an entire big open-concept floor, but for a bedroom or smaller living room, it’s enough to make the space feel comfortable. The 450 sq ft claim is optimistic if you want the whole room to be toasty, but as a supplemental heater it’s fine.

The heat comes out of the front, and it starts blowing warm air within seconds. On high, the air gets hot quickly; you don’t stand right in front of it for long. The fan is noticeable: there is a . It’s not crazy loud, but if you’re very sensitive to noise, you’ll hear it over a quiet TV show. On low heat, the fan noise is slightly less intense but still present. Personally, after an evening or two, I didn’t pay much attention to it anymore, but it’s not silent.

For the flame effect, the ability to adjust both brightness and speed is genuinely useful. At slower speeds with medium brightness, it looks fairly natural and relaxing. I tested it with and without a reflective back in the fireplace opening (as one reviewer suggested), and they’re right: a more reflective background does make the flames look deeper and more lively. With a dark, non-reflective back, the flames still look fine, just a bit flatter. Also, the flames and heat are independent, so you can run just the flame effect with no heat, which I ended up doing a lot in the evenings when the room was already warm.

There’s no noticeable smell from the unit after the initial burn-in (first 10–15 minutes you might get a light factory smell, then it goes away). No visible dust burning or anything like that. Overall, as a heater and ambiance device, it performs like a competent space heater with some decent visual flair. It’s not high-end, but it does what it claims without any nasty surprises.

Out of the box, you get the log unit itself, a separate flame screen that you attach in front, and a small remote. No batteries needed for the heater, but you’ll need a battery for the remote (mine came with one, but don’t count on that forever). The whole thing weighs around 15 pounds, so it’s easy to move around without feeling flimsy. The dimensions (about 20.5" wide, 11.5" high, 8.5" deep) are small enough to fit into most old fireplace openings or on a low console.

Setup is honestly basic: you take it out, clip or slide on the screen, put it where you want it, and plug it in. There’s no assembly with tools, no weird wiring, nothing. I had it running in under 5 minutes. For renters or people who don’t want to mess with installation, that’s a big plus. It’s a freestanding, vent-free unit, so you’re not cutting holes in walls or dealing with gas or smoke.

The controls are doubled: there’s a side control panel on the unit and the remote. From both you can control flame brightness, flame speed, heat on/off, and flame on/off. What’s missing is a real thermostat with a temperature readout. It’s basically two heat levels (750W and 1500W) and an on/off, not “set to 72°F and forget it.” So if you like precise temperature control, this is a bit basic.

Overall, in terms of presentation, it feels more like a practical appliance than some fancy piece of decor. The manual is straightforward, the features match what’s listed, and there are no hidden surprises. It’s not trying to be high-end, but for the price bracket, the feature set (remote, adjustable flame, two heat levels, overheat protection) is pretty solid and covers what most people actually need.

Using this every evening for a couple of weeks, the main thing I noticed is that it does exactly what I wanted: it makes the room feel warmer and cozier with minimal effort. I’d get home, hit the remote, and within seconds the flames are going and the fan starts if I’ve left it in heat mode. No messing with matches, no ash, no gas valves, nothing. For someone who just wants quick ambiance plus extra heat, that convenience matters more than any fancy feature.

The controls are straightforward. The remote lets you cycle through flame brightness, flame speed, and toggle the heat modes. There’s no learning curve. After the first night, I knew exactly which settings I liked (medium brightness, slower flame, low or high heat depending on temperature) and just stuck with those. The independent flame/heat control is genuinely useful—I used flame-only mode quite a bit when the main heating was already doing its job but I still wanted that fireplace look.

On the downside, there are a couple of things that could be better. First, no real thermostat means you’ll probably turn it on, warm the room, then manually shut it off or drop it to low when it starts to feel a bit too warm. Not a huge deal, but less convenient than a true set-and-forget heater. Second, the fan noise and, on some models, the optional crackling sound can feel a bit much if you’re used to a silent room. Thankfully, you can turn the sound off, but there’s no volume control if you like a softer crackle.

In practice, though, as a daily-use appliance, it’s pretty low-maintenance. It starts, it heats, the flames look good enough, and I never had any issues with tripping breakers or overheating. If you treat it as a supplemental heater plus visual upgrade over a basic space heater, it’s effective. If you expect it to replace central heating or mimic a real wood fire perfectly, you’ll probably find it a bit lacking. For a realistic use case—small room, evening use—it does its job well.