What This Week's Heat Is Doing to Your Florida Home (And How to Stop It at the Window)

If you walked outside anywhere in Central Florida this week, you already know the number.

Heat index readings have been sitting between 105 and 111 degrees, the Storm Team Alert has been running for days, and the overnight lows have barely dropped into the low 80s, which means the house never really got a chance to cool off before the next morning started all over again.

Your AC has probably been running since breakfast without ever quite catching up.

It's easy to file that under the cost of living in Florida in June, and some of it is.

But a real share of the heat your air conditioner is fighting walked straight through your windows around two in the afternoon, and that part you can actually do something about without touching the thermostat or calling an HVAC tech.

Your windows are the weak point, and Florida makes it worse

Windows are about a tenth of your home's exterior, yet the Department of Energy attributes 30 to 40 percent of a home's heat transfer to them.

When sunlight hits a standard pane of glass, most of that energy passes through and reaches your floors and furniture, where it turns into heat and gets trapped in the room. West-facing glass is the worst offender, catching the full afternoon sun at the hottest hour of the day, with south-facing windows close behind. If a room on the western side of the house feels like an oven by four o'clock no matter what the thermostat reads, that's why.

The AC isn't failing. It's losing a footrace to the sun.

Closing the blinds helps, but it isn't enough

You've probably tried it already, and it does help.

Window blinds are great for privacy and fine light control, and you can tilt the slats to throw glare up onto the ceiling.

What they can't do is insulate.

Light slips between the slats and re-radiates as heat on the inside of the glass. The DOE says smart use of window coverings can cut heat gain by up to 77 percent, but only certain coverings get anywhere near that, and basic blinds aren't among them.

What actually keeps the heat out

A few options carry real weight here, and the right one depends on the window.

Honeycomb shades, sometimes called cellular shades, lead for interior coverings. The pockets in the fabric trap a layer of air against the glass, the same principle behind a double-pane window. In cooling season, a tightly fitted cellular shade can cut unwanted solar heat through a window by up to 60 percent, according to the DOE.

They're one of the energy-efficient shades we fit most in west-facing bedrooms.

Roller and solar shades take another route.

Our roller shades use UV-blocking fabrics that cut heat and glare while keeping a clean line, and solar shades push that further with a tighter weave that blocks heat and UV while you keep the view of the yard or pool. They suit a Florida room or a home office.

Outdoor motorized shades are the heavyweight move for big glass and the lanai.

Stopping the sun before it reaches the glass beats catching the heat once it's inside, which is why the DOE rates exterior shading as the most effective category for cutting solar heat gain. Our outdoor motorized shades mount outside and drop at the touch of a button, shading the space and the glass behind it.

Interior shutters are the permanent option.

Closed against the afternoon sun, plantation shutters add a solid layer between the glass and the room, with energy-rated versions built to insulate.

Start with the rooms the sun is already winning

You don't need to re-cover the whole house at once.

Walk through in the late afternoon, when the sun is low and hard, and note which windows the light is pouring through. In a Florida home they're almost always on the west and south sides. There's a calendar reason to move now, too. The 2026 Atlantic hurricane season is already open, with Tropical Storm Arthur forming this week as the first named storm of the year. It's well away from us, but summer here runs long, so every room you treat in June keeps paying you back through the hottest stretch of the year.

VU Window Treatments has worked out of our Ocoee facility since 1984, and everything we install is American-made and built to order.

We measure on site, because a shade that doesn't fit tight leaks heat around the edges. If your power bill jumped this month, the cheapest fix is probably already on your windows. Book a free in-home consultation and see fabric and shade samples in your own light before you decide anything.

Questions we hear a lot this time of year

Which window treatment keeps the most heat out in Florida? 

Honeycomb shades lead for interior windows, cutting solar heat gain up to 60 percent with a tight fit. For your worst west-facing glass and the lanai, outdoor motorized shades do even more, since they stop the sun before it reaches the glass.

Will the right shades lower my electric bill? 

They cut the heat load your AC fights during peak afternoon hours, when cooling costs the most. Most homeowners notice rooms holding temperature longer and the system cycling less often.

My windows are already double-pane. Do I still need treatments? 

Often, yes. Efficient glass slows heat transfer, but direct sun on a west or south window still drives the room temperature up. A good shade handles the part the glass can't.