I’m asking this because every time I wake up to make toast the bread never makes it down and I have a digital toaster
So when I press the button that says toast nothing happens
And every morning my girlfriend unplugs the toaster and some of our portable stoves, ovens, and microwaves and it’s really annoying when I want to cook something or warm it up nothing happens
Point is if it’s off and plugged in is it really using energy and does it make a difference if it’s plugged in or not

Surprised she doesn’t unplug the dryer, washer, or the main oven 

I have no idea. It could be defective toaster. The mechanical ones work very well, than those digital ones.

The only reason is that the electronic controller of these appliance has gone.
Appliances with mechanical controllers consumes 0 watts when not operating.
These are only the electronic ones (If their turning on/off is done by electronic means and not by a mechanical switch) that continue to consume small amount of watts even when off, since the power supply for the controller continues to receive power, in order to activate the electronic on/off mechanism.

All of my computer accessories (Printer, speakers, and modem/router), are connected via a power strip with a neon illuminated switch that I switch off when turning off my computer, and my computer and its monitor are both connected to a UPS, that I turning it off after turning off my computer.

All of my computer accessories (Printer, speakers, and modem/router), are connected via a power strip with a neon illuminated switch that I switch off when turning off my computer, and my computer and its monitor are both connected to a UPS, that I turning it off after turning off my computer.

You need to leave the UPS on, or it won't keep the battery charged. Also, switching off a router frequently is not advisable since (depending on the type of connection you have to your ISP) it can disrupt synchronisation and cause your connection speed to fall.

Here, all the IT equipment (apart from the actual computers and monitors themselves) are running 24/7. I can't disconnect the router or network switches, as I have IP telephones which would not function if they weren't online, also the printer is connected to the cloud so that I can print to it from anywhere. There are also network drives/servers that need to be accessible.

My modem/router are used for my computer internet only. I didn't had any problems with the connection speed because of this.
The UPS continues to charge its battery when off but the plug remains plugged.

Unplugging these appliances does not make any sense from energy conservation point of view (many of them consume zero even when electronic - they shut down their controller supply as well, unless they have the stupid features like clock or so).

But there is another reason, why you may like to have these things unplugged or at least switched off by something else than their normal power control: Fire safety. The thing is, the switching mechanism (regardless if electronic or mechanical) may just fail and that may happen in the wrong way - turning the heat ON without any control.
This is prime fire cause with hot water kettles, mainly when kept empty (the overheating protection tends to cycle ON/OFF, but without the water it can not generate the steam needed for normal automatic switch off; once the protection switch fails, the plastic body just melts and then tend to ignite).
Similar problems are with other appliances.

In that respect the energy saving may be more of an indirect nature, e.g. like for the hot water kettle:
You have two safe habit options what to do when not in use: One is to always always keep the kettle full of water (so it is always able to generate steam and switch itself off in case it gets unintentionally switched ON) and the other is to always disconnect it from the mains (so there is no power to cause any problems in the first place). The second means you pour in only the amount of water you need to heat up, so it means quite significant energy saving compare to having the kettle full and so always heating up 1.5l of water when you need just 250ml for a cup of tea - so the kettle energy consumption gets reduced more than 3x by choosing the "unplugging" instead of "fill in the water" habit.

But in any case for the regular switching off it is way better to install switched sockets (e.g. a "master switch" for all kitchen desk sockets,...), because the sockets will wear out soon and then pose a fire risk because of insufficient contact pressure (and consequent elevated contact resistance).

We keep all kitchen appliances, save for the refrigerator, the dishwasher the microwave oven and the stove, unplugged at all times, except when in  use. The reason is for fire risk as Medved said. The only time we leave them on is when the yoghurt incubator is incubating (5 hours) or the slow cooker is cooking (often in the vicinity of 5 hours as well).

We keep all kitchen appliances, save for the refrigerator, the dishwasher the microwave oven and the stove, unplugged at all times, except when in  use. The reason is for fire risk as Medved said. The only time we leave them on is when the yoghurt incubator is incubating (5 hours) or the slow cooker is cooking (often in the vicinity of 5 hours as well).

We leave most things plugged in, but we have switched sockets unlike most of you on the other side of the water, so we don't have to physically pull plugs to disconnect stuff.

Fire safety does not mean unplugging. Unplugging it all all the time might be bad for fire safety - Wear of the receptacle and of the cable near the plug, leading to loose connection eventually..

With the kettle - dont put it on its base when not in use. The base alone draws no power and poses no danger

With microwave - is there actually any danger (other than destroying the microwave) from it running continuously in case of control failure ?



Powering off anything with electronic control does make sense for potentially prolonging the life of the appliance however :

 - The power supply have limited life (mainly capacitor deterioration)

 - There allways is a chance for an extreme voltage transient arriving which would destroy the power supply at once

Fire safety does not mean unplugging. Unplugging it all all the time might be bad for fire safety - Wear of the receptacle and of the cable near the plug, leading to loose connection eventually..

With the kettle - dont put it on its base when not in use. The base alone draws no power and poses no danger

If the contact in the base is live, although it's not possible to physically touch it, it could still short out. What if you accidentally spill water onto it..?

I unplug most appliances when not in use-not really to save energy-but for lightning protection-its the cheapest form of protection!so many appliances have microprocessors and circuit boards in them-the unplugging protects them from lightning surges.

Fire safety does not mean unplugging. Unplugging it all all the time might be bad for fire safety - Wear of the receptacle and of the cable near the plug, leading to loose connection eventually..

Depends on the frequency of use. For a kettle or so the switch is OK. Dont forget many appliances have these redundant switches already build in (e.g. the microwave - keep the door open and you have additional two contacts breaking the power to the magnetron transformer, when combined with always resetting the timer to OFF after use means there is no way it may turn the power ON; of course, usable only when it does not turn ON the light whenever opened)
But if something is used really sparsely (e.g. a kitchen robot - once per two months or so), unplugging does not that much harm compare to the risk when left unattended.

With the kettle - dont put it on its base when not in use. The base alone draws no power and poses no danger

It is he simplest thing to do, but it has a drawback: It occupies space (in many small homes quite precious thing), so it is very likely after a while the tendency to save space will win over the safety...

With microwave - is there actually any danger (other than destroying the microwave) from it running continuously in case of control failure ?

Quite a lot: Transformer fire, capacitor blow up and smoke, magnetron overheating (when nothing inside and the power becoming reflected back to the magnetron) and maybe breaking the ceramic (= beryllium ceramic dust spread over)...

Powering off anything with electronic control does make sense for potentially prolonging the life of the appliance however :

 - The power supply have limited life (mainly capacitor deterioration)

 - There allways is a chance for an extreme voltage transient arriving which would destroy the power supply at once

Well, with many things, mainly when used often, the stress from powering these ON may become the prime cause of their failure. Many power supplies in those "white goods" is really not designed for frequent power switching. It starts with the EMC filter: It draws no power by itself, usually is upstream of the normal operation power switching element, but the power ON shock causes there both high current spike, as well as an internal overvoltage event (the voltage may reach twice the input voltage at the time of connection due to the LC resonance effect).

The limited running life is related to hot operation, but with decent designs these things are not hot when idle (either they are designed like that, or the heat comes only with operation load)

For this it is really very good idea to look for appliances without features like cock or so. When it does not have to supply any stupid clock or LED, the electronic is usually designed so, it really disconnect the internal power when not in use. Simple because it uses to be easier and cheaper to design it less efficient but with the ability to disconnect itself from power after use (either mechanical switch, but even when done electronically) than designing it to stay below 100mW stand by power consumption what is needed by legislation now.

See here when you need to disconnect appliance from the power.

See here when you need to disconnect appliance from the power.

In this case you see it failing when using it, so you know it needs to be either fixed properly and not used until it made to work again as it should.
My guess is, you would need to scrap it anyway, because most likely the contacts are welded together, what means their material is damaged so they will very likely weld soon again, so it will never be safe again.

The problem is mainly with unintended power ON, which may lead to operation without supervision, so such failure will very likely end up by a fire.

I don't think unplugging simple appliances saves any energy. But I do unplug TVs, DVD players, etc because those things do use energy when not on. Especially those in the bedrooms that aren't used very often.

Sometimes I wish we had switched outlets like those in the UK have. I do have the power strips that I switch off, but then they can still get hit by surges because turning off the switch shuts off the surge protection I would assume.


With modem, router and things, I have to leave those plugged in because the phones and wi-fi run on that router and modem.

I unplug kitchen appliances when not in use other than the microwave, mostly for peace of mind because then I know they're off.