How much does it cost to run a slow cooker?
About $2.53 a month on the typical usage below, at the U.S. average $0.1816/kWh. Set your own rate and usage and the figure updates instantly.
A slow cooker only sips ~150–300W, so even an all-day cook is cheap.
Running a slow cooker at 1.6 kWh a cycle, 2 cycles a week costs about
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A slow cooker is one of the cheapest ways to make dinner with electricity. It runs on 150 to 300 watts — a fifth of what a space heater draws — and most of that low, steady wattage goes into holding a gentle simmer, not blasting heat like a stovetop burner or oven element. Cook a pot roast for eight hours and you'll spend less than running a single incandescent bulb for the same stretch.
The reason slow cookers stay cheap even though they run for hours is that low wattage matters more than long runtime. An oven pulls 2,000+ watts to preheat and hold temperature, so even a 1-hour bake can cost more than an 8-hour slow-cooker meal. The only real lever on cost is size and setting — a big 7-quart pot on High pulls closer to 300W, while a small 3-quart pot on Low can sip under 150W for the same meal.
What drives the cost of running a slow cooker
- Wattage, not runtime, dominates the math — 150-300W is low enough that even an all-day 8-hour cook stays cheap, unlike high-draw appliances where hours matter a lot.
- Pot size and setting: larger multi-quart cookers and the High setting pull toward the top of the 150-300W range; smaller pots on Low sit near the bottom.
- Your electricity rate (cents/kWh) swings the final dollar figure more than anything about the cooker itself, since the wattage range is narrow to begin with.
How to cut it
- Cook on Low instead of High when your schedule allows — it draws less wattage and the extra time costs almost nothing given how low the base draw already is.
- Match pot size to the meal; a half-empty 7-quart cooker wastes capacity, and downsizing to a 3-4 quart pot for small meals trims watts without changing the recipe.
- Resist lifting the lid to check food — every peek lets heat escape and makes the heating element work (and draw power) longer to recover.
- Compare it to the alternative: if a slow cooker replaces a 2,000W+ oven for the same meal, you're saving money even if the slow cooker runs 6-8x longer.
Data basis
- Electricity price
- U.S. Energy Information Administration, Electric Power Monthly, Table 5.6.B, June 2026 year to date, released 2026-08-26. Retrieved 2026-09-11. Average residential revenue per kWh. A benchmark average, not a utility tariff — it excludes the fixed charges, tiers, time-of-use windows, taxes and fuel adjustments on a real bill.
- Appliance energy
- A representative running power for a slow cooker, compiled from published manufacturer specifications and public appliance-energy guidance, and presented as a typical figure with the usual range shown above. It is not a measurement of your unit, and we do not claim a single primary source for it — the nameplate on your appliance, or an hour with a plug-in energy meter, beats any typical figure we can publish.
- Usage model
- Per cycle — 1.6 kWh a cycle, 2 cycles a week
- International prices
- rounded typical household tariffs for each market, in that market's own currency unless the row says US$ equivalent. These are planning benchmarks with no single primary source; enter the per-kWh price from your own bill for an accurate figure.
- Last reviewed
- 20 August 2026. Next scheduled review 20 February 2027.
- Corrections
- Think a figure is wrong? Tell us at corrections@watt-dollar.com and see our corrections policy.
Common questions
How much does it cost to run a slow cooker per month?
On the assumption shown above — 1.6 kWh a cycle, 2 cycles a week — a slow cooker costs about $2.53 a month, or $30.30 a year, at $0.1816/kWh. That price is the U.S. average; set your own rate and usage above and the figure updates.
How is that worked out?
Energy per cycle x cycles per week, plus any standby draw between cycles. At 1.6 kWh a cycle, 2 cycles a week that is 0.46 kWh a day, which at $0.1816/kWh costs $0.08 a day.
How can I cut the cost of running a slow cooker?
Cook on Low instead of High when your schedule allows — it draws less wattage and the extra time costs almost nothing given how low the base draw already is. As a worked example: running 1.6 cycles a week instead of 2 takes it from $30.30 to $24.24 a year, about $6.06 less.
Is a slow cooker cheaper to run than an oven?
Yes, usually by a wide margin. A slow cooker draws 150-300W versus 2,000W+ for an oven, so even cooking for 8 hours instead of 1 hour typically still costs less — ovens spend a lot of that wattage just preheating and reheating every time the door opens or the thermostat cycles.
Does the Low or High setting change the cost much?
A little, not dramatically. High pulls toward the top of the 150-300W range and Low toward the bottom, but because both settings are already low-wattage, switching from Low to High for the same recipe usually changes the total cost by well under a dollar.