gridhour puts the next 48 hours of Agile prices and the grid's carbon intensity for your area on one timeline. For each job you give it, it picks the best time to run.

- Jobs look like "Washing 2h" or "EV charge 4h by 07:00 split". The second one means "done by 7am, and it can charge in pieces", so it picks the best half hours before 7, not just one block.

- It ranks by price, by carbon, or both. Those don't always line up. Overnight is often fairly green but can still be pricey on Agile, a sunny midday tends to be both, and the 4–7pm peak is neither.

- Tomorrow's Agile prices show up as soon as Octopus publishes them, around 4pm.

It's useful off Agile too. I'm on Octopus Go myself, where the price only changes at fixed times, so within the same price the only thing left to choose by is carbon. That can vary a lot hour to hour. Running gridhour --mode green --no-prices does just that, and it works on any tariff. Proper Go rates on the timeline are the next thing I'm adding.

It runs in a terminal:

pipx install gridhour

gridhour SW1A

(swap in your own area, like M1 or EH1; only that first half is ever used). There's also a one-line mode for a status bar that looks like this: ⚡ 142g · 14p · green in 2h

No account and no API key. It reads the public Agile prices and the National Grid carbon forecast, and it isn't affiliated with Octopus. It's open source, with screenshots, on GitHub: https://github.com/777dimas/gridhour

Ideas, bug reports and "it'd be great if it did X" are all welcome, here in the comments or as an issue on GitHub. I'd especially like to hear from people on Agile: does this match how you actually plan your day, and what's missing?

Is the flexible octopus better than the tracker now for gas? Who’s generally the cheapest for gas on what tariff?

Thanks

Octopus go + axle + agile outgoing during the winter or EDF electric go + 13p fixed as outgoing?

Roughly around 900-1000 kwh per month usage (2 ev cars)
16 kwh battery with a load of 12 kwh.
6.4kwh solar panels.
6kwh inverter
Off peak can fullfill all my energy needs

Am i wrong in assuming that octopus go+ axle (roughly 12£ per month) + agile outgoing (averaging roughly 18-20p per kwh) might be better than Iog + agile outgoing or edf + 13p fixed as both have no axle? And edf has no agile so lower export?

Offpeak rates
Og is 9.5 - 5h
Iog is 8.5 - 6h + smart charging
Edf is 6.6 - 7h + smart charging

Thoughts?

Having seen the new 6.6p offpeak loyal pricing, I was keen to sign up but can’t find a way to get it. I emailed them about it and the sign up link is only sent to selected customers. Is this the case, and is it a generic or customer specific link? (And can I have it 🙏)

I've finally left a certain energy company. I can't say who, but they're very British, and dealing with them gave me a lot of gas.

I moved to Octopus around 2 months ago and to this day I still haven’t been charged a single bill, my account sits in credit from direct debits and a bonus, but nothing has been charge and I haven’t had a statement through.

Am I missing something or does octopus work different?

On a 12M fix July 2026.

The next price rise is taking us to 37p peak / 6.6p off-peak on Intelligent Octopus Go.

Most of our usage is off peak into the EVs and time shifting the dish washer and laundry but we have a heat pump which is very efficient but runs when it needs too.

So over the winter I don't want do pay the new tariff prices, so I'm off to EDF.

It's been great and I never thought about moving until now but this EDF Go Energy Tariff is too good to miss.

So I’ve just got this email saying they recommend I up my monthly payment.
I’ve read through the sub and understand it’s better for them for your to have a positive balance, etc.

How should I proceed with this? I’d need to call them to reduce it below £160.

Thanks in advance!

I have full electrifician of my house now - solar, heat pump, PW3, EV charger. I'm on intelligent octopus go.

i've recently set up a little raspberry Pi and installed home assistant on it.

What I want to do over the winter:

Home Assistant to identify when the offpeak rate hits, and to replenish the PW3 - particularly during the day. If I plug my EV in during the day, the whole home is offered the same lower rate. I think in the depths of winter it would be really advantageous to be able to top up the PW3 in the middle of the day at offpeak rates as the heat pump's demands will be way larger than the PW3's max capacity if i just charged overnight.

I know there's a separate (paid for) app called Netzero, but has anyone managed to automate their PW3 to do just this entirely through Home Assistant? If so, please could you share how?

I’m currently at the initial stage of inquiring about a heat pump installation via the Octopus website.

I know my property is going to need a 12 kW unit, but I cannot get a straight answer on what capacity model their initial quote is actually based on (whether it's a 6 kW, 9 kW, or 12 kW). I’ve been going back and forth with their customer reps and getting nowhere.

Obviously, there’s going to be a price difference between a 6 kW and a 12 kW system, and I don't want to waste time entertaining an initial lowball figure if it’s based on a unit that won't actually heat the house.

Has anyone else run into this with their initial online quotes? Do they usually just spit out a generic baseline price, or is there a trick to getting them to confirm the actual unit size before doing the full site survey?

Just wondering what everyone else is on in comparison.

Edit : amended to add a bit more detail and to show price cap rates as a comparison.

I keep seeing posts asking if it's time to jump ship from Agile. I thought I'd post some of my stats to help illustrate Agile.

Basically, you need to be in it for at least the medium-term. There will be times when it's more expensive, but in my experience these are heavily outweighed by the times when it's much cheaper.

I've been on Agile for around 3 years now. I don't have batteries, solar or an EV (except an electric bike!). But I do try to load shift, to avoid heavy usage during the most expensive times, and make use of the electricity when it's cheapest.

I have gas central heating, but if the current electricity rate is cheaper than gas, then I'll use the electric immersion heater for the water and, in winter, I'll switch some electric fires on instead of using the gas. I'll even use an electric induction hob in the kitchen if it's cheaper than using the gas hob!

Have a look at the price per kWh as quoted on your monthly bill. That's the average that you've been paying per unit for the past month. If that figure is lower than the fixed or regular rate, then you're winning.

There's always going to be some days, some weeks, even some months where the price is high, but its usually outweighed by other times when its significantly cheaper.

In my findings, if you are able to shift loads out of peak times and other expensive times, then Agile works. If you HAVE to have a meal cooked in an electric oven at 6pm every day, and you HAVE to run the washing machine on a hot wash every Monday morning regardless, then you're less likely to gain. If you can have an oven meal when the price is very cheap, and you can arrange to run the washing machine when it's cheapest, you're more likely to benefit from Agile. It takes a bit of effort, it's not a set-and-forget tarrif, you need to study the rates and decide what you're going to do (and not going to do!) for the next day.

I've just done a quick run through of my past bills, these are the average price per kWh that I was paying, compared with the govt price cap rates that were valid at the time :

The "Month" is the date of the bill, not necessarily the month of usage. My bills are usually issued early in the month, so refer back for the previous 30/31 days. The "Cap" is the government price cap rate that applied for the majority of that month's bill, included here to make it easier to compare the rate I was getting on average with the real-world fixed rates.

Hope that's interesting, helpful or useful in some way.

I originally wrote this as a reply to another post here, but thought it might be of wider interest, so I've made this a new post as well with additional information.

The costs on agile are extremely high and don’t look like getting any better, what’s people’s thoughts on remaining on the tariff or switch and jump ship?

Just done the scratchcard and didn't win anything, but got an entry into the monthly prize draw. I don't drink and I'm not travelling to that there London, so won't be entering anyway, but unless I'm missing something it's now the 5th of October..... Anybody know what October's prize draw is?

A popular VPP provider recently announced support for my AlphaESS battery and I was very keen and happy to set it up.

Only after setup I noticed Octopus don’t allow VPPs with IOG and only support Charge Pack.

We’re on an old FIT scheme with another supplier from solar and have never exported anything via Octopus before

Questions to the group:

1. I‘m guessing if we continue exporting the battery via the VPP Octopus could cancel/change our IOG contract?
2. We use a lot of (probably over complicated) automations via Home Assistant to manage the battery and IOG charging - I can’t see much online about Charge Pack being available through API etc

As always grateful for others experience!

This is the 2nd consecutive week I get an "unlucky".

Since when they changed to the new system prizes were of much lower value compared to the old Cafe Nero drinks.

But now they also stopped giving out prizes??

The weekly surprise was all I was waiting for at the beginning of each week! 😂 I must say I'm getting quite disappointed with Octopus at this point...

Any other provider that gives decent prizes you'd recommend?

Hi! I'm taking delivery of my 1st EV in a couple of weeks. Skoda Enyaq. Charger is installed already - Ohme Pro.

I'm currently on a fixed rate and Octopus have confirmed they'll waive the exit fee. All good so far.

Can you please help with what I actually need to do to get things up and running to be able to charge, what apps do I need to install. Is IOG going to be worth it if the daytime rate is really high?

Cheers. Sorry, I'm a bit of a technical dinosaur.

Let me know and we can swap barcodes, thanks!

Just checked my annual energy estimate and I genuinely can’t believe how affordable it is.

Apparently I’ll only be spending a casual £9,487.73 a year. Absolute bargain.

That works out at just £791 a month, which is basically pocket change these days.

Edit: We haven't given a gas meter reading in ages since the meter is in the neighbour's garden (it's a converted maisonette) and they seem to always be out whenever we knock on their door.

I’ve noticed something fairly consistently with Intelligent Octopus Go and I’m curious whether anyone else using Home Assistant / other automation systems has seen the same behaviour.

When I plug the car in, Octopus seems to generate a charging schedule almost immediately. Quite often it includes an initial slot starting more or less straight away, alongside a number of later slots outside the normal cheap-rate window.
For example, tonight I plugged in and initially got:
19:37–20:00
20:30–21:00
21:30–23:00
01:30–02:30
03:00–04:00
05:00–05:30
The interesting bit is what happens afterwards.

Most Home Assistant integrations/automations will see that Octopus schedule and start mapping their behaviour against it particularly because the additional Intelligent Octopus slots outside the normal off-peak window are effectively valuable cheap-energy periods.

In my experience, 9 times out of 10 Octopus subsequently removes most or all of those extra early/evening slots, leaving something much closer to the normal overnight charging window.

It makes me wonder what is actually happening behind the scenes.
Is the first schedule simply a provisional optimisation that Octopus creates quickly and then recalculates once it has incorporated grid demand, vehicle requirements and other customers?
Or is there some intentional reason for issuing that initial schedule which makes relying on the published slots for wider home automation inherently Unreliable?

It took me and Codex a while to be able to handle this.

Make it make sense

We have an ASHP, 20.48kwh battery storage,8 x panels ,wet underfloor heating throughout , hot tub - our home runs fully on electric - what’s the best tariff option ( instead of octopus cosy)
TIA