A kilowatt-hour (kWh) is the basic unit of electricity consumption used by utilities for billing. If you run a 100-watt light bulb for 10 hours, you use 1 kWh. The average US household consumes about 886 kWh per month. Electricity prices are quoted in cents per kWh, making it the universal measure for comparing costs across states and providers.
Kilowatt-Hour (kWh)
A unit of energy equal to using 1,000 watts for one hour, the standard billing unit for electricity.
Related Terms
Megawatt (MW)
A unit of power equal to one million watts, used to measure the capacity of power plants.
Electricity Rate
The price charged per kilowatt-hour of electricity, varying by customer class (residential, commercial, industrial).
Base Load
The minimum level of electricity demand over a 24-hour period, typically supplied by always-on power plants.
this entity is one of the U.S. state-level electricity rates and generation mix concepts that recurs across this site. The definition above is the technical answer; the paragraphs below add the practical context for how the concept connects to the the EIA Open Data API and State Electricity Profiles data behind every per-entity page on the site.
In the the EIA Open Data API and State Electricity Profiles data, this concept shapes one or more of the fields that drive the per-entity grades and rankings on this site. The methodology page describes which fields feed into which output; this glossary entry documents the underlying term.
Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration, 2026.