The element is the most vital part of an electric oven. Without it, your food will remain uncooked and cold - so when your cooker element breaks, it's important to find the correct replacement quickly.

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Still, when you're replacing your oven's element, it's nice to have a rough idea of how long you can expect the new one to last. And what caused your old cooker element to break in the first place, anyway?

What's the average lifespan of an oven element?

As an estimate, most cooker elements should last for about 5 years. Of course, this is dependent on the health and overall quality of your oven; the better your oven, the longer its parts should last.

Why did my oven element break?

Sometimes a cooker element will fail because it has just suffered a lot of wear and tear. As the wires inside a cooker elements get hotter, they expand; when they cool, they shrink back down. This repeated expanding and shrinking can cause damage to the wire over time, meaning that your oven may eventually break for no apparent reason.

Elements can also break if they overheat. This may happen if your oven's thermostat is malfunctioning - the thermostat is supposed to switch off the element once the oven has reached the desired temperature, but if that doesn't happen, the element may continue to heat up until it breaks.

Read More: How Does a Thermostat Work?

Remember: oven elements aren't interchangeable. If yours breaks, you'll need to buy a new one that's compatible with your appliance. If you need to replace your cooker element, go to the Cooker Spare Parts homepage and enter your cooker's manufacturer and model number - then we'll show you a comprehensive list of compatible spares.

Alternatively you can search our browse our oven elements here. We also stock various grill elements.

If you have any questions, please feel free to get in touch with our knowledgeable customer service team!