How many watts does a leaf blower use? Find out by entering your wattage, how many hours a day you run it and your electricity rate, then hit Calculate. You get your monthly cost and the kWh it uses. Those same results also cover how much electricity a leaf blower uses.
Planning to clear your yard this fall and wondering how many watts does a leaf blower use? A typical corded electric model draws about 1,020 W while it moves leaves and debris, a battery handheld lands near 500 W, and gas units don't list electrical figures at all. Knowing the wattage of your leaf blower lets you size an extension cord, a generator or a power station, and it explains why the noise and your electricity bill both climb when you squeeze the trigger.
There is no single number, because leaf blowers range from small plug-in tools to backpack units with large battery packs. As a working range, expect roughly 400 W for the lightest corded blower up to about 1,800 W for the strongest, the ceiling being what a standard 15-amp household circuit can deliver. So how much wattage does a leaf blower use on an ordinary Saturday? For most homeowners the answer sits between 660 W and 1,380 W, depending on the model. The table below uses round, representative figures for each style, each one multiplying the pack or line voltage by the current the motor draws. Next, look at how many watts does a waffle maker use.
| Blower type | Volts | Amps | Running power | Cost per hour |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Light corded | 120 | 5.5 | 660 W | $0.11 |
| Mid-range corded | 120 | 8.5 | 1,020 W | $0.17 |
| Heavy-duty corded | 120 | 11.5 | 1,380 W | $0.23 |
| Battery handheld | 40 | 12.5 | 500 W | $0.08 |
| Battery backpack | 56 | 20 | 1,120 W | $0.18 |
Costs in the last column assume an electricity rate of 16.3 cents per kilowatt-hour. Swap in your own rate from your utility bill and the figures scale in a straight line.
A gas engine converts fuel directly into airflow, so its rating is engine size or air speed rather than electrical figures. If you are comparing a gas unit with a plug-in one, compare airflow and weight, not watts.
The math is the same for every electrical appliance. Find the voltage and the current on the label near the motor housing, then use the rule watts = volts x amps:
$$P = V \times I$$A mid-range corded blower on a 120 volts household outlet drawing 8.5 amps works out to:
$$120 \times 8.5 = 1{,}020 \text{ W}$$Most corded models in North America are a 120-volt design, so only the current changes from model to model. Battery tools work the same way, except the voltage is the pack's rating, such as 40 V or 56 V.
The label shows the maximum. Actual draw shifts with motor efficiency, with worn bearings, and with how far the trigger is pulled. A brushless motor wastes less as heat, so a brushless blower can deliver the same airflow on fewer watts. Many motors also pull a short startup surge several times their running current for a fraction of a second, which matters when you size a generator or an inverter.
Wattage is power; what you pay for is energy, which is power multiplied by time. Divide the watts by 1,000 and multiply by the hours to get kilowatt-hours:
$$\text{Energy} = \frac{W \times h}{1000}$$Take the 1,020 W mid-range blower, run for 25 minutes (about 0.42 hours) twice a week through a 12-week fall cleanup. That's 24 sessions, or 10 hours in total.
| Period | kWh used | Cost |
|---|---|---|
| Per session (25 minutes) | 0.43 | $0.07 |
| Per week (2 sessions) | 0.85 | $0.14 |
| Per month (4 weeks) | 3.40 | $0.55 |
| Per year (12-week season) | 10.20 | $1.66 |
That is about $1.66 for the whole season, which is why the plug-in route is one of the cheapest ways to move leaves. Compared with a refrigerator, its 1,020 W draw is several times higher while it runs, but a refrigerator's compressor cycles all day and the blower runs for minutes.
Models with adjustable speeds or a variable throttle draw far less current on the lowest setting. The same blower measured at 3.6 amps on low speed pulls about 430 W, against 1,020 W on high speed, so a lower setting that still moves dry leaves saves energy and noise at the same time. A dedicated speed control dial is worth having for that reason alone.
Because the numbers above are small, the real savings are about run time rather than a different tool. A few habits shave minutes off every job:
Power source decides how you measure consumption. Cords limit your reach, packs limit your time, and gas limits the neighbors' patience.
Corded blowers weigh the least, usually under 9 pounds, and start with a button. They need a power outlet and a heavy-gauge extension cord rated for outdoor use, since a thin cord over a long run causes voltage drop and heat. They cost the least to run per hour in the table above.
A battery handheld blower trades the cord for a pack. A 40 V pack with 4.0 amp-hour batteries stores 160 Wh, so a 500 W blower empties it in about 19 minutes at full throttle. Many people buy within one battery platform so the same packs run mowers and trimmers, and a spare charged pack doubles the working time. Cordless blowers also need no extension cord.
A gas backpack unit carries the engine on your back, holds more fuel and keeps going as long as you refill the tank. Most use a two-stroke engine that needs a fuel and oil mix; a four-stroke engine skips the mixing and burns a little cleaner. Like every gas unit, it is rated by engine size and airflow rather than electrical wattage, so the 500 W to 1,380 W figures in the table apply only to electric and battery models. Expect more maintenance and more emissions in exchange for that unlimited run time.
A portable power station is the usual answer when no outlet is within reach, and sizing it starts with the blower's wattage. For the 1,020 W example, a station with an output rating of at least 1,500 W covers the running load with 50% headroom, and a 1,800 W unit is safer because of the startup surge. Capacity matters as well as output: a 25-minute session needs about 425 Wh, so any station above 500 Wh finishes the job on a single charge. The same logic applies to a backup generator at home during an outage; the blower is rarely the biggest appliance on that circuit, but it can trip an undersized inverter.
Lower wattage tends to mean a lower decibel reading, and that is where electric models earn their quieter reputation: a 430 W low-speed setting is audibly calmer than the same blower at 1,020 W. Noise pollution from gas units is the reason some towns restrict hours or ban them entirely, so check your local regulations. Lower speeds also stir up fewer allergens from the lawn, and you should wear hearing protection whatever the power source.
At home, a blower is one more appliance sharing a circuit, and it behaves differently from the others. Among household appliances, the blower is unusual: unlike a toaster or a space heater, leaf blowers are used briefly and seasonally, so their yearly energy share is tiny even when the running load is high. Plugging one into a kitchen or garage outlet that also feeds a freezer or a heater can still trip the breaker, because a 1,020 W blower plus a 1,500 W heater is already past what a 15-amp, 120-volt circuit supports continuously. Next, look at how much electricity does a jigsaw use.
The environment gets a say as well: an electric blower has no exhaust where you stand, and a season of its electricity uses less energy than a few tanks of gasoline in a handheld gas unit. Battery models carry the same advantage, since charging a 160 Wh pack takes a few cents of power.
For a small yard, corded leaf blowers keep both the purchase price and the power output modest. For a large property, battery backpack leaf blowers and gas models deliver more power output per hour of work, so expect roughly 660 W for a small yard and 1,100 W or more once the area grows. Match the tool to the area first and the circuit second.
Every plug-in tool carries a rating plate, usually molded into the housing near the handle or printed on a sticker beside the motor. Most manufacturers print the power draw in amps, some print the wattage directly, and a few print only the model number, in which case the product page or the owner's manual has the missing figure. Copy it down once and you never have to guess again. Next, look at how much electricity does a hair dryer use.
For a pack-driven tool, read the pack instead: the voltage on the battery and the amp-hour figure give its stored energy, and dividing that energy by the blower's draw gives the minutes of work you can expect from one charge. For the 4.0 amp-hour pack from earlier, 160 Wh divided by 500 W gives the same 19 minutes, so the label tells you the runtime before you buy.
Start from the size of the job, then work backwards to the wattage: about 660 W for the light corded unit, 500 W for the battery handheld and 1,120 W for the backpack. Small yards suit a light corded unit near 660 W; mid-size lots suit a battery handheld with a spare pack; large properties suit a battery backpack or a gas model. If your goal is the lowest running cost and the least environmental impact, an electric blower used at low speed beats the rest, and its yearly electricity bill barely registers next to the other costs of keeping a yard tidy.