On this page, you will find out how many watts a LED light uses.
You’ve probably heard it a thousand times, if you want to save electricity use LED lighting in your home. There are two reasons behind this switch away from incandescent lighting. First, LED light bulbs last for a lot longer before burning out. Secondly, the power consumption is minuscule, in fact, it’s 80% less than traditional lighting!
Below we will discuss and test LED light wattage, explain how to work it out for yourself, and calculate the total electricity required.
How Many Watts is an LED Light?
The average LED light uses between 5 to 10 watts.
The exact number depends on the size, model, and bulb of your LED light. In many cases, the power consumption can vary wildly. For example, a lamp with a single LED bulb uses around 6W, while a floodlight with over 100 LED bulbs can reach over 100W!
In a domestic setting, an LED light won’t reach more than 10W, as it would become too bright.
While LED lights use 80% less power than a traditional incandescent you can still reach high power levels with a large number of bulbs. When looking at the power consumption you should take into account the wattage of an individual bulb and how many bulbs you are running.
How to Find Out Your LED Light Wattage
There’s 3 ways you can work out the wattage of an LED light.
- Check Product Specification
The quickest way is to look at the LED light’s specification. The watts (W) is usually written on a sticker on the base of the appliance. If not, you can check the user manual or the manufacturer’s website for technical details.
- Use a Wattmeter
A wattmeter is brilliant for getting a live wattage reading and tracking total energy usage of any appliance. You can plug it into your LED light to get instant information.
I used one to test my LED light bulb pictured above which gave a live reading of 9.7W.
- Wattage Formula or Calculator
If you know the amperage and voltage of your LED light you can use this to find the maximum watt rating. Simply use the formula Amps x Volts = Watts. Or you can head over to the ‘Watt Calculator’ to work this out.
LED Light Wattage Examples
Let’s take a look at specific examples of how many watts an LED light draws. Below is a collection of modern LED light bulbs with their listed power ratings.
| LED Light Bulb | Power Rating (Watts) |
| GE LED Standard Light Bulbs | 10 |
| Linkind A19 LED Light Bulb | 9 |
| SYLVANIA ECO LED Light Bulb | 9 |
| LE 100W Equivalent LED Light Bulbs | 14 |
| Rayh Color Changing Light Bulb | 5 |
| Sunco Lighting BR30 LED | 11 |
| LED Healthy Light Globe Bulb | 6 |
| Comzler LED Daylight Bulb | 6 |
As you can see, the power ratings vary between different LED lights. So you should take the time to check your own appliance.
How Much Electricity Does an LED Light Use?
You can use LED light bulb wattage to work out how much electricity it uses. Plus this can be useful in understanding how much it costs to run your LED light.
A watt (W) is a measurement of power at a single point in time. A watt-hour (Wh) is the total amount of electricity used in an hour. For example, an LED light drawing 10W would use 10Wh when running for an hour.
Happily, electricity bills are recorded in kilowatt-hours (kWh). A kilowatt is simply 1000 watts. So a 10W LED light running for 1 hour uses 0.01kWh.
In reality, you use an LED light for 5 hours a day. This means an LED light uses about 50Wh or 0.05kWh electricity a day. That’s 1.5kWh a month and 18.25kWh a year.
That’s a rough electricity cost of $0.22 a month or $2.73 a year to run a 10W LED light for 5 hours a day.
Using an LED Light Off-Grid
If you’re planning to use your LED light in an off-grid situation like a power outage, RV, boat, camper, semi-truck, or similar, the information above is helpful. You can ensure your electrical equipment is powerful enough and calculate the runtime.
You can either use a power inverter, portable power station, or generator to generate AC electricity.
To make sure everything runs smoothly you should check two things on this equipment – wattage capacity and total energy capacity.
Your power source, like an inverter, should have a wattage capacity of at least 20% more than your LED light. This ensures it will be able to deliver enough power as they are never 100% efficient. For example, a 100W inverter is able to run 80W worth of LED lighting.
Secondly, you need to ensure your energy source, like a battery, has enough energy to run the LED light for the required amount of time. As we already know, one light bulb uses upto 10Wh electricity an hour. This is the equivalent to 8.3Ah on a 12V battery.
How Many Watts Does a LED Light Use Summary
I hope you now understand how many watts an LED light uses.
It’s no secret that the LED lighting industry continues to grow exponentially. The reason for this popularity is the long lasting design and low energy consumption. As you know, a single bulb uses less than 10W and can easily light up a whole room. If you’re trying to save electricity or looking for off-grid lighting solutions, then LED is your best friend.
