2b:I[31964,["5953","static/chunks/app/blog/%5Bslug%5D/page-940075dea53b52c0.js?dpl=dpl_7wTZEAozwjNKEr629g33EVN598L1"],"ViewTracker"] 2c:I[2197,["5953","static/chunks/app/blog/%5Bslug%5D/page-940075dea53b52c0.js?dpl=dpl_7wTZEAozwjNKEr629g33EVN598L1"],"SafeImage"] 2d:T228c,

I once spent forty minutes of a paid shoot day trying to figure out why every fifth flash was misfiring on a Profoto B10 Plus. Turns out the studio I'd booked was on a 13A wall socket shared with the floor below — a downstairs barista was steaming milk on an espresso machine and the voltage was sagging just enough to confuse the Profoto's recycle.

That was about £400 of paid time learning that 'studio has plenty of plugs' is not the same thing as 'studio has the power you need'.

So here's the basic primer that nobody actually publishes. What 13A, 16A, 32A and 3-phase mean in practical UK photo and film terms, and which one you need for which kind of shoot.

The unit you actually care about: amps

Voltage in the UK is 230V (nominally — actual delivery sits around 220–240V). Power in watts is voltage times amps. So a 13A socket can in theory deliver 230 × 13 = 2,990W. Call it 3kW. That's the absolute ceiling, and you do not want to run anything close to it for any length of time, because the cabling, the breaker and the ring main itself all have safety margins.

Practical rule of thumb I use: never load a 13A socket above about 2.4kW for sustained draw. That gives you headroom for surge (some lighting kit, especially HMI ballasts and some LED units, draws much more on startup than steady-state).

13A — the wall socket

Standard UK three-pin. Fused at 13A in the plug itself. This is what every domestic-conversion studio offers as standard. Most rooms in a converted Victorian house or first-floor commercial unit are wired with 13A sockets on a 32A ring main shared across the whole room or floor.

Catch one: the ring main is shared. If two photographers are working in adjacent rooms and you both fire up an Aputure 600d Pro plus a fan heater plus a kettle, you can trip the room MCB and lose everything.

Catch two: the cable run matters. A 13A socket at the end of a long ring is going to drop voltage under load. That's what bit me on the espresso-machine shoot — the studio was technically rated 13A but the cable run plus the downstairs draw meant my actual delivered voltage was around 215V, which is enough to make some flash kit hiccup.

16A — the blue commando

The blue round-pin connector you see on professional lighting circuits. Rated 16A, so 230 × 16 = 3,680W theoretical. Usually wired on its own dedicated circuit back to the consumer unit.

The big benefit isn't the extra 3A on paper — it's that 16A circuits are almost always dedicated. You're not sharing with the kettle and the air-con and the under-floor heating. The voltage is stable, the breaker won't trip from someone else's draw.

Most properly-equipped UK photo studios will have at least two 16A circuits available. If you're shooting with anything bigger than two strobes plus modelling lamps, ask for them by name when you book.

32A — the heavier blue commando

Same connector style, bigger. 230 × 32 = 7,360W theoretical, call it 6kW practical sustained.

This is what you want if you're running multiple high-draw fixtures together — say two Aputure 600d Pros (720W each at full draw), plus a hair light, plus a teleprompter, plus a fog machine, plus your editing trolley. A single 16A starts to look tight; a 32A handles it easily.

Mid-size cyc rooms and bigger production studios will have a 32A available. Smaller daylight rooms usually won't.

100A 3-phase — the heavy metal

Three-phase power gives you three live conductors instead of one, each delivering up to whatever the breaker rating is. A 100A 3-phase supply gives you, in theory, around 69kW total (with the maths being roughly 3 × 230 × 100 × power-factor-of-around-1).

You need it when you're running:

• Multiple HMI heads (a 4kW HMI can pull 5–6kW with ballast losses on startup)

• Big tungsten setups (a 5kW tungsten head is exactly what its name says, plus dimmer overhead)

• Large LED arrays for car shoots (an Arri SkyPanel S360 alone is rated around 1,500W, and you want six of them)

• Anything where the power budget exceeds about 8kW sustained.

Most car-shoot cyc rooms in Park Royal, Acton, Bermondsey have 3-phase. Many product and small fashion studios don't. If you're spec'ing a lighting plot and the total wattage exceeds 6kW, ask the studio specifically about 3-phase before you book.

What kit pulls what

Real numbers, current spec, from manufacturer data sheets:

Profoto B10 Plus: 500Ws flash, runs on its own internal battery for 200 full-power flashes. AC adapter for continuous use is rated at about 100W. Modelling light is 2,500 lumens drawing about 30W. So a four-light Profoto setup might pull 400–500W from mains, easy on a 13A.

Aputure LS 600d Pro: 720W max draw at full output. One unit on a 13A is fine. Three of them on a single 13A is asking for trouble — you're at 2.16kW sustained, which is below the theoretical 3kW limit but close enough to it that any kettle activity puts you over.

Arri SkyPanel S60-C: 450W max draw. SkyPanel S360-C is around 1,500W. Bigger Arri heads can hit 2kW+. These are 16A jobs minimum once you have two of them on.

Tungsten: a 1kW redhead is, well, 1kW. A 2kW blonde is 2kW. Old-school but still in use for film and TV work. Two redheads on a 13A and you're at the limit.

HMI: a 1.2kW HMI typically draws around 1.4–1.6kW with the ballast. Startup surge can be 2–3kW for a few seconds. Always wants its own dedicated circuit, ideally 16A or 32A.

The questions to ask before booking

Three questions cover 95% of cases:

One. 'How many 16A blue commando circuits are there, and are they dedicated or shared?'

Two. 'Is there a 32A circuit available, and where is it located in the room?'

Three. 'If I'm bringing X total wattage of lighting, can you confirm the room can handle it?'

Honest hosts will know the answers. Hosts who don't know will say 'should be fine' — which is the wrong answer. Push them for specifics, or downsize your lighting plot.

Things that have caught me out

Air-con units sharing the lighting circuit. A typical studio split unit pulls 1–2kW. If it's wired on the same ring as your sockets, that's a chunk of your headroom gone before you've turned a light on.

Modern computer monitors and editing trolleys. A 32-inch reference monitor plus a tower PC plus two external drives can pull 400–600W. Add a printer and a coffee machine and you're at 1kW before you start shooting.

Heaters in winter. The 2kW oil-filled radiator the studio leaves in the corner because the building is freezing in January is two-thirds of your 13A budget on its own.

Hair and makeup areas with wall mirrors and dryers. A pro hair dryer is 2kW. A heated curling iron rack is another 500W. If hair-and-makeup is on the same circuit as your set, expect trips.

The cheap kit that solves most problems

Buy or hire a clamp meter. £40 from Screwfix. Clip it round the live conductor of an extension lead and it reads the actual current draw in real time. Five seconds tells you whether you're at 8A or 13A on a given circuit.

Buy or hire a few short heavy-gauge extension leads — 2.5mm² minimum, ideally 4mm² for runs over 10m. The voltage drop on a thin domestic extension over 20m is enough to misbehave with strobes.

Get a couple of 16A-to-13A and 32A-to-16A breakout splitters if you're working freelance and turning up to varied studios. Means you can run your kit on the heavier circuit even when the studio's only put a regular socket strip nearby.

How to spec a shoot day

Add up your worst-case lighting wattage. Add 30% for startup surges. Add another 1kW for ancillaries (laptops, monitors, kettles, heaters). That's your minimum circuit budget.

If the answer is under 2.4kW you can probably get away with a single 13A on a quiet circuit. If it's 2.4–6kW you want a dedicated 16A or 32A. Above that you're in 3-phase territory and you need to spec the studio accordingly.

For finding studios that publish their actual power specs upfront — not just 'plenty of sockets' — the listings on creativestudiohire.com break out 13A, 16A, 32A and 3-phase availability per room. It's the kind of filter that should be standard on every platform but somehow still isn't.

Power planning is unsexy. It's also the cheapest insurance you can buy for a smooth shoot day. Five minutes on the booking call beats forty minutes on the day.

20:["$","div",null,{"className":"container mx-auto px-4 py-8","children":["$","div",null,{"className":"grid grid-cols-1 lg:grid-cols-3 gap-8","children":[["$","article",null,{"className":"lg:col-span-2","children":[["$","$L2b",null,{"postId":"9938da6d-7036-49eb-99a1-cc1f9e41bb72"}],["$","div",null,{"className":"relative w-full h-96 mb-8 rounded-lg overflow-hidden bg-gray-100","children":["$","$L2c",null,{"src":"https://zleegsldkizzjytljdor.supabase.co/storage/v1/object/public/blog-images/blog-images/studio-power-13a-16a-32a-three-phase-explained-1776662895608.png","alt":"Studio power explained: 13A, 16A, 32A and when 3-phase actually matters","fill":true,"priority":true,"className":"object-cover","fallbackClassName":"w-full h-full flex items-center justify-center"}]}],["$","header",null,{"className":"mb-8","children":[["$","div",null,{"className":"flex flex-wrap gap-2 mb-4","children":[["$","$L15","ddb5d000-7372-493e-ae85-d1ee7a1d12a0",{"href":"/blog/categories/gear-equipment","className":"text-xs font-medium bg-indigo-100 text-indigo-800 px-3 py-1 rounded-full hover:bg-indigo-200 transition","children":"Gear & Equipment"}]]}],["$","h1",null,{"className":"text-3xl sm:text-4xl font-bold text-gray-900 mb-4","children":"Studio power explained: 13A, 16A, 32A and when 3-phase actually matters"}],["$","div",null,{"className":"flex flex-wrap items-center text-sm text-gray-600 mb-4","children":[["$","time",null,{"dateTime":"2026-05-08T08:00:00+00:00","children":"May 8, 2026"}],["$","span",null,{"className":"mx-2","children":"•"}],["$","span",null,{"children":[0," views"]}]]}],["$","p",null,{"className":"text-xl text-gray-600 border-l-4 border-indigo-500 pl-4 italic","children":"I tripped a studio's whole ring main once trying to run an Aputure 600d, a kettle and a hair dryer at the same time. Here's the power-circuit basics every photographer should know before they book."}]]}],["$","div",null,{"className":"prose prose-lg max-w-none prose-headings:font-bold prose-h1:text-3xl prose-h2:text-2xl prose-h3:text-xl prose-h4:text-lg prose-p:my-4 prose-a:text-indigo-600 prose-a:no-underline hover:prose-a:underline prose-img:rounded-lg prose-li:my-2","children":["$","div",null,{"dangerouslySetInnerHTML":{"__html":"$2d"}}]}],"$L2e","$L2f"]}],"$L30"]}]}]