How Much Does It Cost to Run a TV Cable Box?
About $39 a year for one HD DVR — $3.23 a month at $0.16/kWh. It draws 30W while you watch and 27W while it is switched off, so 77% of that is spent on a box nobody is looking at. Set your own wattage, hours and rate below.
Nearly as high as the figure beside it. That is the whole problem.
Typical draw by device
Cable box cost per year
$38.72
242 kWh at $0.16/kWh — $3.23 a month, watched or not.
Spent while nobody watches
$29.96
27W for 19 hours a day — 77% of the total
Per hour actually watched
2.1¢
The whole year's bill over 5 hours a day of viewing
Saved by a streaming stick
$36.73
3W watching, 1W idle — a year
30W for 5 hours plus 27W for the other 19 averages 27.6W around the clock × 8,760 hours = 242 kWh × $0.16 = $38.72. Drop the viewing to an hour a day and it barely moves.
Every extra room on the cable package has its own box, and each one runs all year whether that room is used or not.
Household set-top boxes are commonly metered in a 10–40 W band, DVR models at the top of it, and they hold most of that draw when switched off — the presets above are round figures inside that band rather than a spec sheet. A plug-in meter will tell you your own box in a day. Not sure of your rate? Check average rates by state.
How much electricity does a cable box use?
Yearly cost = average watts ÷ 1,000 × 8,760 hours × your rate
Every other appliance on this site is billed by the hours you use it. A set-top box is not, because it never really switches off. Pressing the power button leaves the tuner warm, the program guide downloading, and the DVR listening for tonight’s recording — so a 30W box only falls to about 27W, where a modern TV drops to one or two. The right question is not how many hours you watch. It is how many watts the box holds for the 8,760 hours in a year.
Worked example (HD DVR, 30W watching, 27W off, 5 hours a day, $0.16/kWh): 30W × 5 h + 27W × 19 h = 27.6W on average, all day. That is 0.0276 kW × 8,760 h = 242 kWh × $0.16 = $38.72 per year, or $3.23 a month.
The box costs more to run than the television
A typical 55" LED TV pulls 100W — more than three times the DVR beneath it — and still costs less to own, because it is dark for 19 hours a day. On 5 hours of daily viewing the panel uses 183 kWh a year and the box uses 242: the box burns about 33% more electricity than the screen it feeds, and it has no screen. Full detail on the panel itself is on our cost to run a TV page.
Why watching less TV barely lowers the bill
Because the gap between 30W and 27W is so narrow, viewing hours have almost nothing to push against. Every row below is the same 30W / 27W DVR at $0.16/kWh, and the annual cost hardly moves between a box you never turn on and one you never turn off. What does move — dramatically — is what each hour of television actually costs you.
| Hours watched a day | Average draw | Cost per year | Per hour watched |
|---|---|---|---|
| Never switched onA guest-room box, plugged in and forgotten | 27W | $37.84 | — |
| 1 hour | 27.1W | $38.02 | 10.4¢ |
| 2 hours | 27.3W | $38.19 | 5.2¢ |
| 5 hoursUS average viewing | 27.6W | $38.72 | 2.1¢ |
| 8 hours | 28.0W | $39.24 | 1.3¢ |
| 12 hours | 28.5W | $39.95 | 0.9¢ |
| Never switched offAll 24 hours at full draw | 30W | $42.05 | 0.5¢ |
The whole range of human viewing habits spans 11% of the annual cost. For comparison, the TV itself costs 1.6¢ an hour and nothing at all when dark — so at 5 hours a day the box is the more expensive half of the pair, per hour and per year.
Spent while nobody watches
$29.96
187 kWh · 77% of the total
Per hour actually watched
2.1¢
Against 1.6¢ for the TV
Unplugged 8 hours a night
$12.61
Saved a year — if it records nothing
Cable box vs. streaming stick: electricity compared
A streaming stick draws 3W watching and 1W idle. The wattage gap while watching is about tenfold; the annual gap is far wider, because the stick genuinely idles and the box genuinely does not. Every row runs the same 5 hours a day at $0.16/kWh.
| Device | Watching | Idle | kWh per year | Cost per year | vs. HD DVR |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Thin client boxThe extra-room box that streams from the main DVR | 10W | 9W | 81 | $12.91 | −$25.81 |
| HD cable box, no DVRTuner and guide only — nothing to record with | 15W | 14W | 124 | $19.91 | −$18.80 |
| HD DVRThe common rental box, and this page's anchor | 30W | 27W | 242 | $38.72 | — |
| Satellite receiver with DVRSame story as cable — the dish changes nothing here | 30W | 27W | 242 | $38.72 | $0.00 |
| Whole-home DVR gatewayServes several rooms; the hungriest box in the house | 40W | 36W | 323 | $51.63 | +$12.91 |
| Smart TV appNo second device — the TV's own draw already counts it | 0W | 0W | 0 | $0.00 | −$38.72 |
| Streaming stickRoku Streaming Stick, Fire TV Stick, Chromecast | 3W | 1W | 12 | $1.99 | −$36.73 |
| Streaming boxApple TV, Roku Ultra, Nvidia Shield | 5W | 2W | 23 | $3.68 | −$35.04 |
Swapping one HD DVR for a streaming stick saves about $37 a year in electricity — $73 in a two-box household — and the stick costs roughly $1.99 a year to run, about 20 times less than the box. Electricity only. Whether streaming is cheaper overall depends on the subscriptions replacing the cable package, which is a much larger number than anything on this page.
Why the box cannot idle the way a stick can
A streaming stick has one job and does it on demand: when you stop watching, there is nothing left to keep running. A cable box has three more. It holds a tuner locked to the cable plant so a channel appears instantly, it downloads a rolling program guide through the night, and if it is a DVR it wakes to record whether the house is empty or asleep. Those are features, and they are the reason “off” costs 27W. Nothing you can change in a settings menu will alter it much.
The smart TV app is the cheapest option of all
If the television has the app built in, it adds no device and no watts beyond the panel you are already paying for — the top row of the table, at zero. A stick is worth its $1.99 a year when the TV is old, slow, or missing the service you want. Either way, the electricity difference against a 30W box is the same order: about $37 a year, per room you stop renting a box for.
How to cut what the box costs
Return the boxes you do not watch
The single biggest lever, because the cost follows the box rather than the viewing. A DVR in a guest room costs the same $37.84 a year whether anyone ever switches it on, and the rental fee on top of that is usually larger than the electricity.
Smart-strip the boxes that record nothing
A switched strip or scheduled smart plug that kills a 27W box for 8 hours a night saves $12.61 a year. Never do this to a DVR with scheduled recordings, and expect a few minutes of guide download when it comes back.
Ask for thin clients, not extra DVRs
Most providers offer a low-power client box for extra rooms that streams from the main DVR rather than tuning and recording on its own. At 10W against 30W it costs $12.91 a year instead of $38.72.
Cut the cord on the secondary rooms first
You do not have to abandon cable to stop paying for four tuners. Replacing the boxes in the bedrooms with sticks or the TV’s own apps saves about $37 a year each, and those are the boxes with the worst cost per hour actually watched.
Meter it before you believe any of this
Set-top box draw varies more between models than any figure here suggests. A plug-in meter left on the box for a day settles the question, and it is the only way to know what your particular box does when you press “off”.
Chase the box before the chargers
One DVR’s standby outweighs every phone charger, microwave clock and coffee timer in the house put together. The blanket advice to unplug everything wastes effort on watts that do not exist. More in our vampire appliances guide.
Related Guides
Cost to Run a TV
The panel this box plugs into — by size, OLED vs LED, and standby
Vampire Appliances
The DVR tops this list. What the other nine cost you
Appliances That Run 24/7
Fridge, modem, cameras and set-top box priced by the year
How to Save on Energy Bills
Practical tips by room with savings
Cost to Run a Light Bulb
The other small load that adds up by the hour
Electricity Rates by State
Find your state's average rate
Frequently Asked Questions
How much does a cable box cost to run?
About $39 a year, or $3.23 a month, for one HD DVR at the 2024 US average rate of $0.16/kWh. The box draws roughly 30W while you watch and about 27W while it is switched off, which averages 27.6W across the day — so it uses 242 kWh over the 8,760 hours in a year. Rent two boxes and you pay it twice. A plain HD box with no DVR is closer to half that; a whole-home gateway serving several rooms is more.
How much electricity does a cable box use when it is off?
Almost as much as when it is on. A set-top box does not really power down — it keeps the tuner warm, downloads the program guide, and on a DVR records to schedule whether anyone is home or not. Pressing "off" on a 30W box typically drops it to something like 27W, not to the 1-2W a modern TV falls to. Over the 19 hours a day nobody is watching, that is 187 kWh and $29.96 a year — 77% of everything the box costs you. It is the largest standby load in most homes by a wide margin.
Does a cable box use more electricity than the TV?
Usually yes, which surprises almost everyone. A typical 55" LED TV watched 5 hours a day uses 183 kWh a year and costs $29. The DVR beneath it uses 242 kWh and costs $39 — about 33% more electricity, from a device with no screen. The TV is only on for 5 hours; the box is on for all 24. Hours, not watts, are what separate them.
Do streaming sticks use less power than a cable box?
By a large margin. A streaming stick draws about 3W while streaming and falls to roughly 1W when idle, because unlike a cable box it has no tuner to keep warm and nothing to record. On the same 5 hours of daily viewing that is $1.99 a year against the DVR's $39 — roughly 20 times less. Swapping one box saves about $37 a year in electricity; a two-box household saves about $73, before anything the cable bill itself does.
Should I unplug my cable box?
Only if it has nothing to record. Unplugging a 27W box overnight — say 8 hours — saves about $12.61 a year per box, and a switched power strip makes that effortless. But a DVR that is unplugged cannot record, and a box that has been fully powered down often takes several minutes to re-download its guide before it will show you anything. The good candidates are the boxes in guest rooms and bedrooms that nobody records to and nobody watches for weeks at a time. The living-room DVR that records four series a week is not one of them.
Why does watching less TV not lower my cable box bill?
Because you are billed for the box, not for the viewing. At 30W watching and 27W idle, cutting from 5 hours a day to one hour takes the annual cost from $38.72 to $38.02 — a rounding error. The extreme case makes it plainer still: a box you never switch on costs $37.84 a year, and one you never switch off costs $42.05, a spread of only 11% across every possible viewing habit. The lever is the box's existence, not its use — which is why the cost per hour actually watched (2.1¢ at 5 hours a day) climbs so fast for a set you rarely turn on.