In HVAC, heating and cooling capacity is sometimes expressed in kilowatts (kW). To properly understand how powerful an air conditioner or a furnace is, we need to convert kW to BTU (BTU per hour, to be precise).
To simply convert kW to BTU, you can use this handy calculator:
Basically, you just input the kW, and the kW-to-BTU calculator will give the heating/cooling capacity in BTU (British Thermal Units).
Further on, you will find a calculated table with kW-to-BTU conversions for 1 kW to 30 kW (or 3,412 BTU/hr to 68,243 BTU/hr). For reference, the smallest small room air conditioners generate about 1 kW of cooling effect, and the bigger 5-ton central air conditioners generate about 17 kW.
Let’s look at the kW to BTU formula first:
How To Convert kW To BTU?
Kilowatts and BTU are both units of power. To convert kilowatts to BTU, we can use a very simple formula:
1 kW = 3412.142 BTU
That means that 1 kW equals to 3412.142 BTU. The kW to BTU converter uses this formula to calculate BTU from the given kW:
Based on this formula, we can also calculate specific BTU values for every kW. Here is the calculated kW to BTU table:
kW To BTU Table
| kW | BTU/hr |
|---|---|
| How many BTU is 1 kW? | 3,412 BTU |
| What is 2 kW in BTU? | 6,824 BTU |
| What is 2.5 kW in BTU? | 8,530 BTU |
| What is 3 kW in BTU? | 10,236 BTU |
| What is 3.5 kW in BTU? | 11,942 BTU |
| What is 4 kW in BTU? | 13,649 BTU |
| What is 4.5 kW in BTU? | 15,355 BTU |
| What is 5 kW in BTU? | 17,061 BTU |
| What is 6 kW in BTU? | 20,473 BTU |
| What is 7 kW in BTU? | 23,885 BTU |
| What is 8 kW in BTU? | 27,297 BTU |
| What is 9 kW in BTU? | 30,709 BTU |
| What is 10 kW in BTU? | 34,121 BTU |
| What is 12 kW in BTU? | 40,936 BTU |
| What is 15 kW in BTU? | 51,182 BTU |
| What is 20 kW in BTU? | 68,243 BTU |
| What is 25 kW in BTU? | 85,304 BTU |
| What is 30 kW in BTU? | 102,364 BTU |
Examples Of Air Conditions With kW Cooling Capacity
To give you an idea of how kW to BTU conversion looks like, we include the examples of the most common cooling capacities of air conditioners here:
- 1.5 kW air conditioners are the small 5,000 BTU window AC units.
- 2.4 kW air conditioners are the smaller 8,000 BTU portable and window AC units.
- 3 kW air conditioners are the standard-sized 10,000 BTU portable and window AC units.
- 3.5 kW air conditioners are the biggest 12,000 BTU mini-split, portable, and window AC units.
- 15 kW air conditioners are the big 4 ton central air conditioners.
If you have any questions about this HVAC power conversion, you can pose them in the comments below.