Don’t Worry About Unplugging Wall Chargers When Not in Use
There is nothing wrong with trying to conserve electricity and lower your electricity bill, but turning off the chargers for smartphones, tablets, and laptops when they’re not charging does little. They are not the energy vampires that some think.
If you’ve ever wondered, “How much does it cost me to leave the charger plugged in?” Chris Hoffman of How-To Geek has your answer: almost nothing. Using the Kill a Watt meter, Hoffman tested chargers for iPhones, iPads, MacBooks, Chromebooks, Windows laptops, and Android phones. Individually, each charger consumed a large 0.0W of power. Then, just in case, Hoffman filled the entire extension cord with six different chargers and got a total reading of 0.3W.
Assuming you have the highest electricity cost in the country (30.04 cents per kWh in Hawaii), it would only cost you about 79 cents to keep them plugged in for the entire year. And this is provided that you never disconnect them from the network for travel or movement around the house for 8,760 hours a year. So go ahead, leave your chargers plugged in if you like. That being said, there are still a few energy vampires in your home to watch out for ( this calculator might help, too). Plus, things change when your charger is actually connected to your device, so it’s still not a good idea to keep charging your devices all the time. The whole experiment is worth reading, so check it out at the link below.
Tested: Should chargers be unplugged when not in use? | How-To Geek