Do you leave your Chargers plugged in?

Hmm. That’s not good news for me.

It is, you should be able to replace yours and save lots of energy

I was looking at the kill-a-watt device. Good to hear the phone chargers are really that low in consumption.

You can always check my reviews of usb chargers, I do include a couple of the phone brands and they are often very good.

Thanks HKJ, that’s a good idea.
I have the Xtar SP1 charger and looked through your review for standby current for just the Xtar walwart (don’t know the correct name to call it) while plugged into wall but not plugged into charger (12V input) and I see you don’t test that.
It could be a nice addition to your reviews to add this info if you wish.

I’ve plugged the Xtar walwart back in when not in use as it was a slight hassle to plug/unplug into wall when wanting to charge. I do however unplug the charger end (12V input)

After I got a stationary power meter I do often include standby/idle power in my charger tests, but it is usual with the charger connected, but idle.

That’s some router :money_mouth_face:

Every charger model is different so you have to check yours. There has been government pressure and some regulation to cut phantom power usage because as it rises it increases societal electricity consumption for little benefit, but there is still a long way to go, some items like cable boxes typically use a great deal of power when idle.

This type of devices can usual not measure low power consumption, but sometimes it is possible to modify the device.

I noticed that, 1W is the lowest it can register

Nope, my Kill-a-watt P3 P4400 does tenths watts. Check out the vampire draw from the XStar SP1:

Although I think you are right that the older ones didn’t do tenths.
PS - if you unplug the XStar at the dock, it’s wall wart draws nothing.

laptop and phone chargers are always plugged in,
I rarely use ni-mh and lithium chargers, so they are unplugged after use.

Even if it shows something, do not expect very good precision, you are on the least significant digit!

Ha, I wonder it it’s not my internet provider’s modem using my free power to power their network!

HKJ, another load reads 2.3 to 2.4, and wonders between those digits freely, so I have high hopes it’s accurate. But you’re right, we can’t be sure.

It does not say much, many meters has a tolerance of +/- a few counts on the last digit. That means 0.1 can mean 0.01 or 0.3. When you are up to two digits it is not really that significant any more.

Cool, thanks, mine does 1W only but if i buy another in the future its will probably be a newer model that does

Yes. I have 4 Eneloop wall chargers that always stay plugged in. (8aa and 8aaa are in them on stand-by).

And my Olight Omni-Dok charger and Tenergy 4 x C/D chargers are always plugged in.

I unplug my charger when not in use

Joshk, thanks for the pic of the SP1 with the kill-a-watt!