does vpn drain battery on my macbook?

I use macbook air m3 2024 so its not old, battery life is normal, it shows 90% of maximum capacity. so everything look normal. but when I use vpn, it seems that it's draining my battery. I noticed this few weeks ago when I was using netflix and gaming the whole day. basically I need to charge my macbook every 3 hours. but when I am not using vpn but watching netflix and gaming, I need to charge it every 5 hours. can it be that vpn usage affect the battery so much that there is 2 hours difference?

would it help if I used low power mode when using vpn to avoid drianing my battery faster?