To calculate the average power output of a machine, you must know both the total amount of work performed and the time taken to complete that work.

The formula for power is given by:

where $P$ represents power, $W$ denotes the work done, and $t$ signifies the time taken. To determine the average power output of a machine, you divide the total work done by the total time taken.

For example, if a machine performs $5000 \, \text{J}$ of work in $10 \, \text{s}$, the power output can be calculated as follows:

In cases where the machine performs varying amounts of work over different time intervals, you can still find the average power output by summing the total work done and dividing it by the total time taken. For instance, suppose a machine performs the following work:

• $2000 \, \text{J}$ in $5 \, \text{s}$
• $3000 \, \text{J}$ in $10 \, \text{s}$
• $5000 \, \text{J}$ in $15 \, \text{s}$

First, calculate the total work done:

Next, calculate the total time taken:

Now, you can compute the average power output:

Thus, the average power output for the machine in this example is approximately $333.33 \, \text{W}$.