How Many Watts Does a Gaming Laptop Use | Usage and Costs

Let’s get it out there: you’re planning on buying a gaming laptop or have one already and wondering how many watts it uses. So, really, how many watts does a gaming laptop use on average? And how much electricity bill do they add up to? That we’ll find out today in this guide.

For instance, this article will explain average laptop watt consumption and electricity usage to help estimate how much it costs you monthly. Plus, we’ll explore the electricity usage of today’s most popular gaming and normal laptops. 

With that said, let’s roll in. 

How Many Watts Does a Gaming Laptop Use?

A gaming laptop’s wattage usually falls between 30W and 350W. It all depends on the type of gaming laptop you have and its hardware parts. 

Gaming laptops with multiple fans, big high-refresh-rate displays, and powerful hardware parts carry higher wattage than laptops with normal features. 

One popular gaming laptop, the Acer Predator Helios, generally consumes between 100-110 watts. Furthermore, gaming laptops like Zephyrus 15 and Dell G15 require 200W and 180W, respectively. 

Even gaming laptops don’t consume much power when you’re not running high-end processes like heavy games. Their wattage depends on how heavily your laptop’s hardware is being used. 

For instance, your laptop will consume more power when running a high-end game than when processing a simple game. 

Besides that, your laptop’s wattage during heavy processing highly depends on its hardware specifications. 

Factors That Affect a Gaming Laptop’s Wattage

Your laptop’s wattage keeps changing. Its wattage at any given moment depends on various factors that we’ll quickly explore below:

Graphics Card TGP

One major hardware part affecting your laptop’s wattage is its graphics card’s TGP, Total Graphics Power. It refers to how much power a graphics card consumes at a given time. 

The high-end graphics cards like RTX 3080 Ti require up to 170 watts themselves, let alone the other hardware parts like the CPU. So, the TGP of your laptop’s graphics card greatly impacts its overall wattage.

CPU Wattage

Your laptop’s CPU wattage also highly affects its overall wattage. Generally speaking, laptop CPUs generally consume between 45W-50W at a given time. 

But the top-end mobile processors like the Core i9-12950HX require up to 157W when used at their max turbo speed. So, your laptop’s CPU wattage also plays a role in its overall wattage. 

Hardware Usage

Another factor that greatly impacts your laptop’s wattage is its hardware usage. The CPU, graphics card, and other hardware parts consume more power when used at their max capacity. 

For instance, the Core i9-12950HX processor has a base wattage of 55W. But at its maximum turbo power, it requires up to 157W. 

Other than that, the power consumption of your laptop’s hardware parts is at its maximum when you enable overclocking on the CPU or GPU. On the flip side, putting your laptop in non-gaming or power-saving mode limits its hardware power and, thus, power consumption. 

Screen Brightness

The display is another significant electric consumption hardware part of laptops. That’s why slightly dimming your display provides extra hours of battery life and vice versa. 

With that at hand, your laptop’s screen brightness affects its power consumption. If your laptop’s brightness is always at 100%, it will consume significantly more power. 

But if you switch off your laptop’s display and use an external display with it, the laptop’s overall wattage will be lower. 

Game Graphics Settings

The type of games you run and their graphics settings will also impact your laptop’s power usage. If you play hardcore games like Red Dead Redemption at max settings on your laptop, its hardware usage will be at max, leading to more power consumption. 

But if you play the same game on low graphics settings, less hardware power will be needed, resulting in lower wattage. 

Similarly, the power consumption will be lower when playing traditional and classic games with low hardware requirements. 

Gaming Laptop Wattage in Different Modes

Below is an overview of the power ratings of the most popular gaming laptops:

Laptop Name	Wattage
Razer Blade 15	230 watts
Asus ROG Zephyrus G14 (2022)	105 watts
Razer Blade 14	230 watts
Lenovo Legion 5 Pro	170 watts
MSI GS66 Stealth	105 watts
Acer Predator Helios 300	100 watts
Asus ROG Strix Scar 17 (2022)	100 watts
Alienware m17 R5 AMD (2022)	165 watts
Asus ROG Zephyrus G15	115 watts
Razer Blade 17	200 watts
MSI GE76 Raider	155 watts
Asus ROG Strix G15	243 watts
HP Victus 15	200 watts
MacBook Air	30 watts
MacBook Pro 13″	61 watts
MacBook Pro 14″	67 watts
MacBook Pro 16″	96W or 140W according to specs
Dell G15 Gaming Laptop	180 watts

Note 1: As mentioned above, a laptop’s power rating differs from its wattage. Laptops generally consume less power than their max power ratings.   

Note 2: The accurate wattage of a laptop may differ depending on the hardware configurations you pick. 

How Many Watts Does a Normal Laptop Use?

A normal laptop generally uses between 30W-250W of power. The most popular wattage for normal laptops, however, is 65W. But a laptop with a 65W power rating generally only uses half the wattage unless you use its hardware parts at their max. 

That said, here’s an overview of the wattage of everyday laptops in different modes:

• Off mode – 0.30W
• Idle mode – 2.50W
• Short idle mode – 5.90W
• Sleep mode – 0.70W

The number of watts consumed by gaming laptops in the above modes is quite the same or slightly higher. 

Once again, your laptop’s wattage depends on its models, specifications, brand, and many other factors. The power consumption of its different components, like the CPU, graphics card, and display, affects its overall wattage. 

Why Do Gaming Laptops Consume More Power Than Normal Laptops?

Gaming laptops consume significantly more watts than everyday laptops because of their power-hungry hardware parts. These laptops come with high-end graphics cards and processors with considerably higher power ratings than regular laptops. 

For instance, NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2080 is a relatively old yet powerful graphics card for gaming laptops. It alone consumes around 150 watts. 

On the flip side, normal laptops rarely come with dedicated graphics cards with high wattage. Similarly, these laptops carry less powerful processors with little power consumption. 

Apart from that, gaming laptops usually pack multiple-fan cooling systems, RGB lighting, and ultra-smooth displays, all of which add up to their overall wattage. 

How Many Watts Does a Laptop Charger Use?

Generally speaking, laptop chargers consume 30-50 watts. If your laptop supports 50W charging, it’ll charge faster with a 50W charger than with a 30W one. Anyhow, gaming laptop chargers usually have higher power ratings of up to 180W. 

That said, your laptop charger may keep using electricity when plugged into an outlet but not your laptop. However, it only uses a tiny part of a watt, such as 0.33 watts. The power consumed by laptop chargers is usually negligible. 

12 Effective Ways to Limit Your Laptop’s Electricity Usage

Below are the most effective ways to reduce your laptop’s power consumption and electricity bill. 

1. Make it Go to Sleep Mode Sooner

Generally speaking, a laptop sleeps after a particular time to reduce power consumption and increase battery life. It’s highly effective for office workers, work-from-home individuals, and hardcore gamers who use their laptops for extended periods. 

But you can always benefit more from this feature by setting your laptop to sleep mode sooner. An inactivity time of 1-2 minutes works best for most users. 

2. Limit Its Screen Brightness

Your laptop’s screen brightness is on par with its power usage. So, you can significantly reduce its energy consumption by reducing its screen brightness. You may lower its screen brightness anytime you feel the screen is too bright and causing eye fatigue. 

3. Disable Background Apps You Don’t Use

It’s not uncommon to have many apps running in the background. These continuously use your laptop’s hardware juice and, thus, its power. So, it’s preferable to disable the background apps you don’t use to limit your laptop’s power usage. 

If you’re on Windows, use Task Manager to close unused apps. For Macbooks, you can use Activity Monitor to track background processes. 

4. Use Lower Graphics Settings in Games

AAA games like Red Dead Redemption, GTA V, and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare are popular among gamers. But these require a lot of hardware resources from your laptop and, thus, consume a lot of power. 

If you continuously play high-end games like these on your laptop, consider lowering their graphics settings, like display resolution and graphics details to reduce power consumption. 

5. Charge Your Laptop When Power is Cheap

Generally, electricity is cheaper when its demand is less, like at night. When power is cheap in your area depends on your electricity provider, but mostly it’s between 10 AM and 8 AM. 

So, charging your laptop within this time range is preferable for a minimum electricity bill. You can do the same for other electrical appliances and devices at your home. 

6. Disable RGB Lighting

RGB lighting looks cool, but it continuously uses power. If you wish to reduce your gaming laptop’s power usage, disable its RGB lights. Don’t worry; you can turn them on anytime you wish to flex!

7. Unplug the Laptop When Battery is Full

It’s not uncommon for laptops to keep consuming power when they’re in off mode, their battery is fully charged, but their charger is plugged in. So, consider unplugging the laptop when the battery is full to avoid unnecessary power usage. 

8. Use Power Saving Mode

You can also use put your laptop in the power saving mode to save power. This mode disables unused features and processes of your laptop and limits its hardware power and screen brightness to reduce energy consumption. 

9. Consider Battery Saving Mode Too

The battery and power saving modes are different, as the first one is optimized to make your laptop’s battery last longer. If you’re concerned about longer battery life, put your laptop in battery-saving mode. 

10. Switch Off Wi-Fi and Bluetooth

The features like Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and keyboard brightness keep using your laptop’s power in the background. So, it’s worth disabling them when not in use. 

11. Don’t Let It Heat Up

Your laptop’s performance drops as it heats up. Its hardware parts, like the processor and graphics card, have to struggle more in such a case to maintain performance. The result is increased power consumption, besides risk to the sensitive hardware of your laptop. 

With that at hand, use your laptop on a flat surface to prevent overheating. If your laptop overheats too much, consider a cooling pad.

12. Disconnect External Devices When Not in Use

I’ve seen many gamers hook up a second display, an external mouse, a portable hard drive, and other external devices with gaming laptops. 

Sure, these devices class up your laptop’s user experience, but they continuously use power. So, it’s worth switching them off when you don’t need them. 

Wrapping It Up

Whether you already own a gaming laptop or looking to buy one, considering its electricity usage is an intelligent move.

Generally speaking, gaming laptops use between 35W to 320W and don’t lead to significant electricity usage. 

Though gaming laptops typically use 2-3 times more power than normal laptops, their electricity cost usually doesn’t go beyond $0.75/mo. 

Simply put, powerful gaming laptops don’t come with a significant addition to your electricity bill every month. Instead, they’re pretty inexpensive to keep. 

Further, you can close background processes, reduce screen brightness, and adjust your laptop’s sleep settings to reduce battery consumption.