Laptops

How Many Watts Does It Take To Charge A Laptop?

The wattage varies from laptop to laptop so there is no exact number we can say about how many watts a laptop needs to be charged as it depends on the battery size and specifications. However, some range can be suggested that can give a rough idea of how many watts a laptop needs on average and that is 30 watts to 300 watts, again it depends on laptop specifications. Moreover, there are some factors that decide how much wattage a laptop requires to get charged and I have explained most of them so you can get the exact wattage required to charge a laptop.

Deciding factors for how much wattage a laptop needs to get itself charged

Laptops have a number of electronic components that consume a considerable amount of energy to function. Moreover, the laptop manufacturers design the battery according to the power required by the whole laptop to function efficiently.

For example, the gaming laptops need more power to function properly so its battery will be bulky and require more wattage to charge. On the other hand, simple laptops do not need large amounts of power as they do not run comparatively high-end applications thus requiring less wattage to get charged. So, below are the two factors that must be foreseen in order to get to know about the exact wattage your laptop need for changing:

Battery

One of the main differences between a laptop and a desktop PC is that the laptop has a battery which makes it work in standalone mode.

Moreover, the manufacturers design the battery capacity normally according to the power consumption of all other components of the laptop. Therefore batteries provide all the necessary power to all the components of a laptop to make it work in standalone mode

Similarly, normal laptops have smaller capacity batteries like Dell Inspiron 15 5000 has a battery capacity of 54-watt hour whereas the Dell G15 gaming laptop has a battery capacity of 86 watt hour. The average range of battery capacity lies between 50-watt hour and 90-watt hours. To check your battery capacity one should consult the user manual of the laptop and it will tell you how many watts are required to charge the laptop.

Charging adaptor

The charger that comes with the laptop is designed by the manufacturers to fulfill the requirement of the laptop and according to the battery capacity. To get an exact idea of how much power will be required by the laptop to get charged see the details on the sticker at the back side of the charger:

The power rating of the charger is set more than the battery capacity as some of the components need high power to function properly such as graphic cards. So in that case one has to connect the charger before playing games otherwise the battery drain time will considerably decrease.

Conclusion

The energy consumption of a laptop mainly depends on the power required by the battery to run the laptop in standalone mode. Moreover, there are some of the main components that make most use of the power of a laptop. There are primarily two things one should look for in order to get to know about how many watts a laptop needs to charge itself, one the battery capacity and other is the laptop charger.

About the author

Aaliyan Javaid

I am an electrical engineer and a technical blogger. My keen interest in embedded systems has led me to write and share my knowledge about them.