Leaving your Router/Modem on, Costs ? 15 April 2022 at 10:09PM in Broadband & internet access 20 replies 1.1K views

Leodogger

With electricity costs soaring I am wondering what it is costing me to have my router on all day?   Is it best to keep it on or turn it off when I go to bed until the morning?

We are off on holiday for a couple of months (we are retired) and I am wondering if I should turn off the router whilst I am away?   We are with Plusnet.   Anyone have any advice?

Chino

Leodogger said:

We are off on holiday for a couple of months (we are retired) and I am wondering if I should turn off the router whilst I am away?

If away for that period I would switch it off (at the mains), if only from a safety point of view.

Neil_Jones

Routers are designed to be left on all day every day.

Just don't leave them on the floor and they'll be fine with passive airflow.

Running costs in the grand scale of things is relatively negligible.  About £20 a year if that based on unit rate alone.

If you keep switching your router off and on all that'll happen is your line speed/connection speed will fall through the floor because the exchange thinks there is a fault, so it'll slow the line speed down to try and "fix" it.  It'll take best part of ten days to come back up to normal assuming you leave it on.

shiraz99

Neil_Jones said:

Routers are designed to be left on all day every day.

Just don't leave them on the floor and they'll be fine with passive airflow.

Running costs in the grand scale of things is relatively negligible.  About £20 a year if that based on unit rate alone.

If you keep switching your router off and on all that'll happen is your line speed/connection speed will fall through the floor because the exchange thinks there is a fault, so it'll slow the line speed down to try and "fix" it.  It'll take best part of ten days to come back up to normal assuming you leave it on.

Worse than that the line speed may eventually get capped.

Leodogger

Neil_Jones said:

Routers are designed to be left on all day every day.

Just don't leave them on the floor and they'll be fine with passive airflow.

Running costs in the grand scale of things is relatively negligible.  About £20 a year if that based on unit rate alone.

If you keep switching your router off and on all that'll happen is your line speed/connection speed will fall through the floor because the exchange thinks there is a fault, so it'll slow the line speed down to try and "fix" it.  It'll take best part of ten days to come back up to normal assuming you leave it on.

Actually £20 is a lot of money to us as we are pensioners and have had to save for a long time to go on this visit to our daugher in Spain.    If it is safe to do so I would turn it off but if it means they will cap our usage and charge more to uprate it again then obviously I would not do it.

brewerdave

Leodogger said:

Neil_Jones said:

Routers are designed to be left on all day every day.

Just don't leave them on the floor and they'll be fine with passive airflow.

Running costs in the grand scale of things is relatively negligible.  About £20 a year if that based on unit rate alone.

If you keep switching your router off and on all that'll happen is your line speed/connection speed will fall through the floor because the exchange thinks there is a fault, so it'll slow the line speed down to try and "fix" it.  It'll take best part of ten days to come back up to normal assuming you leave it on.

Actually £20 is a lot of money to us as we are pensioners and have had to save for a long time to go on this visit to our daugher in Spain.    If it is safe to do so I would turn it off but if it means they will cap our usage and charge more to uprate it again then obviously I would not do it.

It isn't an issue if you shut it down properly then go away for a holiday or even a weekend. I have always shut my router down when leaving the house for a mutiday period and never had an issue with speeds on reconnection.
I don't bother shutting down overnight because the perceived wisdom had always been that the weakest part of the router was the power supply not tolerating too many on - off cycles

The_Fat_Controller

Turning your router off for a holiday is the right thing to do unless needed for home automation, CCTV etc.

Only repeated, short term switching (several times a day) will instigate an intervention from the line management system and may reduce your speeds.

If that happens, speeds will eventually return to optimum for your line, there is no charge involved, it's all automatic.

Even turning it off overnight should not cause issues and would save money, but it will shorten the life of the device, they like stable temperatures and are designed to be left on 24/7/365

Troytempest

Just been to Spain for 8 weeks and left it on, in fact it is never turned off......

All the reasons above are correct.

Leodogger

Troytempest said:

Just been to Spain for 8 weeks and left it on, in fact it is never turned off......

All the reasons above are correct.

So switching it off could save me £20 and doing it just for long term holidays would be OK according to their info.  So I will probably switch it off.

Neil_Jones

Leodogger said:

Troytempest said:

Just been to Spain for 8 weeks and left it on, in fact it is never turned off......

All the reasons above are correct.

So switching it off could save me £20 and doing it just for long term holidays would be OK according to their info.  So I will probably switch it off.

Except its not going to save you £20 is it?

I said the running costs are £20 a year (ish).  If you only power it off for long term holidays (assuming you go twice a year) for two months at a time then that's only going to save you £3.33.  You'd only save £20 if you turned it off altogether, but you'll still be charged by the provider whether its on or not.

You'll spend more in your monthly bill to BT/Plusnet/Sky/whoever than you're going to save in electricity for the router.

Leodogger

Neil_Jones said:

Leodogger said:

Troytempest said:

Just been to Spain for 8 weeks and left it on, in fact it is never turned off......

All the reasons above are correct.

So switching it off could save me £20 and doing it just for long term holidays would be OK according to their info.  So I will probably switch it off.

Except its not going to save you £20 is it?

I said the running costs are £20 a year (ish).  If you only power it off for long term holidays (assuming you go twice a year) for two months at a time then that's only going to save you £3.33.  You'd only save £20 if you turned it off altogether, but you'll still be charged by the provider whether its on or not.

You'll spend more in your monthly bill to BT/Plusnet/Sky/whoever than you're going to save in electricity for the router.

Sorry I misread your comment.    I still think it is a safety issue though, so maybe will still switch it off.   I might ring the supplier and ask their opinion too just to be on the safe side.