How we pick and size products
The Outage Brief exists to answer one question well: when the power goes out, what do you actually need to keep running, and which power station can run it? This page explains exactly how we choose products, how the sizing math works, and how the site makes money — so you can check our work.
How products get into our database
We track 20 portable power stations from BLUETTI, EcoFlow, Anker SOLIX, and Jackery — the models a US buyer is most likely to cross-shop. A product gets in if the manufacturer publishes full specifications and sells it direct in the US. Every spec we use — battery capacity, continuous and surge output, weight, battery chemistry — comes from the manufacturer’s own product page, and we record when we pulled it. If a manufacturer doesn’t publish a number (a surge rating, for example), we say so on the product page instead of guessing.
How the sizing calculations work
Our sizing guide doesn’t use rules of thumb. For every scenario it adds up the real load:
- Energy needed = Σ (watts × quantity × hours × duty cycle) ÷ 85% inverter efficiency × 1.20 reserve. Fridges and freezers cycle on and off, so they use a 35% duty cycle.
- Runtimes are always ranges at 80–90% efficiency — never a single promised number.
- A “full match” has to pass three checks: enough continuous watts, enough surge watts for motor startup, and an estimated runtime that covers the whole scenario at a pessimistic 80% efficiency. Products that only make it at best-case efficiency are labeled as such, and products whose battery is too small are listed as not suited, with the reason.
- Surge ratings come from the manufacturer. “Power lifting” / X-Boost-style modes do not count toward surge — they can fail to start motors reliably.
The headline requirement includes a 20% reserve for battery aging, cold weather, and estimation error. It’s the number to buy if you want that reserve intact.
What we don’t do
We don’t buy and bench-test these units, and we won’t claim otherwise. Everything on this site is built from manufacturer specifications run through the published sizing model above. That makes our comparisons reproducible — you can check any number here against the manufacturer’s page and our formula — but it means we don’t report on things specs can’t tell you, like fan noise or build feel.
How prices are checked
Prices are the manufacturer’s direct US price at the time we check, and every price on the site carries its checked date. We re-verify prices on a rolling basis, but prices move — especially around sales — so treat the manufacturer’s page as the final word, and the date next to a price as how much to trust it.
How this site makes money
When you buy through some links on this site, we may earn an affiliate commission at no extra cost to you. Commissions never change which products appear, how they’re ranked, or what the sizing guide recommends — order is decided by the math and by cost per kWh. Our full affiliate disclosure is here: https://theoutagebrief.com/disclosure/
