TempoLife › Features › Defibrillators and cardiac arrest response › cost
What a defibrillator costs to buy and to keep
The purchase is the small part. Pads and batteries expire on a schedule, cabinets and signage cost real money in a cold climate, and the recurring line is what an organisation forgets to budget for.
CPR in sixty seconds
- Unresponsive and not breathing normally? Gasping is not breathing. Treat it as a cardiac arrest.
- Call 112 (113 in Norway). Speaker on, phone on the floor. Stay on the line — the dispatcher will coach you.
- Push hard and fast in the centre of the chest: 5–6 cm in an adult, 100–120 per minute, letting the chest come all the way back up.
- Send somebody else for a defibrillator. Do not go yourself unless it is seconds away. Keep compressing.
- Turn the device on and do what it says. It decides whether to shock. After a shock, go straight back to compressions.
This is a reference written for bystanders, not a diagnosis, a training course or medical advice. It cannot tell you what is wrong with a particular person, and it does not replace the dispatcher on the other end of an emergency call — they can see what is near you and they will talk you through it. If you are worried about your own heart, or about a symptom, that is a conversation with a clinician rather than a page on a website.
Why this page has no price list
We do not publish euro figures for specific models, because a price that is wrong is worse than no price: it varies by country, by model, by whether the supplier bundles training and cabinet, by VAT treatment and by whether a municipality is buying one unit or forty. What is stable, and what people planning a purchase actually get wrong, is the structure of the cost. Get a written quote from more than one supplier in your own country, and ask every one of them to price the whole eight-year life rather than the box.
The one-off costs
The device itself, which is the item everybody focuses on. A cabinet, which is not optional if it lives anywhere public and which in this climate needs to be heated and insulated if it is outdoors. Mounting and, for an outdoor cabinet, an electrical connection. Signage — the green AED sign at the device and, more usefully, directional signs at the entrance and the lift. A first-response kit to hang beside it: scissors, a razor, a towel, gloves, a pocket mask. Training for a first cohort of staff.
The recurring costs, which are the ones that get forgotten
Electrode pads expire, typically after two to five years depending on the model, and a used set has to be replaced immediately. The battery expires on its own schedule, generally in the same range for standby life, and is a genuine consumable rather than something to be recharged. Paediatric pads, if you keep them, expire separately. Heated cabinets consume electricity year-round. Training needs refreshing — annually is the common recommendation, and staff turnover means the real interval is shorter. And somebody's time has to go into the monthly check.
Who pays, in practice
Public-access devices in this region are typically funded by a municipality, a foundation, a company, a sports club or a village association, and mixed funding is normal — a foundation grant for the device and the municipality for the electricity and the cabinet. Several national heart associations and charitable foundations run defibrillator funding programmes; the Danish network is the clearest example of a foundation-funded model at national scale. Ask your municipality and your national heart association before you fundraise from scratch.
The cheapest thing you can buy is the register entry
It is free. A device that costs a four-figure sum and is not registered delivers a fraction of its value, because no dispatcher can send anyone to it. Before worrying about the second device, register the first one, put a proper sign at the front door, and make the availability honest.
| Item | When | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Defibrillator unit | One-off | Semi-automatic and fully automatic models both suit public access |
| Cabinet | One-off | Heated and insulated if outdoors in this climate |
| Mounting, power, signage | One-off | Directional signs matter as much as the sign on the box |
| Response kit | One-off, then top-up | Scissors, razor, towel, gloves, pocket mask |
| Electrode pads | Every 2–5 years, and after every use | Check the printed expiry, not the purchase date |
| Battery | Every 2–5 years standby, sooner after use | A consumable, not rechargeable |
| Paediatric pads | Expire separately | Only if the site needs them |
| Training and refresher | Annual, plus new staff | Turnover shortens the real interval |
| Register entry | Free, review annually | The highest-value line on the list |
Sources: Danish Heart Foundation (Hjerteforeningen) on defibrillators · TrygFonden Hjertestart og Hjerteløber · checked 2026-09-08
Frequently asked questions
How much does a defibrillator cost?
It varies too much by country, model and bundle for a single figure to be useful, so ask two or three suppliers in your own country for a written quote covering the device, cabinet, pads, battery and training over its life.
What are the running costs?
Electrode pads and the battery, both of which expire on a printed date typically two to five years out and both of which must be replaced after any use, plus training refreshers, heated-cabinet electricity and somebody's time for the monthly check.
Are there grants for buying one?
Often. Municipalities, national heart associations and charitable foundations in this region fund public-access devices, sometimes as a full programme. Ask locally before fundraising from scratch.
How the system around it works
The chain of survival, link by link
Recognition and a call, early CPR, early defibrillation, advanced care and recovery. What each link is actually worth, which one the public owns, and where the chain breaks in practice.
What the survival numbers actually say
Roughly one in ten survives an out-of-hospital cardiac arrest, and the spread between towns is wider than the spread between treatments. How to read the statistics without being misled by them.
National registers, and getting your device into one
A defibrillator the dispatcher cannot see barely exists. What a national register is, which one is the real one in each country, why registration is free, and the paid look-alikes to avoid.
Volunteer responder systems
Denmark, Sweden and Norway alert trained volunteers by phone to arrests near them — one to fetch the defibrillator, one to start compressions. How the systems work, who can join, and what happens when your phone goes off.
Where public defibrillators actually are
The green sign with the heart and the lightning bolt, the places that reliably have one, the cabinets that are locked and the ones that are not, and what to do when you have thirty seconds to decide whether to go looking.
Everything on this subject
Before the emergency, there is a long quiet stretch
Blood pressure, resting heart rate, movement and sleep are the part of this you can act on for years beforehand. TempoLife keeps them in one place, free to start.