| Model | Capacity | Output | Price tier | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jackery Explorer 300 | 292 Wh | 300 W | $ · budget | Phones, router, CPAP one night |
| EcoFlow DELTA 3 Plus | 1024 Wh | 1800 W | $$ · mid-range | Fridge + essentials overnight |
| Anker SOLIX C1000 Gen 2 | 1024 Wh | 2000 W | $$ · mid-range | Highest surge in the 1kWh class |
| Anker SOLIX C2000 Gen 2 | 2048 Wh | 2400 W | $$ · mid-range | Multi-day fridge + fans |
| EcoFlow DELTA Pro 3 | 4096 Wh | 4000 W | $$$ · premium | Whole-home critical circuits |
🔋 How long will a power station run your appliances in an outage?
Quick answer: divide usable battery capacity (rated Wh × ~0.85 inverter efficiency) by the total watts you're running. A 1024Wh station running a refrigerator (~150W while the compressor runs), a box fan (~75W), and a Wi-Fi router (~12W) lasts roughly3.7 hours of continuous draw — and considerably longer in practice, because a fridge compressor only runs 30–50% of the time.
But runtime is the second question. The first is whether the station can run the load at all: a 300W unit cannot power a 500W air conditioner for any length of time, and most stations cannot supply the brief 3–6× surge a fridge compressor demands at startup. The calculator below checks continuous output and startup surge before it reports hours.
Estimates updated . Product buttons are paid Amazon links (disclosure).
2. What you'd run at the same time:
Estimated runtime
— hours
— hours
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Methodology. AC loads are derated 15% for inverter conversion loss — modern portable power station inverters typically run 80–90% efficient under load. Loads marked as running off USB or 12V ports bypass the inverter and are derated only 5%. Appliance figures are typical running draws, not nameplate maximums: the microwave figure is real input draw (about 1,500W for a "1,000W" oven, since the 1,000W rating is cooking output, not consumption). Startup surge is estimated at roughly 6× running watts for compressor appliances and is checked against each station's published peak rating. Compressor appliances cycle on and off, so real-world fridge-only runtime is often 2–3× longer than continuous-draw math suggests. Always check your own appliance's label — these are typical values, not measurements of your unit.
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Go deeper on your result
Sizing for a refrigerator? See what size power station runs a refrigerator. Planning around a CPAP? Read keeping a CPAP running in an outage. Deciding between tiers? Start with battery backup for home: the three tiersor the full whole-house generator vs power station cost math.
What do these terms mean?
Watt-hour (Wh)
A watt-hour is the amount of energy needed to run a 1-watt load for one hour. A 1024Wh battery can power a 100W device for roughly 10 hours before efficiency losses.
Inverter efficiency
Inverter efficiency is the share of stored DC battery energy that survives conversion to household AC power — typically 80–90% in portable power stations. The lost energy becomes heat.
Duty cycle
Duty cycle is the fraction of time an appliance actually draws power. A refrigerator compressor runs about 30–50% of the time, which is why real fridge runtime beats continuous-draw estimates.