How much electricity your consoles use and what they cost you

Electricity is always a big talking point in South Africa.

When we’re not experiencing load-shedding and constant fears of meeting demands, we’re quickly shutting off lights so that the bill doesn’t get too high.

Gamers experience the stress of this problem ten-fold, as their hobby revolves around squeezing as much gaming time out of their platforms as possible.

Below is the average wattage of each of the most popular gaming devices:

Console	Watts
PS4	90-150 (120 average used)
Xbox One	70-120 (95 average used)
Wii U	35
PS3 Slim	85
PS3 Original	190
Xbox 360 S	90
Xbox 360 Original	180
Wii	40

With the above information, we then used an EnergyUse Calculator to calculate the kWh per year of each device, if you were to use it an average of 3 hours a day:

Console	kWh used a year
PS4	131.4
Xbox One	105.85
Wii U	40.15
PS3 Slim	94.9
PS3 Original	208.05
Xbox 360 S	98.55
Xbox 360 Original	197.1
Wii	43.8

The final step is to translate this information to Eskom’s 2016/17 current Tariffs and charges. As this amount differs according to transmission zone and peak periods, we took an average of R1,20 p/kWh and applied it to the above data:

Console	Cost per year
PS4	R157,68
Xbox One	R127,02
Wii U	R48,18
PS3 Slim	R113,88
PS3 Original	R249,66
Xbox 360 S	R118,26
Xbox 360 Original	R236,52
Wii	R52,56

How do the final results compare to your expectations? Are you going to start monitoring your gaming habits or maybe allow yourself a little more play time? Let us know in the comments below and in our forums.