Power Station Size Calculator

Tick what you'll actually run. You get your daily watt-hours, the power station capacity the trip needs after solar, driving and the rig's own battery, and the inverter rating your biggest appliance demands.

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Start from
What you'll run, per day
The trip

How the number is worked out

Each appliance is watts × hours. Anything that plugs into a household outlet runs through an inverter, which costs about 15%, so those are counted 15% higher. That sum is your daily budget.

Solar is counted as rated watts × peak sun hours × system efficiency — 210, 338 or 480 Wh per 100 W of panel depending on the sun. Driving counts the 12 V socket at about 110 W, which is what a socket fused near 10 A delivers.

Whatever recharging doesn't cover, you have to carry for every day of the trip — and even if solar covers the whole day, you still need one day's worth stored to get through the night. The rig's house battery takes the first share: a 100 Ah lead-acid battery gives about 600 Wh, because discharging it past half damages it. The power station covers the rest, rounded up to a size that is actually sold.

Air conditioning and electric space heaters are left out on purpose. A 2 kWh station runs a rooftop AC for about an hour, if its inverter survives the startup surge at all. Those need shore power or a generator. The full reasoning is inHow Much Power Do You Actually Need in a Van or RV?

Buying the size you just got

Check two numbers, not one. Capacity in watt-hours decides how long; continuous inverter output decides what you can run at all. Then look for LiFePO4 cells — thousands of cycles instead of a few hundred — and pass-through charging, so the station can sit on the 12 V socket while it runs the fridge.

In the 1–2 kWh band, BLUETTI and Jackery both build heavily, and 1,500 W+ inverters and fast solar input are standard rather than premium there.

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