* NOTES SINCE PUBLICATION * I forgot to make the point in the video that you currently need to have a GivEnergy battery to be on Intelligent Octopus Flux.

Initial comments after having switched from Agile after Gary’s video, it seems to be doing what many have done using HomeAssistant and the Add On PredBat, but without the angst of learning all the ins and outs of those systems. It is apparent it uses the solar forecasts then starts charging the battery as the inverter starts clipping the output, then dumps it all down to 33% of our 8.2kWh battery. So far so good 😀

Thanks Gary, I too am on Agile+fixed export and had considered going back to Flux, your video has caused me to do some envelope calculations for IOF - conclusion is that it's marginal benefit for me: I compared two days, 12th May poor solar (30kWh generated, 9 imported) where on Agile I received £2 net profit, on IOF it's £1.10 For 14th May a good solar day (70 generated, 13 imported), Agile profit was £8.25, IOF it'd be £8.90. Assuming more good than not good, IOF is therefore slightly better but not much, offset in part by the standing charge being 24p higher. In your calculations of peak rate cost arbitrage I suggest you need to subtract your peak period home consumption from the export potential as you want to be taking that from the battery not the grid. On those two days for me it's 2.8kWh peak consumption that would come off my theoretical best case 10.7kWh peak period export. If Octopus doesn't export the most it can then profit will of course be lower. Interesting stuff though

Love your video’s and I’ve been running IOF since April. I’m only just getting comfortable with them managing everything. I’m struggling with the infinite battery concept being something for the winter though. I did occasionally miss starting or stopping Timed Discharge and this certainly relieves me of that (self-imposed) stress. Keep up the good good 👍🏻

Another great topic Gary! Probably needs a warning up-front though that if you don't have a GivEnergy battery (and most don't) that this option is simply not available. For most of us this is something that may happen in the future, or just fades away.

Another excellent video. It's great to see you trying these tariffs out. As an owner of a givenergy battery I will wait with baited breath for the results.

Gary, good video and explaining to people how it works. I changed from Octopus Go also in Oct last year to Agile. But the Agile wasn't for me, there are nice low or 'you get money' for importing or exporting electricity but it didn't get me what I wanted. I switched in April to Octopus Intelligent Go (as I have an EV). I have also PV and batteries and have now my import down to approx 8p/kW using the 7ppkw charging over night (Scotland)

The 1600 - 1900 hours discharge is also flexible. I’ve noticed that I’ve been discharging till 1930 ish probably to get the battery down to a reasonable recharge level. My total energy cost last month on this tariff was £13. That’s because we heat our water with gas. At the moment in May I’m £60 to the good. As I commented originally months ago it does take a bit of getting used to, so far I am satisfied how it is performing. Keep up the good work Gary.

excellent video Gary, thank you. I've been on IOF for 2-3 wks now and my only concern is the Inverter operating temperature during the 4pm-7pm forced export period. I'm in contact with Octopus on this but have also implemented a sort of 'safety break' using Home Assistant (this inserts a 2-minute pause in discharging if Inverter temp rises above a pre-set threshold). There is a thread running on this topic (see previous comment in the list), but let me know if you want to know more. Thanks once again. Keep up the good work!

Thanks, Gary - very helpful to get my head around possibilities. I don't have supported batteries (PureDrive II) but put them on the list with Octopus. Currently on Octopus Flux and doing my own arbitrage for the summer - which is going well so far. £100 in revenue since March, as my production is much greater than usage and I have found a manual force charge setting that works most days. Looking forward to hearing about the "One Tariff" approach 👍

An excellent and timely reminder to have another look at this tariff. It didn’t seem to make any sense when it was first released at the end of last summer.

Thanks again for the interesting video. I should be on this tariff from 20th May as that's when my Solar 12 panel array and Givenergy 5.2 KWh battery. I will need to get my head around the spreadsheets and at some point would like to compare notes with you Gary

I've been on IOF for a few weeks now, and I've found it works a little differently from how you explained. I'm getting reduced power export at around 2KW between 4 30pm and 6pm then further export from 7pm to 8pm (outside of peak rate). Battery discharges to 40% and idles overnight so drawing from the grid. It starts to charge up to a limit of 1200W in the morning when it gets light from solar. I've turned off my Eddi solar diverter to maximise export income. This time Last year I was exporting 33% of my solar generation, whereas this year it is nearer to double, even when subtracting the night time draw from the grid. It looks very profitable, but it seems the battery is being used to balance grid demand rather than maximising income for the customer, after all this is the whole purpose of the product !

Hi Gay, fantastic video as usual. I've been on IOF for the last few months, and for the most part it works great as you say. However I think it can be more intelligent. I have noticed on a sunny day, when my PV can generate 7.5kw, there can be 3.0kw charging of the battery and 4kw export with baseload of 0.5kw. Fantastic !!! But I have noticed the battery being idle or worse actually charging from the grid during the morning of a forecasted sunny day. My theory is that it may be possible to have the battery full by lunch time. With the sun still shining I will still export at 4kw with 0.5kw baseload but the battery can't charge as it is full, with generation at about 7.5kw, my system will be clipped by 3.5kw / hour. If the system was "more intelligent" and took a sunny forecast in to account it would not import to charge the battery in the morning, as it knows the charging will be by solar allowing maximum useage of the PV generation. Now I haven't actually seen this happen yet, but I'd be interested to know if other people have seen this.

i been on IOF since april and it working great right now :)

When the role out allows more than 'Give Energy' battery systems I'm going to switch. I'm on the standard flux tarrif at the moment but want to swap ASAP... Great Channel Gary keep up the good content 👍

Great video but you forgot to mention IOF is only compatible with Givenergy at present

The way it discharges is to set the discharge on your battery to the amount it would take to get from 100 to 20% in 3 hours. This is then your discharge rate split between export and house load. So on no solar days you won’t export the full 80% but days when your solar will cover the load you will get the full 80% out. My battery discharges at 2571 watts. So on dull days you will import during peak times if your house load > solar + 2571. That sounds bad when you have a battery but it does balance out. You will always deplete your battery buy 80% but the house load will be taken off this if no solar. On the other hand on very good solar days you’ll export up to the max inverter amount. What I haven’t experienced yet is if the 2571 + solar is above 5 kw in my case. I’m guessing the solar will go out no matter what and you could end up with more than 20% at 1900 hours.

Good video. I’ve been on the tariff since October. You missed two points. Firstly, a percentage of solar generation will be at peak export which increases export income. Secondly, in the summer the battery is charged evenly between 10am and 4pm. This could help some some users with clipping and as such get more generation.

Hi Gary, thanks for the video. Great content and thought provoking as always. Here's a question... Im interested in a heat pump but also intelligent Octopus Flux (currently on normal flux with a 4kwh array and 8.2kW GivEnergy battery). In your infinite battery scenario, you could generate and store up your excess/exported power over the summer months, but if you then moved onto say Octopus Cosy over the winter months, youd in theory lose that stored up energy in the grid, as the equalisation in your tarrif rates would be gone. So, would there be an arguement to stay on Intellegent Flux over the winter to make full benefit from the summer excess/exported power? Hope that makes sense? If not, thanks all the same and keep up the great work!

Hi Gary, I do like your description of an "infinite battery". With having the same import and export rate and no losses at the metering point that's also a "perfect infinite battery". However if you combine Intelligent Go which hopefully you can get into with its six hour 7.5p/kWh import rate over winter, with say Flux over summer and even better with the home battery not needing to AC charge - that means that all your excess summer export at between 15p/kWh and 25p/kWh gets banked in your account for use in winter where you can import back two to three times the amount of energy you exported and still break even on the cost. I was calling it "seasonal storage" like a ground source heat pump can do (as distinct from a home battery's 24 hour operation) but it's also a multiplied seasonal storage which is better. Sort of two to three times infinity perhaps? Or is that still just infinity? 🤔

I enjoyed the Agile tariff through the winter (changing the settings on the inverter every day according to rates) especially the negative pricing times but at the end of March changed to Intelligent Go and life is a lot simpler. At 5.30 the house battery is 100% and after an hour or so of light I'm exporting and earning. All car charging is at 7.5p and all export earns 15p. I'm happy with that. Would be interested in IOF when my Fox battery becomes compatible.

As you know, Agile has on most days numerous 30-minute slots which are cheaper than the buying price of pence per kW paid for battery storage, giving two benefits. First, as you allude to with IOF, Agile can effectively increase your battery size without any discharge losses or the need to shell out for bigger storage by taking from the grid when the price is below the pence per kW paid for battery storage. Secondly, batteries are warranted with an energy throughput & once exceeded they are out of warranty plus throughput increases degradation shrinking your battery storage capacity. This is an uninformed opinion, but, I'd keep an eye on the energy throughput once using IOF. If throughput significantly increases above your historic throughput, that's a cost that needs factoring in as it brings your batteries to their end-of-life faster. Hard to determine the price, but it's a cost nonetheless.

Checking today figures very sunny I imported 3.7kwh and exported 25.37kwh. I switched to IOF early last month. Their charge and discharge control took a couple of days to sort, now by 4pm I’m close to 100% in battery, it stops exporting at 21% and has been very reliable. Sure I’m now making the most from my system 10.8kwp 19kwh batteries I do GO over winter as use a granny charger for my hybrid.

The maths confirm this is the right switch for you, and then back onto Agile/Go in Oct. I did look at this tariff, but based on my April data, I would have been worse off on Flux rather than stick with Agile. I will re-check at the end of May and see if this now swings more in favour of Flux as I don't have historical data to use from last year. Thanks for another useful video.

I signed up to this tariff few days ago, but I still fail to understand the reason why it stops discharge at 20% and never uses the 20% it as it leaves my battery mode as Eco (Paused) after discharge. I see no reason why it can't just discharge down to your predefined reserve SOC (mine is 4% default reserved for power cut)?

You always raise good points and I know you want to test this tariff, this seems fair... but I just cannot see anything that beats Intelligent Octopus Go, so for those that can this just seems to win out regardless. You just are never going to beat a tariff that lets you buy for 7.5p in the cheap window and then export at twice that rate all through the day... so from an infinity battery perspective for every 1kWh you store in the battery you get to draw back 2kWh. I liked the idea of Agile for when the power is really cheap, but in all honesty 98% of the time it rarely drops anywhere near the Go rate of 7.5p let alone go negative, Go being guaranteed each day for 6 hours minimum... I say minimum, because when you connect your car up at say at 18:00, Octopus will more often than not reduce the tariff then and there to the 7.5p rate all the way through till the morning... yet on Agile you are just left paying the higher rate. It is also simple to set and forget and just get on with life :)

Currently 6kW/p on Agile import with Fixed outgoing, consuming nothing and exporting ~20kWh a day (May) ~ £2.50 net profit a day to us. We've a 9.5kW battery and did consider a 2nd battery but with a household use of ~12kWh a day we couldn't justify the cost and payback times for a 2nd being only 9.5kW*15p a day or about 7 years. Seriously thinking about Intelligent Octopus Flux for a 6 month trial to leverage a quicker payback time, and negate the need/desire to have a 2nd battery, just a little concerned if it voids or limits the GivEnergy battery warranty with it's terms around grid-trading. Really like the idea of loaning units at 22.73p/30.31p (my area) to the grid to store for me, as over the summer we tend to use a bit more electricity at night with bedroom aircon and I'm not sure the 9.5kW battery will fully support 21:00 to 07:00. My only niggle (and it a my mindset one) is exporting most of my battery at 4pm-7pm meaning I'll be importing in the later evening/night where currently I'm self sufficient.

I've just had my 1st month on Intelligent Octopus Flux , We have had a good generation peroid so I am in the plus this month ( £87 ) So far I am happy with the control of my systen By Octopus Although I wouldnt mind if we could set a lower max charge point ( 100%) just for the general health of the battery , Happy to float between say 10% and 90 % so to not stress the batteries . I really love your " Infinate" Battery concept it makes real sence Although my heart would realy like to see days when I dont have to import off peak and Just use solar or Night rate power from the batteries I would love to find an app so I could compare my import , use & Generation against various tarrifs Keep up the great "man in the streeet" understandable videos Andy 5 kw gen 2 giveneryy inveter , 15 kw givenery batteries , 6.34 kw solar

Hello Gary, I am currently on intelligent Flux at the moment. Just to let you know that not everyday Octopus are discharging for full 3 hours at peak rate also some days finishing at 18:30 which then puts you drawing back from the grid at peak rate when my battery has over 50% left. I think this needs to be factored into your calculation. Alan.

I've switched from 'unintelligent' Flux to Intelligent - it is a much better deal! Not worried about Octopus' use of my battery - seems to be much gentler and more nuanced than the default Givenergy set-up. Had Flux for the winter as we didn't have an EV. Now we have an EV we can hopefully switch to Intelligent Go in Autumn. If the Givenergy EV charger is integrated (MGs are not integrated with Octopus so it has to be the home unit). Otherwise it will be a case of calculating when Traditional Go becomes better than Intelligent Flux.

curious how this would compare to intelligent octopus that I’m on currently (which is gated behind a requirement for an EV). It opens up 15p export and with 7.5p offpeak for 6 hours so ideal for EV charging and battery charging. I can run the house from the battery so my ‘average’ rate is 8.5-9p, but in the summer I can get 15p export so arbitrage of 7.5p all day - plus my battery will likely be topped up anyway so I can still choose to force discharge at a similar arbitrage rate?

Been on this tariff just over a week now, and I'm pleased by both the automatic battery management, and the financial returns! I'm seeing about 33% more export revenue compared to regular Flux, and have had no clipping from my 5kW hybrid inverter thanks to Octopus charging the battery at 1.5kW from 10am-4pm. I also don't have to 'guess' what the weather will do the following day, and decide how much to charge my battery in the off-peak window beforehand. Couple of other observations: 1. The charging pattern seems very straightforward, however they do put limits on the state of charge of the battery for each time slot, for example - charge the battery to 26% from 10:00-10:30. This can lead to my battery getting to 26% and stopping charging before 10:30, which seems a bit odd, and has the potential for a few minutes' clipping over the peak hours. It does however give my inverter a little break to cool down a bit. 2. The environmental benefits may not be the best, as often the grid is dirtiest just after 7pm, when my battery is idle and I'm drawing back from the grid. I may have to look into using my battery below 20% for the evening, just to be a bit greener. 3. The GE app shows that overnight, if my house baseload is 120W, I may be drawing 190W from the battery. However, on IOF then I'm using grid power, which draws less (just under 160W for a 120W load). I still haven't got to the bottom of this discrepancy, but I'm happier on IOF because I can use the grid overnight, and save myself about 0.5kWh losses from the battery per day. It'll be interesting to see how charging patterns change if there's a very windy period and wholesale import rates are low - I expect the battery will charge during these times, similar to how an automated Agile system works.

I’ve been on OIF for a few months now having switched from bog standard flux. I’m broadly happy with it but there is a downside. In Suffolk we are fortunate to benefit from Octopus Power Ups but OIF isn’t intelligent enough to charge your batteries during these 2-3 hr periods. I’m yet to raise it with them - seems daft as you have zero control to make any changes!

FYI: I live in Spain and have contracted Octopus Relax Tariff. (that's how it's called over here). I pay 0,1240 €/kWh + VAT (21%) (10.67 pence / kWh+VAT). For a household of 2, we consumed about 300kWh in March, and will probably use about 3000 kWh this year. Just to compare with your (Gary) 7200kWh. I assume you have electric immersion heater. I heat water with nat gas. And we of course have milder climate.

I also changed to it last month and think it's good as I don't have to manage anything

Other than not having GivEnergy my concern with this tariff is not having a large enough battery. You need at least 15 kW of storage to be able to have the battery exporting for the full three hour peak period otherwise you will have to buy in some energy at peak rate. I prefer Flux. It would be interesting to see your calculations for how much better Intelligent Flux is than regular flux? Less than 5% of my energy is being used at anything other than the cheap overnight rate.

Hi Gary - I’m currently on Octopus Agile with a 9.5kW GivEnergy battery, but with an EV and GivEnergy charger. Can’t get onto Intelligent Go because the charger and car aren’t compatible and don’t want to be on Octopus Go as the export is so low. Would Intelligent Flux work for EV users do you think?

Haa hhaaa, you had us at Horse Guards parade and now you have us at the Oxford post office.

Would love if here in the US there were options for utility providers and tariff rates. Pure monopolies and expensive here especially in California. Thankful I have solar and have NEM 2.0 … it’s been 2 years now without an electricity bill and I love the peace of mind

Hi Gary Looks as if with this option the smallest battery that will qualify for this tariff is the best option in VFM and payback time terms

Hi Gary - fantastic video. However, the Agile tariff is unpredictable it may work you but not for me.. a bit like playing the lottery!

I hated this in the first few days as it does need to settle down. I posted on Facebook as such and was told it would settle. I was very dubious but it did and is now working well.

I wish Octopus would do a combination of Tracker and Intelligent Go. Daily updated prices with a peak / off peak margin. With my Ohme charger, I could just plug in every day, set a price cap of some number of pence and never have to think about it.

I love the idea of the Agile Tariff, but whenever I look at typical import and export rates, it just seems like a really bad deal vs Intelligent Go, for an EV, solar & battery owner. Am I missing something?

I'm loving IOF, I do cheat it a bit. I have a 10kWp East / West split array with a 5kW inverter, so on sunny days I would suffer with quite alot of clipping. Last year I managed it with Home Assistant automations, adjusting the battery charge rate in line with solar generation to keep space in the battery to take the generation that would otherwise be clipped. On IOF Octopus charge my battery at 1.4kW during the day, which would limit the excess I can put into the battery to that amount. To counter this, I have been running my automation anyway on sunny days (updates every 20 seconds) which overrides what Octopus do and eliminates all clipping. I also manually drain the battery to 5% overnight to maximise available storage for solar the next day.

I would try intelligent octopus flux but my battery is not supported unfortunately . I could try agile but don't feel comfortable and keep changing the export time for the battery every day. So I am quite happy with flux.

Don’t forget that the discharge period doesn’t all go to the grid. It’s split between home usage and grid. You will export all 80% if the solar at the time covers your house load but on dull days you might not export it all.

Salute your bravery. My Gen1 GE kit would I feel not be up to the task.

Hi Gary, I have been trying to install Intelligent octopus flux but my install has an issue with the giv battery. Even though I have a compatible battery model Giv5.2, it won't connect. Do you have that issue?

Eon offers 6.9p/kwh between 00:00-07:00 and 16.5p/kwh for export

I need to watch this a couple of time to really get my head around it but.... Does Intelligent Octopus Flus do away with getting a home battery entirely? If I understand the concept of the 'infinite battery' on this tariff I can use the grid instead of a battery to smooth my generation capacity and consumption demands. Or am I off down the wrong path here?

How beneficial was the resulting income credit Gary, worthwhile?

I have an EV so decided to go for the standard Flux. Topping up an EV using intelligent can cost you a hefty sum at 21p, so you would loose a lot that you have made with draining your batteries at peak times. Topping up your car during the three hour flux period on the standard flux is still expensive, but you can make it back with sunlight.

Since I don't have solar potential then I think come July I might switch to a fixed tariff for at least a year, This is because battery prices are too high for me at the moment and looking at last year's prices during autumn and winter when the kwh price can be more expensive in the evening when space heating is required, it will be cheaper on a fixed tariff, Here's hoping battery prices keep falling then next year....What about constraints on changing tariff? You cannot go back to Agile if you leave for 9 months. Also, batteries have a total cycle count so is degrading with every charge.

I’ve just come away from octopus flux to e-on. They have an ev tariff of 28p from 7am to midnight and then a 7 hour window of just 6.5p export is fixed at 16.5p. I’d rather have the consistency and it’s a 1 year fixed rate, but has no exit fees if I decide to change. We have no battery, a 12kw solar system, an electric car and air source heat pump so suits our needs and usage.

Anyone know if I can use this tarrif with a foxess inverter and mira batteries?

I have no solar or battery, 1 room, all lekky, and agile has saved me a fortune on monthly bills.

Gary, the real life loses of the battery are well above 10%. My GE app shows efficiency 94% for the two years we now had the 8.2kwh battery. However, my experiments using the smart meter readings for import-export showed efficiency under 70%. Apologies for repeating myself, as I have made similar comments 2-3 times in your channel, but my numbers are consistently the same. If your battery has real life efficiency similar to mine, the revenue from the forced discharge is very likely close to zero.

Been on this tariff for a couple of months now and I’m confused as to why it leaves approx 22% of battery charge during the evening and overnight period which I have no ‘home’ access to and hence draw from the grid during this period. Think I might need to discuss with Octopus or am I missing something

Hi Gary, Great channel and i always look towards new video. However, to switch to iof you are giving up control of usage of your battery to suits grid needs, not as much mine to certain point. I bought battery to for my needs, not grids. And here comes problem. Lifespan of the battery. I know some manufacturers do offer unlimited cycles, but force discharge still put extra wear on bartery and even with unlimited cycles, capacity will much lower. My battery are not supported yet, but even if they become supported, i will still not force discharge them, on regular bases. Maybe now and them. And you havent included cost of wear and tear of your battery in your calculation. You have made video about it in the past. I dont have any electric car, so for now i do stick to normal flux and octopus go in winter. Until something better comes around. Great content, keep going.

Now here is the thing. Gary doesn’t have an EV car, I do (well hybrid) but the point is it’s not the car it’s whether the charger you bought is supported by Octopus and guess what I have pod point and Octopus said they don’t support Pod Point so people ask them first depending on what make you buy. Once again the sales man sold me a dummy.

Watch your bills closely. I am not convinced Octopus can calculate flex bills properly

your usage may be higher than you think because it includes battery charging.. it is for me