How did we pick these?
San Antonio has a better claim to this subject than any city in Texas. The building in the photograph is the Milam, on Soledad downtown, and when it opened in January 1928 it was the first air-conditioned high-rise office building in the United States, with 300 tons of refrigeration and chilled water feeding fans on every floor. The American Society of Mechanical Engineers made it a landmark for exactly that reason. Air conditioning as an everyday expectation starts here.
Which makes it stranger that most lists of San Antonio HVAC companies cannot tell you whether the company they are recommending is legally allowed to touch your equipment. Air conditioning is a licensed trade in Texas. The Department of Licensing and Regulation issues the Air Conditioning and Refrigeration Contractor licence, every company doing this work must hold one, and the state publishes the whole licence file as open data.
So we did the obvious thing nobody does. We took every licence number these companies print on their own sites and looked each one up in the state's own records, then checked the class and the endorsement. All seven came back matching the company name. Four hold Class A, which has no limit on equipment size. Cowboys and Carnes hold Class B. Accu-Aire publishes no number at all on its site, so we found it in the state file instead and have said so in its entry.
After the licence came the ordinary tests: a San Antonio street address rather than a call centre, a founding year, manufacturer dealer tiers the manufacturer controls, and an independent local source. That last one is thin in this city, which is why KSAT's SA Picks vote carries weight here that we would not give it in Dallas.
What we cut. Central Air Conditioning Company's site would not load for us at all, and the founding claims attached to its name elsewhere disagree by thirty years. Allstate Air and Heat and South Texas Air both publish a licence number but no street address, which fails the test we apply everywhere. Beyer Mechanical is a real and substantial commercial contractor, but we could not reach a working company website to verify its own details against, so it is out until we can. Several more results were city landing pages run from Boerne, Seguin and Selma.
No business on this page is a client of ours and none paid for its place.
Which company fits which job?
| Company | Trading since | Licence class published | Best for |
| Cowboys | 1985 | Class B combined | Most houses, any hour |
| Comfort-Air | 1964 | Class A combined | HVAC and plumbing together |
| Mission | 1956 | Class A combined | Clinics, and medical gas |
| Jon Wayne | 2001 | Class A combined | Sunday emergencies, four trades |
| Wrangler | 2014 | Class A combined | Mini splits and one hot room |
| Carnes and Sons | 2010 | Class B environmental | Stone Oak, evenings, Carrier kit |
| Accu-Aire | Not stated | Found in state file, Class A | Commercial and institutional plant |
What should you know before you book?
Three things specific to this city.
You cannot pull your own mechanical permit. San Antonio's Development Services department requires a licensed trade contractor for HVAC work and allows homeowner trade permits only for plumbing on your own homestead. Anybody who offers to let you permit the job yourself is telling you something about how they work.
A change-out is permitted after the fact, not before. Under the city's limited service and repair provision, a contractor replacing equipment on an existing electric system in a house files within three working days of finishing. So same-week service is normal and legal. Ask for the permit number once the job is done, and keep it with the warranty.
Get the CPS Energy rebate into the conversation while you are still negotiating. SaveNow pays by the cooling ton in tiers tied to the SEER2 rating, with separate tiers depending on whether you are replacing early or replacing something that has died. The tier your equipment lands in can be worth more than the discount you are haggling over, and it depends on a model number that is still changeable at that point.
What should you do next?
For a house, call Cowboys first, Carnes and Sons if you are up in Stone Oak and want evening service, and Jon Wayne if it is already 1 a.m. For a job that crosses into plumbing or a generator, Comfort-Air. For a clinic, Mission. For a building with chillers or a walk-in, Accu-Aire.
Whoever you call, do the licence lookup first. It takes a minute, and this is the one trade in Texas where the answer is published.
Then have a look at the rest of our San Antonio coverage, the other cities on the HVAC hub, our Dallas HVAC rankings, which ran the same licence test one metro north, and if you have people visiting while the house is torn up, the things worth doing in San Antonio away from the River Walk.
