Laundry Cost Calculator

Where the figures come from

Only the water and energy quantities are sourced — your utility rates are yours to enter, so the cost is an estimate for your bill, not a published number. US and EU figures stay in separate panels because the two test procedures are not comparable.

• US, ENERGY STAR: certified washers use about 14 gallons a load vs 20 for a standard machine, about 300 loads a year, and save about $530 in energy over their lifetime; about 90% of a washer's energy goes to heating water. Source.
• US, DOE: ratings assume 295 cycles a year, and washing warm instead of hot can roughly halve a load's energy. Source.
• EU, European Commission: the average machine used about 96 kWh a year and 36 litres a cycle in 2020. Source.

Finding your own rates

The calculator is only as good as the two numbers you put into it, and the defaults are examples rather than your tariff. Both are printed on bills you already have.

• Electricity. Look for the unit price per kilowatt-hour — on a US bill it is usually shown as ¢/kWh, on a EU bill as €/kWh. If your tariff has day and night rates, use the one you actually run the machine on; if it has a standing charge, leave it out, because it is paid whether you wash or not.
• Water. US bills usually price water per gallon or per hundred cubic feet (1 CCF = 748 gallons); EU bills price it per cubic metre (1 m³ = 1,000 litres). If your bill separates supply from wastewater, add the two together — a washing machine sends almost everything it draws down the drain.

What actually moves the number

In rough order of impact, and each one is something you control today:

1. 1. Temperature. About 90% of a washer's energy goes to heating water, so the dial is the lever — the DOE puts washing warm instead of hot at roughly half the energy of a load. Your care label's wash-tub number is a maximum, not a target, so cooler is allowed whenever the garment may be washed at all.
2. 2. How full the drum is. A machine uses nearly the same water and heat whether it is half or fully loaded, so half-loads roughly double the cost per garment. Size the load with the laundry weight calculator.
3. 3. The machine itself. On the ENERGY STAR figures a certified washer uses about 14 gallons a load against 20 for a standard one — but that only pays back over years, so it is a replacement decision, not a this-week one.
4. 4. How often you wash. The published ratings assume about 295–300 cycles a year. Fewer, fuller loads beat more, emptier ones on every line of the bill.

Why your bill may still differ

This is an estimate of the marginal cost of running the machine, and there are honest reasons it will not reconcile exactly with what you pay.

• Where your hot water comes from. The energy figures assume the machine heats its own water electrically. If yours is fed from a gas boiler or a heat pump, most of the heating cost sits on a different bill, at a different unit price.
• What is not counted. Detergent, drying, and the machine's own standby draw are outside this calculation. Drying in particular is often the larger of the two — see how to tumble dry clothes.
• Averages are not your machine. The EU and US figures are fleet averages from official test procedures; a specific model on a specific cycle can sit either side of them. Use the number to compare choices, not to predict a total.