Less than the spec sheets suggest, and much less than the marketing suggests. Loudness comes from your speakers' sensitivity and your room, not from chasing watts.
The arithmetic first. Doubling amplifier power buys you about 3 dB, which is a just-noticeable step in level. Going from 100 W to 200 W is not "twice as loud"; it is a small nudge. Meanwhile a speaker rated 3 dB more sensitive gives you that same nudge for free, at every volume, with no extra heat. Sensitivity and listening distance set your loudness budget; the amplifier just has to stay clean inside it.
Second, watt ratings are measured differently across brands: how many channels are driven at once, at what distortion, into what load, over what bandwidth. A figure quoted with two channels driven at 1 kHz into 6 ohms is not comparable with one quoted all channels driven, 20 Hz to 20 kHz, into 8 ohms at low distortion. Comparing headline numbers across brands is close to meaningless. Comparing them within a brand's own range, measured the same way, tells you something.
What actually matters is enough clean power for your speakers in your room, from an amp section that does not collapse when all channels work hard at the same time. Film soundtracks do exactly that in the loud passages, and it is the moment a thin power supply announces itself as compression and hardness. Sensible sensitivity, sensible distance, mid-range AVR: not a problem.
Where does the rule stop mattering? Large dedicated rooms, long listening distances, low-sensitivity or low-impedance speakers, and listeners who want reference level with headroom. That is where separate power amps earn their keep, and it is a minority of rooms.
Typical Indian living room, sofa three to four metres from the screen, reasonable speakers? Mid-range AVRs have power to spare, and the money is better spent on the speakers and the subwoofer. Watts are cheap to print and cheap to buy; sensitivity and directivity are what you actually hear.
Tell us the speakers you are considering, the room size and how loud you listen, and I will tell you whether the amplifier is even part of the decision. Usually it is not.
Not sure what fits your room and budget? Share your room size and budget on WhatsApp. It is a two-minute answer with a floor plan.
