Economy 7 and multi-rate meters: the short version
It rarely pays to be a quiet Economy 7 customer. On a default tariff your supplier chooses how to split the price cap between the day rate and the night rate, and that choice decides whether your meter saves you money or costs you more.
On Flexible Octopus October rates, every daytime unit costs about 24% more than on the same supplier's single rate, and Economy 7 break even sits at about a third of your use in the off-peak hours. For a home that can shift one heavy load, time of use tariffs built for storage heaters, EVs and heat pumps are now often the better answer, because the best of them keep the rest of the day close to single rate.
What Economy 7 is, and the split nobody sees
An Economy 7 meter records electricity on two registers: one for seven cheaper hours overnight, one for the rest of the day. The design dates from the late 1970s, when its job was to charge storage heaters and hot water cylinders while demand was low.
The confusion starts with the price cap. Ofgem caps a multi-rate tariff on its combined cost, so the day and night rates together cannot exceed the cap, but neither rate is capped on its own.1 Suppliers pick the split, and the cap formula assumes 58% of use by day and 42% at night.2
- The day rate sits above the single rate. Flexible Octopus averages 32.65p by day across the 14 regions in October, against 26.32p on its single-rate tariff.3
- The night window moves, the clocks do not. The seven hours fall somewhere between 11pm and 8am, set by region and meter, and most Economy 7 meters ignore daylight saving, so the cheap window runs an hour later by the clock in summer.4
- Timers drift. Heater and immersion timers set years ago may no longer line up with the meter, especially after a meter exchange.
- Your bill shows the split. Look for two unit rates and two sets of readings, usually labelled day and night, or normal and low.
The day-night maths: when does Economy 7 pay?
Whether the meter pays comes down to one number: the share of your electricity used in the off-peak hours. Each unit you move from day to night saves about 18p. Each unit left in the day costs about 6p more than it would on single rate.
On Flexible Octopus October averages, Economy 7 break even lands at about 34% of use at night, with the two standing charges within a penny a day of each other.3 Below that line Economy 7 costs more than single rate. Above it, the saving grows quickly.
Ofgem's medium multi-rate home uses 3,400 kWh a year with 42% of it at night, and on these rates that household saves about £49 a year against single rate.2 A home using only a fifth at night pays about £89 more, which is the common pattern where storage heaters have been taken out or gas now does the heating.
Same meter, different maths
Break-even depends entirely on how your own supplier splits the cap. MoneySavingExpert's April averages, a 34.38p day rate and 15.43p night rate against a 24.67p single rate, push it nearer half, and on those figures a 42% home pays roughly £60 a year more on unit costs.5 Your own rates decide which side of the line you sit on, which is what the check below is for.
Cooking, washing and evening television all land on the higher day rate, so a home without storage heating rarely reaches the break-even share. A gas-heated home using 2,500 kWh a year with a fifth of it at night would pay about £65 a year more on Economy 7 than on single rate, on October averages.
Same cap, different splits
The cap protects the blend, not the split. Two suppliers can both sit inside it while charging day and night rates several pence apart, and Sustainability First has shown suppliers raising night rates and cutting day rates in winter while still meeting the formula.6
| Supplier | Day | Night | 20% at night | 42% at night | 60% at night |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| British Gas | 31.94p | 14.63p | £968 | £839 | £733 |
| EDF | 32.09p | 14.42p | £971 | £839 | £731 |
| E.ON Next | 32.13p | 14.37p | £972 | £839 | £730 |
| Octopus | 32.40p | 14.00p | £976 | £839 | £726 |
| OVO | 27.23p | 18.34p | £865 | £799 | £744 |
| Scottish Power | 32.13p | 14.37p | £972 | £839 | £730 |
OVO's flatter split costs about £100 to £110 a year less than the rest for a home using a fifth of its power at night, then becomes the most expensive of the six at 60%. The right default tariff depends on your own split, and a supplier can change its split every time the cap moves.
- The split changes without you. The cap resets every three months, and each reset can move your day and night rates in different directions.
- The home changes too. Storage heaters come out, gas boilers go in and EVs arrive, yet the meter, the tariff and the timers stay as they were.
- Better options go unseen. The cheapest answer for a multi-rate home is often a fixed deal or a time of use tariff, not another default Economy 7 tariff.
Is Economy 7 still working for you?
Your annual statement or supplier app shows how many units you used by day and at night, along with both unit rates and the standing charge. The check starts on Flexible Octopus October averages, so replace those with your own figures.
Economy 7 or single rate?
Enter yearly figures from your bill. The defaults are Flexible Octopus national averages for October 2026, for both Economy 7 and single rate.
Your result changes whenever your supplier's rates do, so run it again after each price cap update.
Are time-of-use tariffs better than Economy 7?
For many homes, yes, but not automatically. Economy 7 gives every household on it the same fixed window, while a time of use tariff aims its cheap rate at a specific appliance, and the better ones avoid charging a large premium on everything else. If Economy 7 still suits you, a fixed Economy 7 deal removes the risk of the split moving under you each quarter, so compare the day rate as carefully as the night rate before you fix.
| Option | Cheap rate | Rest of the day | Suits | Watch out |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Single rate | None | 26.32p cap rate | Homes with little night use | No night discount at all |
| Snug Octopus | 8.57p, 00:30-06:30 plus smart top-ups | 26.26p in London | Storage heaters | Needs a SMETS2 meter and meter-controlled heaters; variable |
| Whole-home EV tariffs | 6.7p-9.5p overnight | 31p-43p | EV drivers who shift other use too | High day rate on the whole home |
| EV charging add-ons | Bill credit on car charging | Your normal rate | Compatible cars and chargers | Car and charger must be supported |
| Heat pump time of use | 14p, 11am-4pm | 27.16p average | Heat pumps running in the afternoon | Needs daytime heating to pay |
Time of use without an EV
Nearly every tariff in the table above assumes a car on the drive. EDF FreePhase does not: it prices the whole home in three bands, cheapest overnight, dearest between 4pm and 7pm, and hands back free electricity when wholesale prices turn negative. For an Economy 7 home that cannot reach the break even share, it is the closest thing to a straight swap. A smart meter is needed, and there is no exit fee.
See EDF FreePhase →Storage heaters: the tariff SwitchInsights rates highest
Snug Octopus is the closest like-for-like replacement for a storage heater home. It charges the heaters overnight and at other cheap moments Octopus picks, adds a one-hour afternoon boost at the same rate, and in London prices the cheap window at 8.57p against 26.26p the rest of the time.7
On that example Snug costs about £208 a year less than Flexible Octopus Economy 7, against the £128 Octopus's own comparison claims on older rates and a larger home.7 It needs a second-generation smart meter, heaters driven by the meter rather than a timer, and half-hourly readings, and the price is variable.
EVs and heat pumps
EV drivers face the same trade-off Economy 7 presents. Whole-home EV tariffs charged 6.7p to 9.5p overnight in Electrifying's October comparison but 31p to 43p at other times, while an add-on such as ScottishPower EV Optimise leaves the house on its normal rate and credits back the difference on the car's charging alone.89 Heat pump tariffs move the cheap window to suit the heating instead, with ScottishPower Heat Pump Saver charging 14p from 11am to 4pm and about 27.16p across the remaining hours.10
Not every time-of-use tariff fixes the Economy 7 problem. A home that cannot shift most of its use simply swaps one high day rate for another, so look hardest at the rate you will pay for the majority of your units, not the headline night price. SwitchInsights' guide to EV tariffs works through the same trade-off for drivers, and a postcode quote from So Energy will show what a flat rate costs at your address.
What is changing for multi-rate meters
Older Economy 7 meters are settled on a standard profile that assumes when you use power. Half-hourly settlement replaces that with real smart meter data, which Elexon says lets suppliers build offers that reward flexible use.11
- 22 October 2025Suppliers start moving meters to half-hourly settlement12
- May 2026More than 8.4 million meters settled half-hourly, about a quarter of the roughly 33 million in Britain11
- 30 June 2026Radio Teleswitch Service switched off13
- October 2026Elexon's target of 80% of meters moved
- May 2027Every meter due on half-hourly settlement
The Radio Teleswitch Service used to control heating and hot water on some older multi-rate meters. The energy consumers minister said the switch-off went to plan, with a small number of those meters still in place but no longer relied on, after Ofgem had warned that a failed meter could leave heating stuck on or off and storage heaters charging at the wrong time.13
An Economy 7 smart meter also makes leaving easier. Suppliers can usually move a communicating meter between Economy 7 and single rate remotely, with no engineer visit.5
Stay or move?
- Storage heaters or a hot water cylinder run overnight on a timer
- More than about a third of your use falls in the off-peak hours on your own rates
- Your timers match the meter's off-peak window
- You cannot get a smart meter for the time being
- Storage heaters have gone, or gas now heats the home
- Less than a third of your use falls at night
- You have, or plan, an EV, heat pump or home battery
- You have a SMETS2 smart meter that could carry a smarter tariff
- Read the meter for a week. Note both registers morning and evening to see your real day and night split.
- Confirm your off-peak hours. Ask your supplier for the exact times, and whether they shift between winter and summer.
- Check the meter and the heaters. A communicating meter is what lets a supplier change tariff type remotely, and a smart storage heater tariff also needs heaters it can drive directly.7
- Read the terms. Most smart tariffs are variable, need half-hourly data sharing, and some carry exit fees.
If the answer is a single rate
Most of the homes in the "look at the alternatives" list above end up on a plain single-rate deal rather than another time of use tariff. So Energy quotes those by address instead of by region, which is the only way to see what a flat rate would actually cost at your address, and it runs its electricity on 100% renewable supply and waives the exit fee in the final 49 days of a term.
See So Energy tariffs →If the meter was never the problem, SwitchInsights on whether Economy 7 is still worth it works through the household types in more detail. This article is not financial advice. Compare whole deals on the SwitchPilot Tariff Tracker, which scores them on quality as well as price.
How SwitchInsights analysed this
Every cost on this page is priced on a single supplier's own published rates, so the day-night split is the only thing that varies. We read Flexible Octopus direct debit rates for all 14 distribution regions from the supplier's tariff API on 14 October 2026 and averaged them, with electricity zero-rated for VAT.
Each annual total is based on tariff unit rates and the standing charge together. On these two tariffs the standing charges sit within a penny a day of each other, so the split does nearly all the work, but including them keeps the totals comparable with a real bill.
Costs assume Ofgem's medium multi-rate consumption of 3,400 kWh a year, weighted across the 58% day and 42% night split the cap formula itself uses. Snug Octopus figures use Octopus's published London rates with the standing charge that takes effect on 19 October 2026. The supplier split table carries Uswitch's published South Wales examples, priced on unit costs alone, and every figure we did not derive is credited to whoever published it.
Frequently asked questions
What is a PC2 meter?
Are Economy 7 day and night rates capped?
What share of my electricity needs to be at night for Economy 7 to pay?
Are time-of-use tariffs better than Economy 7?
What is the best tariff for storage heaters?
Can I switch from Economy 7 to a single-rate tariff?
*Affiliate disclosure: the EDF and So Energy links on this page are affiliate links, including the two inside FAQ answers above and one inside the "watch the day rate" note - SwitchInsights earns a commission when readers switch through them, at no extra cost to you. That commission has no influence on what we write or who we recommend.
Octopus, OVO, British Gas, E.ON Next and ScottishPower appear here on editorial merit and we earn nothing from them, and the storage heater tariff this article rates highest is one of those. Rates change, and this is not financial advice.