Home & workshop Electrical

Voltage calculator

Current
A
Resistance
Ω
Voltage 12 V
V = I × R = 0.5 × 24
Power 6 W
Kilowatts 0.006 kW
V = IR · V = P/I · V = √(PR)
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Voltage is current times resistance (V = IR), power divided by current (V = P/I), or the square root of power times resistance (V = √(PR)). Half an amp through 24 ohms means 12 volts and 6 watts dissipated.

How to find voltage

1 Pick the tab matching the two quantities you know.
2 Enter them in the units shown.
3 Read the voltage and the remaining quantities.
4 Sanity-check the power figure — a surprisingly large one usually means a wrong unit.

Ohm’s law and the power relationship together give twelve rearrangements of four quantities, which is why the "Ohm’s law wheel" exists as a poster on workshop walls. Knowing any two gives the other two. The practical point is that voltage is almost never the thing you measure indirectly — a meter gives it to you directly — so this page mostly earns its place in design work: choosing a supply for a known load, or working out what a divider or dropper resistor will present downstream.

Questions

V = I × R from Ohm’s law. Combined with P = V × I you also get V = P ÷ I and V = √(P × R).

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INTERNAL SIGNAL ONLY · WE USE IT TO FIND TOOLS WORTH REBUILDING