Some of you out there are curious to how much it cost to use a CRT monitor vs. a LCD monitor or Liquid Crystal Display computer monitor. Well your short answer is that a LCD monitor will use less electricity than the CRT monitor saving you money.
LCD Advantages
Some of the advantages of using an LCD computer monitor is that you will use a lot less electricity, so you will save money on your electric bill. Also since a Liquid Crystal Display monitor uses less electricity and you need an Uninterruptible Power Supply, you will not have to buy a large capacity UPS. If you do buy a larger capacity UPS, it will last longer using an LCD monitor vs. CRT monitor.
LCD monitors generate less heat. So in the summer time when you run your air conditioning, the A/C will have to work a little harder and longer to cool your home down if you are using a CRT monitor. So by using a LCD monitor on your computer you will save money because your A/C system will not have to run as hard and as long.
Liquid Crystal Display monitors are also easier on your eyes. When using a computer with a CRT monitor for long periods of time your eyes will start to strain and maybe even give you headaches! Using a LCD monitor will not do this to you!
LCD monitors are also smaller in size and weight. Almost anyone can carry an LCD monitor if rearranging rooms in your home. If you are moving a CRT monitor it will require a little bit of strength to move. CRT monitors are also a lot larger in size which makes it difficult to wrap your arms around. You will save room on your computer desk by using a LCD monitor, so you will have more work space or more room to place photos of your family or other things.
CRT Electricity Cost
I’m using a 17″ Flat CRT monitor for this calculation. Which is a great monitor but loves to consume electricity! This 17″ Flat CRT monitor will consume 150 watts! I also have a 14″ CRT monitor that will consume 65 watts! Most of you will have your computer running around 8 hours every day, some will be more, some will be less.
| Monitor Size | Electricity Consumed/Year | Cost/Year |
| 17″ Flat CRT | 438.3 kWh | $43.83 |
| 14″ CRT | 189.93 kWh | $18.99 |
LCD Electricity Cost
My 17″ LCD monitor will consume 28 watts! There are some LCD monitors that are larger that will still consume around the same amount and consume less power! LG has a 22″ LCD monitor that only uses 22 watts!
| Monitor Size | Electricity Consumed/Year | Cost/Year |
| 17″ LCD | 81.82 kWh | $8.18 |
| 22″ LG LCD | 64.28 kWh | $6.43 |
So now you can see that LCD monitors save you lots of money! There are more and more energy efficient LCD monitors being designed and built every day. As for LG’s 22″ LCD only using 22 watts of power, that’s just the start, I’m sure there are other LCD monitors out there that are more energy efficient than the LG 22″ LCD.
How Much Money Will an LCD Computer Monitor Save Me
| Monitor Size/Type | Electricity Consumed/Year | Cost/Year |
| 17″ Flat CRT | 438.3 kWh | $43.83 |
| 17″ LCD | 81.82 kWh | $8.18 |
| Savings | 356.48 kWh | $35.65 |
As you can see switching from a 17″ CRT computer monitor to a 17″ LCD computer monitor will save you $35.65 every year! So go green by buying an energy efficient LCD computer monitor for your home! For more go green tips on saving electricity continue reading through Go Green in Your Home!
February 23rd, 2010 at 7:24 AM
excellent data what i have seen from the above page,my suggestion is pls convert the measurements in volts.in general power measured by volts so take this suggestion
February 26th, 2010 at 4:15 PM
Voltage would not be the correct measurement here. The simplest way I can explain voltage would be how fast the amperage or wattage is carried to the device. Your power company doesn’t charge you per volt, they charge you per kwh. That is why almost all of my measurements explaining how much a device uses is in kwh. Hope this helps! Have a great day.
Power company isn’t charging you for how fast they deliver the power to you, they charge you for the power itself.
October 12th, 2011 at 6:14 AM
I have 15″ CRT monitor and was thinking to switch to LCD monitor. I was unaware of the exact cost savings. After reading your article, I have decided to buy LCD monitor. Thanks!
But, I think it will start savings after 2-3 years, because LCD monitor will cost around $80-100!
October 12th, 2011 at 9:58 PM
Chandrasing,
Switching from 15″ CRT to an LCD monitor will save you around $30-$34 a year depending on how many hours a day your monitor is on, so your monitor will pay for itself in about 2-3 years as you stated. The LCD monitor will be better for your eyes as well. The LCD monitor will also generate less heat, so if you use air conditioning in the summer your ac will have to work slightly less to keep you cool.
January 11th, 2012 at 3:20 AM
after reading this article we decided to buy lcd monitor since we use computers more often… nice and good work…
January 12th, 2012 at 12:20 AM
Dadi,
Good choice, you will save money on your electric bill and put less stress on your eyes. Plus they save some space too!
May 16th, 2015 at 9:18 PM
I have two TVs. They’re about the same physical size. The Panasonic uses almost double what my older RCA crt-tube does!
I went to my parents house and looked at their CRTs and lcds and the same thing: newer TVs use way more power.
May 17th, 2015 at 1:00 AM
Wow, that’s very odd. CRT should be using more power. I’ve never seen nor would know how a CRT would use less than an LCD.
August 1st, 2016 at 7:21 PM
I have a LCD monitor attached to my laptop. When I shut down my laptop I do not turn off the monitor. Is it using power even though my computer is turned off?
September 5th, 2016 at 12:32 AM
Maria,
Yes, the monitor will go into a suspend or sleep mode, which does use electricity still, but less than it would if it was on. Turning the monitor off will even still use a small amount of electricity due to its power supply as well as LEDs. The only way to keep these monitors from using electricity is to unplug them, or plug them into a surge protector and turn the surge protector off.
March 7th, 2017 at 2:18 AM
Just wanting to know how did you work out how much power is used? How many hours did you run to work it out?
March 7th, 2017 at 7:24 PM
Roxie,
I used the formula to calculate kWh from my article on how to calculate kWh and compared. I don’t remember exactly how many hours I had used originally. I did use the same for both LCD and CRT monitor. I probably used 8 hours. If you want to know how much your monitor costs in electricity to run you can plug your numbers in to the kWh calculator and it will calculate exactly what it costs for your monitor, or any electrical device you enter into the kWh calculator. Hope this helps you! Thanks for visiting!