A rectifier, battery, and inverter are mounted in-line with the AC mains and load in an online UPS. The rectifier circuit receives the AC power supplied to the online UPS before converting it to DC power. The battery is charged with DC electricity, which is then delivered to the inverter, and finally to the load. This UPS have much more complex design than offline UPS systems, while the price, weight, and volume are higher. So here this article gives the advantages and disadvantages of Online UPS to better understand this topic.
Pros or Advantages of online UPS:
- It provides isolation between the main power source and load
- Power regulation is better.
- Transfer time is practically zero since the inverter is always ON.
- All the disturbances of supply such as blackout, brownout, spikes, etc. are absent in the output.
- The inverter is always ON, the quality of load voltage is free from distortion.
Cons or Disadvantages of Online UPS:
- The overall efficiency of UPS is reduced since the inverter is always ON.
- Online UPS is costlier than other uninterruptible power supply systems.
- The wattage of the rectifier is increased since it has to supply power to the inverter as well as charge the battery.