1. Help Center
  2. Meters and readings

What is a megawatt hour (MWh)?

1 megawatt (MW) = 1,000 kilowatts (kW). 1 megawatt-hour (MWh) = 1 MW for one hour or 1,000 kW for one hour.

A megawatt is simply defined as 1 million watts. Because there are 1,000 watts in a kilowatt, you could also think of a megawatt as 1,000 kilowatts. When dealing with watts in these quantities, especially when it comes to non-scientific matters, it’s much easier to talk about electricity in terms of megawatts than millions of watts.

Just like there are 1,000 kilowatts in 1 megawatt, there are also 1,000 kilowatt-hours in 1 megawatt-hour.

Your electric bill is measured in kilowatt-hours because megawatt-hours are so much larger in size. Although your electricity usage will rarely be described in megawatt-hours, utilities, for instance, use MWh’s all the time.

The abbreviation for one megawatt hour is 1 MWh.

So, what is a megawatt-hour? A megawatt-hour is just like a kilowatt-hour in the sense that it’s a measure of energy. Compare it to a petrol tank. If your petrol tank holds 15 gallons of petrol, and your car can run on a gallon for 20 miles, then your petrol tank is good for 300 miles. Similarly, you can calculate the range of an electric car based on its battery size and consumption rate. If an EV has a “tank” of 60 kilowatt-hours and consumes 1 kWh for every 4 miles of driving, your total range would be 240 miles.

A megawatt-hour is the same as one megawatt of power used continually for one hour. Because megawatts are so large, it’s easier to grasp a megawatt-hour if we break it down.