Efficiency Comparison of Si and GaN-based External Power Supplies for Consumer Electronics in the Light of New Efficiency Regulations

The European Commission's recent regulation on the eco-design of external power supplies (EPS) marks a significant shift in the industry. Compared to the 2019 regulation, the 2025 version imposes stricter limits on no-load power consumption and average efficiency of the EPS. It also introduces a method for measuring and calculating the efficiency of multiport power supplies. This regulation is also timely, as new wide-bandgap semiconductor technology such as Gallium-Nitride (GaN) is rapidly evolving and becoming increasingly prominent in consumer-grade EPS, particularly in the 60 W power category. Thus, in this paper, the two Commission Regulations are compared, the specifics of the new requirements are examined and the efficiency improvements enabled by GaN-based designs with respect to conventional silicon solutions are analysed.