Two appliances, two completely different problems
| Appliance | Voltage | Running watts | Per load |
|---|
| Washer, cold cycle | 120 V | 300-500 W, spiking on spin | 0.3-0.5 kWh |
|---|
| Washer, warm or hot with internal heater | 120 V | Up to 1,200 W while heating | 1-2 kWh |
|---|
| Electric dryer | 240 V | About 5,000 W | 2.5-4 kWh |
|---|
| Gas dryer | 120 V | 300-400 W — drum, fan and igniter only | 0.2-0.3 kWh plus gas |
|---|
| Heat pump dryer | 120 V on many models | 800-1,400 W | 1-1.5 kWh, over a longer cycle |
|---|
Ranges are typical for current residential machines. Your own plate is authoritative — reading a nameplate explains what the numbers mean.
The pattern is the one that runs through this whole site: motors and pumps are cheap, heating elements are not. A washer moves water and spins a drum. An electric dryer makes heat, and that is a five kilowatt problem.
The gas dryer surprise
Worth checking before you plan anything. A gas dryer burns gas for the heat and uses electricity only for the drum motor, the blower and the igniter — typically 300 to 400 watts.
That is the same order as a refrigerator, and it means a household with a gas dryer can do laundry on a modest generator without thinking about it.
It is also the same principle that makes backing up a gas furnace so cheap: the fuel does the work, the electricity just moves air.
Why the electric dryer is rarely worth it
Three reasons, and together they are decisive for most households.
1. It is 240V and hardwired. Reaching it means a transfer switch sized for a 30A dryer circuit, which is a real installation rather than a cord.
2. It is about 5,000 running watts. That is most of a 7,500W generator on its own, so everything else has to stop while the laundry dries.
3. There is a free alternative. A drying rack. Laundry is the single most deferrable household task during an outage, and unlike food safety or heat there is no consequence to waiting.
The practical recommendation: put the dryer circuit near the bottom of your transfer switch priority list, or leave it off entirely. The whole-house sizing page covers where it falls against everything else.
The dangerous shortcut
The dryer outlet is a 240V receptacle, which makes it the obvious place to plug a generator in with a double-ended cord. People do this, and it is the single most dangerous thing in backup power.
Backfeeding through a dryer outlet pushes power back up the service drop into the utility transformer, which steps the voltage back up on lines a lineworker believes are dead. It is illegal everywhere in the United States and it kills people.
The legal routes are a transfer switch or an interlock kit — the comparison page covers both, and the connection guide covers doing it properly.
Running laundry on a generator, sensibly
- Wash cold. It removes the internal heater from the equation and cuts the load by more than half.
- One appliance at a time. Start the washer when the fridge compressor is off, not during its cycle.
- Spin twice, then hang. An extra spin cycle costs a few watt-hours and removes far more water than it sounds, which cuts drying time on a rack dramatically.
- Do it in daylight. If you are running the generator in blocks anyway, laundry belongs in the same block as the well pump and the water heater.
The short version
- Washer: 300-500W cold. Easy for any 2,000W-class source.
- Electric dryer: about 5,000W at 240V. Needs 7,500W and a transfer switch.
- Gas dryer: 300-400W. Check yours — it may be a non-problem.
- Never backfeed through the dryer outlet. It is illegal and it kills lineworkers.
