Free & impartial energy advice for anyone in Fife

Watt does it cost?

by |Published

Taking control of the appliances in your home is a great way to start saving energy and money. We’ve put together a list of some of the most common household appliances and calculated how much they’d cost to run for an hour.

Different models and brands of appliances will vary in their power consumption (wattage). We’ve made some assumptions about the average or most likely wattage of these appliances. It’s important to remember this table is a rough guide to what these will cost you.
 
We’ve also calculated assuming the appliance will use the ‘maximum‘ wattage for the entire hour, this is not always the case. For example with a washing machine, it will cycle through a programme which draws varying amounts of energy, and a fridge freeze won’t need to draw as much electricity once it has achieved the desired temperature.
 
To calculate how much each appliance uses per hour, we have assumed an electricity unit rate of 25p. This is approximately what the current standard variable tariff is set at as of October 2026, while covered by the Energy Price Cap. The current figures should be taken as a rough indication of what your appliances may use.

Appliance

Wattage

kWh rating

Cost per hour
Electric shower 10,000 10 £2.50
Immersion Heater 3000 3 75p
Kettle 3000 3 75p
Tumble dryer 3000 3 75p
Electric Fire 2500 2.5 62p
Electric Oven 2000 2 50p
Oil Filled Radiator 2000 2 50p
Hairdryer 2000 2 50p
Grill/Hob 1500 1.5 38p
Dishwasher 1400 1.4 35p
Washing Machine 1400 1.4 35p
Iron 1400 1.4 35p
Air Fryer 1400 1.4 35p
Electric Mower 1300 1.3 32p
Vacuum cleaner 1200 1.2 30p
Toaster 1100 1.1 27p
Microwave 800 0.8 20p
Dehumidifier 700 0.7 18p
Towel Rail 500 0.5 13p
Plasma TV 450 0.45 11p
Fridge Freezer 400 0.4 10p
LCD TV 200 0.2 5p
Heated Blanket 150 0.15 4p
Freezer 150 0.15 4p
Desktop PC 150 0.15 4p
Games Console 150 0.15 4p
Fridge 100 0.12 3p
Slow Cooker 75 0.075 2p
Laptop (charging) 65 0.065 2p
TV Box (Satellite, Cable, Freeview etc) 40 0.04 1p
DVD Player 30 0.03 1p
Tablet (charging) 10 0.01 <1p
LED Bulb 9 0.009 <1p
Router 7 0.007 <1p
Extractor Fan 5 0.005 <1p
Smart phone (charging) 2.5 0.0025 <1p

If you want to find out what your own appliances use, it’s actually quite easy. It’s something you can get the kids involved in too.

Each electrical item in your home will have a sticker, usually on the back or bottom which shows its wattage. You’re most likely to know this for your microwave, as the wattage means you need to vary cooking times.

Once you find the wattage you divide this (÷) by 1000 to get the kWh (kilo-Watt hour) rating. A kWh is the unit of measurement we use to record energy consumption. Each unit on your electricity meter will be 1 kWh.

Once you have the kWh rating you then multiply (x) this by your tariff cost, at the moment it’s likely to be around 25p.

This may look like the following:

2500 watts ÷ 1000 = 2.5 kWh

2.5 kWh x 0.25 = 62p

 

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