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How Much Power Does An Appliance Use?
Calculating how much power and current an appliance uses is simple once you can find the rating plate.
- What's the Limit?
- What is a Rating Plate?
- Where to Look
- What the Rating Plate Will Tell You
- Working Out Power & Current (amperage) from the Rating Plate
- IMPORTANT NOTE
What's the Limit?
Appliances plugged in to any single wall socket connected to UK mains voltages (230 V) must not exceed 13 Amps or 3000 Watts (3 kilowatts kW).
What is a Rating Plate?
Almost all electrical appliances have a rating plate attached to them. Rating plates give essential electrical information about the appliance.
Where to Look
The rating plate could be a metal plate or a sticker or may be stamped into the plastic moulding.
Look on the back or underneath small items.
On fridges and freezers it is usually on the inside somewhere, often around the bottom shelf.
On washing machines and dryers it will be either on the back or just inside the door.'
On chargers and other appliances with transformers (part of the plug or a separate box between the appliance and the plug) the rating plate will be on the transformer box or plug itself. Note that rating plates on transformers often state the current in milliamps (mA = thousandths of an amp) rather than amps. Also, be careful to use the input current or power in any calculations.
What the Rating Plate Will Tell You
The rating plate will tell you:
What voltage the appliance uses in VOLTS (V)
and either
What amperage (current) the appliance draws in AMPS (A) or MILLIAMPS (mA)
or
The power the appliance uses in WATTS (W) or KILOWATTS (kW)
Working out Power & Current (amperage) from the Rating Plate
You can work out how much power (watts) an appliance uses from the Voltage and the current like this (if the current is given in milliamps (mA), multiply the current by 1000 first):
current (amps) X 230 = power (watts)
You can work out the current (amps) an appliance uses from the voltage (230v) and the power (watts) like this (if the power is given in kilowatts (kW), divide the power by 1000 first):
power (watts) = current (amps)
'''''' 230
IMPORTANT NOTE about appliances with motors and magnets (freezers, washing machines, microwaves, etc)
Appliances that have motors, pumps or large magnets in them can use up to seven times more power than is stated on the rating plate for a short while after they are switched on.
For this reason, fridges, freezers, microwaves, washing machines, dishwashers, spin-dryers, vacuum cleaners, air conditioning units, dehumidifiers, power tools and gardening equipment should not be plugged into adaptors or power strips along with other appliances.
