Not everyone can understand BTU and they just want to know the energy consumption of their air conditioner. This leads to the question, how many watts does an air conditioner use?
How many watts does an air conditioner use
Well, it depends on the unit that you want to purchase. While it is not important to know all about BTU, still, here’s a little information about it.
The BTU (British Thermal Units) is a unit of measure used to describe the capacity of air conditioner. A BTU is defined as the amount of heat required to raise the temperature of one pound of water by one degree Fahrenheit.
- A BTU is equivalent to about 1/100th of a watt.
- 0.08 ton = 1,000 BTU/hr = 293.07 Watts
- BTU and tons are often used interchangeably.
Most brand new air conditioners tell you the power consumption of the unit. You can find it in the tag, body, and user manual.
But for whatever reason you can’t find the power rating (Wattage), just use the calculator or the table below.
To manually compute the wattage of your AC, use this simple formula:
BTU / EER = your AC’s wattage
Important note: You also need to consider the EER of your brand new AC.
This table will also answer the most common BTU to watts questions like:
| BTU | Watts |
| How many Watts does 8,000 BTU Air Conditioner use? | 684 Watts up to 1143 Watts |
| How many Watts does 9,000 BTU Air Conditioner use? | 769 Watts up to 1286 Watts |
| How many Watts does 10,000 BTU Air Conditioner use? | 855 Watts up to 1429 Watts |
| How many Watts does 11,000 BTU Air Conditioner use? | 940 Watts up to 1571 Watts |
| How many Watts does 12,000 BTU Air Conditioner use? | 1026 Watts up to 1714 Watts |
| How many Watts does 13,000 BTU Air Conditioner use? | 1111 Watts up to 1857 Watts |
| How many Watts does 14,000 BTU Air Conditioner use? | 1197 Watts up to 2000 Watts |
| How many Watts does 15,000 BTU Air Conditioner use? | 1282 Watts up to 2143 Watts |
Use this table for faster conversion.
A small tip before buying air conditioner
When it comes to your air conditioning unit, more capacity is not always better, since the more refrigerant that is required to cool a space, the more energy that will be required to run your air conditioner.
For example, a 60,000 BTU air conditioner will use much more energy than a 36,000 BTU air conditioner.
However, if you don’t have adequate insulation, your 36,000 BTU air conditioner will use much more energy than a 60,000 BTU air conditioner.
So, when it comes to choosing an air conditioner, it’s important to consider:
- Capacity
- (BTU)
- Condition of insulation.
- Households with poor insulation may need to install a larger capacity air conditioner to bring cooling to their house.