Most people typically know about commonly used power states like on, off, sleep, and hibernate. However, your computer is capable of handling power in multiple ways. Knowing about those power states can help understand how your PC works with power and might just give you a few handy ways to use your computer.
Not all power states are available on all computers, though. You’ll need to check the power states available in your computer based on your hardware, and we’ll show you how below.
How to Check Your Available Power States in Windows 11
You can find the power states available on your computer using the Command Prompt.
Press the Start Menu, type cmd, hover your cursor over the Command Prompt, and select Run as administrator. Type the following command and press Enter: powercfg /availablesleepstates
You’ll see two lists of power states. One is a list of supported power states while the other one is a list of unsupported power states.
All of Windows 11’s Power States
You probably don’t know what all those power states mean and how they’re different. However, they’re fairly simple to understand. Here is the list of power states you’ll see:
S0: Working State
S0 represents the working state. This is the state of your computer when you’re able to use it.
S0 Low-Power Idle: Sleep (Modern Standby)
Modern Standby is an upgrade to the older S3 power model. It lets you turn on devices much faster than S3, which allows a seamless experience when using a modern device. It’s commonly supported on System on Chip (SoC) devices. However, it’s still possible for a modern device to not support modern standby. If your computer does support S0 low-power idle mode, it won’t support S1, S2, or S3 mode.
S1, S2, S3: Sleep Power States
The “sleep” states are where one or more components of the computer are turned off or switched to low power mode.
The S1 sleep power state stops the CPU, the rest of the components are either turned off or continue running in low power mode, and the RAM maintains power.
The S2 sleep power state terminates power supply to the CPU, other components are either turned off or continue running low power mode, and the RAM maintains power.
S3 is a standby state where the CPU has no power, but RAM maintains power and refreshes at a slow rate. Other hardware components like the hard disk and fan are stopped.
Your device might also support a “Hybrid sleep” mode where you can save the session. If the computer loses power supply in sleep state, you can resume working from where you left off.
S4: Hibernate
Hibernation is different from sleep because hibernation saves the contents of the RAM and the operating system context to a hard disk and powers off all connected devices. When you turn the computer on again, you will be able to directly start working from where you left off before hibernation.
Windows 11 also has a Fast Startup mode, which is a lightweight version of hibernation. Instead of saving everything in the current state (such as the logged-in users and open files and applications), it only saves the bare minimum of services required to start up the system. As a result, it helps start systems faster. However, there are various arguments in favor of disabling fast startup.
S5: Soft Off Power State
S5 is the soft off state. Only components like the power button have trickle current. No other components are actively drawing power under this state and the computer isn’t performing any computational tasks.
G3: Mechanical Off
The mechanical off state is also a state where the computer is completely shutdown like in S5. However, the power is total remove via a mechanical switch. No hardware components, including the power button, have any power supply. This state is usually only needed for disassembling a computer. Note that the real-time clock may still continue running using its small battery.
Power Modes, Explained
Knowing the power modes helps you understand what happens when you put your computer in a particular power state and how power-intensive that state might be. Did you know that Windows also has an Ultimate Performance Power plan? Enabling it isn’t always recommended, but if you’re not too worried about power consumption, you might consider enabling it.
