How much do your appliances use when off but plugged in?

How it’s worked out

1. The standby watts of each appliance come from measurements by Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (a U.S. Department of Energy lab): for each type of appliance, the calculator uses the median, meaning half of the ones measured used less and half used more. Under each appliance you’ll see how many were measured and the highest they found.
2. kWh a year = watts × quantity × hours a day on standby × 365 ÷ 1,000. An appliance using 1 W around the clock uses 1 × 24 × 365 ÷ 1,000 = 8.76 kWh a year (the lab rounds it to 9).
3. Hours on standby are the hours the appliance sits plugged in without being used. The calculator starts at 20 (a TV watched for 4 hours a day); change them for each appliance.

With what the calculator loads when you open it: a TV at 0.95 W, a set-top box at 8 W, a games console at 1.7 W, a microwave at 1.5 W, a desktop computer at 2.7 W, a printer at 2.61 W and two chargers at 0.52 W add up to 18.5 W. On standby 20 hours a day: 18.5 × 20 × 365 ÷ 1,000 = 135 kWh a year, about 11.3 kWh a month. At 0.20 per kWh, that’s about 27 a year in your currency. The set-top box alone is almost half: 8 × 20 × 365 ÷ 1,000 = 58.4 kWh.

Why your appliance may use more or less

There’s a big spread within each type: the lab measured TVs on standby from 0 up to 23.8 W, and set-top boxes from 0 to 30 W. According to the lab, new products often use far less standby power than the ones they replace, and the older the appliance, the more you’re likely to save by unplugging it. In the European Union, since 2025 the appliances covered by the rules may not use more than 0.5 W on standby, or 0.8 W if they show a clock or other information.

The only way to know what yours uses is to measure it with a plug-in power meter: plug it into the wall, the appliance into it, and it shows the watts. The lab warns that below about 1 W the reading is less accurate.