The shipment totals are indicative of the overall soft demand in the residential cooling market. As Carrier CEO Dave Gitlin said when acknowledging the slowdown: “It goes without saying that in the second half of [2025], the [residential] business experienced significant weakness. And a key question is, what will this business do next year?”

Air Conditioners and Heat Pumps

Shipments of a/c units and heat pumps have once again plummeted. The following are the totals for November 2025 compared to the same time last year:

• Air conditioner units and air-source heat pumps: 379,470, down by 46.4% compared to 707,436
• Air conditioners only: 181,223, a decrease of 53.7% compared to 391,531
• Heat pumps only: 198,247, down 37.2% compared to 315,905

Stacked against October 2025’s shipment totals, about 8% more a/c and heat pump shipments were made compared to November. In the same vein, the a/c-only shipments from October to November decreased 11.3%, and heat pumps by 5.7%.

AHRI data shows this is the sixth consecutive month for both products to have lower year-to-date totals than in the same period last year.

Year-to-date totals compared to 2024 were:

• Air conditioners and heat pumps: 7.34 million, down 19.9% from 9.16 million
• Air conditioners only: 3.91 million, down 25.6% from 5.27 million
• Heat Pumps only: 3.43 million, down 12.1% from 3.89 million

Warm Air Furnaces

For November 2025, warm air furnace shipments were a mixed bag of ups and downs. The totals compared to November 2024 were:

• Gas warm air furnaces: 238,810 units, down by 8.4% compared to 260,657 units
• Oil warm air furnaces: 3,199 units, up by 9.5% from 2,921 units

About 2% more gas warm air furnaces were shipped in October 2025 than in November the same year. Roughly 12% more oil units were shipped in October than in November.

For year-to-date shipments, both types of units saw gains relative to the same time last year.

• Gas Warm Air Furnaces: 2.98 million, up 4.4% from 2.85 million
• Oil Warm Air Furnaces: 28,741, up 6.6% from 26,949

Residential Storage Water Heaters 

For November 2025, residential storage water heaters saw small decreases in shipments compared to November 2024.

• Residential gas storage water heaters: 318,129 units, down 0.2% from 318,773 units
• Residential electric storage water heaters: 369,530 units, down 2.5% from 378,925 units

More gas storage water heaters were shipped in October 2025 than November, though it was only about 1.3% more units. Similarly, 5.6% more electric storage water heaters were shipped in October than November.

Changes in year-to-date residential water heater shipments were just as minimal in November. The year-over-year totals are:

• Gas Residential Storage Water Heaters: 3.83 million, up 0.2% from 3.83 million
• Electric Residential Storage Water Heaters: 4.56 million, down 2% from 4.66 million

For more information, visit ahrinet.org.