Question Hi Guys how many solar panels will power the average laptop and how do i know which brand to buy?

Feb 22, 2025
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Also I bought a solar panel before it said it would charge lap tops , phones , other items

But in scorching sunlight it couldn't charge my lap top at all and it could barely charge my phone took like 24 hours to charge the phone

Even worse im now in the UK so no scorching sunlight at all

It seems they can lie blatantly in the sales language so how can I know whats safe to buy

I may use the same solar panels on the top of a 4x4 at a later date
 
They all are experts at telling half truths. The cheaper the panel is the more likely it is to not really perform as they say.

It is all math you just need the voltages and the amp rating of both the panels and you equipment you want to power. Although the solar numbers unless the panel manufacture is very honest will only show power at maximum sun. There are some that rate the panels at 25 and 50% sun.

I would try to find a simple system that converts the dc power from the solar directly to the dc power used by the end devices. Depending on your laptop there are solar panels that output power via USB-C. Converting the power to AC and having the end device convert the power back from AC to the DC voltage needed there is a large amount of wasted energy.
 
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All about power output.

65W laptop, plus charging losses, so call it 80W. You would want something like a 100W solar panel. If your laptop uses more power than that, then you will have to scale things up.

Additionally, that is if you were able to get 100% of the power out of a solar panel at all times, you won't. Also Also, you have to consider the charging voltage. Many laptops use a 20V input for their fast charging. Plugging them into a 5V USB connection is going to be trickle of power.

They have those ones on the market that are basically solar powered battery banks, that might help a little. But they are small, and maybe a smartphone could be charged.

All the ones in the 100W range that I am seeing are portable, but a sizeable piece of luggage to carry around. Customer reviews maybe, but good quality proper solar panels are going to be quite expensive plus a decent DC-DC converter outputting USB-C PD would be ideal.
 
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There are loads of 65W/100W laptop chargers available on Amazon.

If your laptop uses USB-C PD 65W charging, try one of these:-
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Mesuvida-Portable-Foldable-Stations-Off-Grid/dp/B0CYC4XSQR

71Wu87zRhOL._AC_SL1500_.jpg


Even worse im now in the UK so no scorching sunlight at all
There was plenty of sunshine yesterday (1st May) during the "heat wave", but obviously you'd need a much larger panel on cloudy days. Something with two to four times the area of this panel should provide some charge when the sky is completely covered in grey clouds. It all depends on how fast you want to charge the laptop battery and whether you want to use the laptop at the same time.

I may use the same solar panels on the top of a 4x4 at a later date
You'll probably have to decide if you want solar panels suitable for charging a 12V vehicle battery or something suitable for charging a laptop, e.g. 19.5V or USB-C 20V @ 3.25A (65W) or 20V @ 5A (100W).

If you want to run a USB-C PD laptop directly from a vehicle 12V cigarette lighter socket, try one of these:-
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Charger-Adapter-12V-24V-Macbook-Smartphones-Black/dp/B0B9J7V6J2

61yYS3opWdL._AC_SL1500_.jpg


If you have an old laptop, you'll need something like this:-
https://www.amazon.co.uk/KFD-Charger-Chromebook-Universal-Transformer/dp/B0CWQ9KSL4

71CwqWcX7bL._AC_SL1448_.jpg


Obviously you need to pick the correct power rating, DC out put and DC plug to suit your laptop if it doesn't use USB-C charging.
 
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