Short answer: yes. Every residential stairlift worth buying runs on batteries, and the power supply only charges them.
How it works
The lift carries rechargeable batteries and charges at parking points along the rail, usually at the top and bottom and sometimes continuously along the track. You ride on battery power all the time, in a power cut and out of one.
Harmar states the Pinnacle SL600HD manages up to 60 trips on batteries during an outage. That is not an emergency reserve so much as several days of ordinary use.
The habit that decides it
Park it at a charging point. Every time.
A lift left partway up the stairs is a lift not charging. This single habit prevents more service calls than everything else combined, and it is the difference between a lift that works in a storm and one that does not.
If somebody has got into the habit of parking mid-flight because it is closer, that is worth fixing before hurricane season rather than during it.
When the batteries are flat too
There is a manual lowering method. Ask to be shown it at handover, and ask again at the first service, because it is the one thing nobody remembers.
It lets somebody be brought down safely without power and without batteries. Knowing where it is and how it works is five minutes that matters once.
How much electricity it uses
Very little. It is charging a small battery pack rather than running a motor continuously, and the draw while parked is trivial. Nobody has ever called us about their electricity bill after fitting a stairlift.
Leave it plugged in. Unplugging it to save power defeats the charging arrangement and is the commonest cause of a lift that will not move.
Batteries are consumables
Typically a couple of years in normal use, less if the lift is parked away from a charging point. They are the commonest reason a lift stops working and the cheapest thing to fix.
They are load-tested at an annual service rather than voltage-checked, which is a real difference: a battery can show the right voltage and still fail under load. Our maintenance guide covers what a service should include.
Outdoor lifts in a storm
Same arrangement, more exposure. Use the cover when parked, which is the cheapest thing that extends an outdoor lift’s life, and get it serviced annually rather than when something goes wrong. Our outdoor guide covers it.
What to have ready anyway
A torch on each floor. A phone kept on the person rather than across the room. The model and serial number somewhere findable, because it is the first thing any service department asks for.
And if somebody may be stuck upstairs during a long outage, think about what they need up there. Bruno and Harmar both build their lifts around battery operation for exactly this reason.
Torches, personal alarms and smaller equipment ship free from our online shop.
What to do if it stops with somebody on it
Stay calm and do not try to help them off mid-flight. That is the moment injuries happen.
Use the manual lowering method. It should have been demonstrated at handover, and if nobody remembers it, this is the reason to ask at the next service rather than in an emergency.
Then call. Our troubleshooting guide covers the six things worth checking first, and being parked away from a charging point is the answer more often than everything else combined.
Storm season
Before it arrives: check the lift is parking properly, have the annual service done if it is due, and make sure somebody in the house knows the manual lowering method.
That is fifteen minutes in September and it is worth considerably more than fifteen minutes in the dark.
Compared with an elevator
Worth knowing if you are choosing between them. A home elevator also has battery backup with controlled lowering, but it is a larger machine with a larger reserve requirement, and it usually lowers to a landing and stops rather than continuing in normal service.
A stairlift carries on working through an outage in the ordinary way. For a household in an area with frequent outages, that is a genuine point in its favor and it rarely comes up in a sales conversation. Our elevator guide covers the comparison.
Generators
Not needed for the lift itself. If a household is sizing a generator for other reasons, the stairlift is not the load to worry about, and smaller equipment ships free from our online shop.
A note for caregivers
If you are looking after somebody who uses a lift, learn the manual lowering method yourself rather than assuming they will manage. Ask the technician to show you at the next service and take a photograph of where it is.
Five minutes now, and it is the sort of thing nobody regrets knowing.