what is watt

A watt is a unit of power that measures the rate of energy transfer. It is named after James Watt, an 18th-century Scottish inventor, mechanical engineer, and chemist who improved the Newcomen engine with his own steam engine in 1776. One watt is equivalent to one joule per second or 1 kg⋅m²⋅s⁻³. It is used to quantify the rate of energy transfer, and it measures the rate at which electrical work is done when one ampere of current flows through a circuit under the pressure of one volt. The power consumption of small devices is usually measured in watts, and the power consumption of larger devices is measured in kilowatts (kW), or 1,000 watts. Electricity generation capacity is often measured in multiples of kilowatts, such as megawatts (MW) and gigawatts (GW) . One MW is 1,000 kW (or 1,000,000 watts), and one GW is 1,000 MW (or 1,000,000,000 watts) .