Efficiency Calculator
Our efficiency calculator will help you instantly calculate the ratio of energy output to energy input.
We paired this tool with a short text covering:
- Efficiency definition;
- How to calculate efficiency;
- The efficiency formula; and
- Some use cases for efficiency.
Keep reading to learn more about this topic!
What is efficiency?
Efficiency is the ratio between the energy output of a machine or process and its energy input.
A machine converts only a certain amount of energy into useful work when you supply energy to it. The rest is lost as heat or friction.
💡 The Carnot efficiency is the efficiency of a machine working under the Carnot cycle, a thermodynamic cycle that maximizes the efficiency of a heat engine.
How to calculate efficiency ― Efficiency formula
As we said, efficiency is the ratio between energy output and energy input. We summarize this in the efficiency formula:
The result is a percentage between 0% and 100%, where 0% efficiency means all energy is lost during the process. On the other hand, no energy loss occurs in a 100% efficiency process.
In practice, the efficiency of any process cannot be 100%. There will always be energy losses.
🔎 Check our power dissipation calculator to learn why the components in an electric circuit heat as current flows through them.
Efficiency use-cases
Although this efficiency calculator finds the energy efficiency of a process or machine, we can also use the efficiency definition to measure productivity or fuel efficiency.
For example, we measure the efficiency of a light bulb in lumens per watt by dividing the amount of light produced in lumens (the output) by the wattage consumption (the input).
A solar panel's efficiency is usually between 15-20%, and it tells us how much solar energy it can convert to usable energy.
