This guide sizes the power for an LED wall from the panel datasheet: which of the two published figures to use, how many panels fit on a circuit, how the circuits are laid across the wall, and what number to give the venue. It is the arithmetic the planner runs, written out.
Every panel datasheet quotes two power figures: maximum draw, measured at full white and full brightness, and typical or average draw, which is roughly a third of maximum depending on content. They answer different questions, and mixing them up is the common mistake.
Circuits and distribution are sized on maximum. Content is unpredictable: one white flash frame, one test pattern during focus, one source that fails to a white screen. The electrical distribution has to survive all of it without opening a breaker. Typical draw belongs to a different conversation, such as what to tell the venue or what generator to order, where nobody provisions for sustained full white.
A circuit is never loaded to its nameplate rating. The working convention in live production is to load to 80% of the breaker rating, which leaves headroom for inrush current, voltage drop on long runs, and the fact that no two panels draw identically.
That gives the usable capacity per circuit:
Divide the usable circuit capacity by the panel maximum draw and round down. A 180 W panel on a 16 A European circuit gives 2,944 ÷ 180 = 16 panels per circuit, rounded down.
Cabinet power interconnects are directional: in on one side, out on the other, with gendered plugs and jumpers as short as the manufacturer can make them. Seen from the rear, a horizontal run only goes left to right; a run can never turn back. Vertical travel works both ways, so a run can go down one column, hop right, and come up the next for as many columns as the circuit can feed. What it cannot do is snake left and right, because a horizontal return leg would run against the connectors. The other legal shape is a single row fed left to right. A good plan uses whichever shape needs the fewest circuits. A wall 12 columns wide and 6 rows high, where 18 panels fit on a circuit, needs 12 circuits as single vertical strings but only 4 as three-column vertical snakes.
Distribution follows from the circuit count: group circuits onto three-phase distros at roughly 18 circuits per 63 A distro, and count panel-to-panel jumpers as the panel count minus the number of strings, plus about 10% spare because jumpers go missing.
Take 72 panels of a 2.8 mm tile drawing 160 W maximum and about 60 W typical, on European power. Maximum draw is 72 × 160 = 11.52 kW; typical is around 4.3 kW. Usable capacity is 2,944 W per circuit, so 18 panels fit on one (2,944 ÷ 160 = 18.4, rounded down). The 12 × 6 wall runs as 4 vertical snakes of three columns each (down, hop right, up, hop right, down), 18 panels and 2,880 W per snake, which is 4 circuits at 98% each on a single 63 A three-phase distro, and a third of the feeder cable that single vertical strings would need.
The number to give the venue has two parts: the maximum, which sizes the distro and the breaker, and roughly 4.3 kW as the realistic sustained load, with the caveat that the wall can hit maximum at any moment.
RigPlan does this arithmetic for you. Enter the wall once and it derives panels and spares, rigging from your own stock, circuits, the data wiring plan and the full pack list, free with no sign-up.
Open the plannerSize circuits, breakers and distribution on maximum (full white) draw at an 80% derate. Use typical or average draw only for generator sizing and energy cost estimates, never for circuit counts.
Divide 2,944 W (230 V × 16 A × 80% derate) by the panel maximum draw. A 180 W panel gives 16 panels per circuit; a 250 W panel gives 11.
It leaves headroom for inrush current, voltage drop across long feeder runs, and panel-to-panel variation. Loading a breaker to its nameplate rating invites nuisance trips at the worst possible moment.