How much energy should you be using?
Ofgem's medium household uses 2,500 kWh of electricity and 9,500 kWh of gas a year, in force from 1 July 2026. A quarter of homes use less than 1,600 kWh of electricity. A quarter use more than 3,800 kWh. Which one you are is not decided by how many bedrooms you have, whatever the comparison sites tell you.
The thing almost every other site gets wrong
Search for the average bill for a two person household and you will be told that Ofgem's low band means a one bedroom flat, medium means a three bedroom house and high means four or five bedrooms. It is on comparison sites, supplier blogs and price guides everywhere.
Ofgem has never said that. We read the consultation of March 2026, the decision of May 2026 and the previous decision of 2023. The words bedroom, occupant, household size, flat, terraced, semi detached and detached do not appear in any of them. The bands are not descriptions of homes at all.
What they actually are, in Ofgem's own words from the 2023 decision: The lower quartile reflects the annual
consumption that only 25% of all consumers use less than. The higher quartile reflects the annual consumption that
only 25% of all consumers use more than.
They are positions in a distribution of real meter readings, taken
from the government's own consumption statistics. Nothing more.
That matters, because a couple in a draughty four bedroom house with electric heating will use more than a family of five in a new flat. Bedrooms are a bad guide. Your own meter is the only good one.
The three bands, and what changed in July
Ofgem cut every one of these in July 2026, which quietly lowered the headline typical bill without any price moving.
| Band | Electricity, single rate | Electricity, multi rate | Gas | Was, to 30 June 2026 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Low Lower quartile |
1,600 kWh | 1,900 kWh | 6,000 kWh | 1,800 elec, 7,500 gas |
| Medium Median. This is the one every headline uses |
2,500 kWh | 3,400 kWh | 9,500 kWh | 2,700 elec, 11,500 gas |
| High Upper quartile |
3,800 kWh | 6,100 kWh | 14,000 kWh | 4,100 elec, 17,000 gas |
Multi rate covers Economy 7 and similar meters. Ofgem keeps the Economy 7 split at 58% peak and 42% off peak. Source: Ofgem, Review of typical domestic consumption values, decision published 27 May 2026, in force 1 July 2026. Read the decision →
What each band costs where you live
Electricity only, at your region's price cap rates. Nobody else publishes the bands by region, because the bands come from Ofgem and the regional rates come from a different Ofgem table. Putting them together is arithmetic, and the arithmetic is written under the table.
| Electricity region | Low, 1,600 kWh | Medium, 2,500 kWh | High, 3,800 kWh |
|---|---|---|---|
| East Midlands 25.36p a unit, 51.45p a day | £594 | £822 | £1,151 |
| Eastern England 26.61p a unit, 51.84p a day | £615 | £854 | £1,200 |
| London 26.6p a unit, 42.92p a day | £582 | £822 | £1,167 |
| Merseyside and Northern Wales 27.86p a unit, 67.66p a day | £693 | £943 | £1,306 |
| North Eastern England 25.46p a unit, 61.58p a day | £632 | £861 | £1,192 |
| North Western England 26.49p a unit, 45.68p a day | £591 | £829 | £1,173 |
| Northern Scotland 26.35p a unit, 55.14p a day | £623 | £860 | £1,203 |
| South Eastern England 26.88p a unit, 52.32p a day | £621 | £863 | £1,212 |
| South Wales 26.55p a unit, 55.41p a day | £627 | £866 | £1,211 |
| South Western England 26.58p a unit, 55.58p a day | £628 | £867 | £1,213 |
| Southern England 26.47p a unit, 47.81p a day | £598 | £836 | £1,180 |
| Southern Scotland 26.11p a unit, 61.41p a day | £642 | £877 | £1,216 |
| West Midlands 25.6p a unit, 57.23p a day | £618 | £849 | £1,182 |
| Yorkshire 25.6p a unit, 61.67p a day | £635 | £865 | £1,198 |
Each figure is the standing charge for 365 days plus that band's consumption at the unit rate, using the cap rates for that region for 1 October to 31 December 2026. It is what a default tariff would cost at that consumption, before any deal, and it excludes gas. The cap rates these come from →
What the official data does say about your home
There is a proper government source for this, and it is not a comparison site. The Department for Energy Security and Net Zero publishes the National Energy Efficiency Data framework, which are accredited official statistics built from real meter readings matched to property records. The 2026 report covers 2024.
- Across 23.5 million properties in England and Wales, median electricity use was 2,500 kWh a year. A quarter used under 1,600 kWh and a quarter used over 4,100 kWh.
- Across 18.9 million properties, median gas use was 10,000 kWh, with quartiles at 6,500 and 14,400 kWh.
- In Scotland, median electricity use was 2,400 kWh and median gas 10,600 kWh.
- It does break consumption down by property type, floor area and the number of adults, and it finds that
both gas and electricity consumption increase with adult occupancy
. It does not publish a simple table of kWh by number of people, and neither will we until we have read the underlying spreadsheet ourselves.
Notice how close those medians are to Ofgem's bands. That is not a coincidence: Ofgem builds the bands from the same government consumption data. It is also the clearest evidence that the bands describe meters, not households. The report → The data tables →
Water, where the honest answer is different
People search for the average water bill for a two or three person household. No official body publishes one. Not Ofwat, not Water UK, not Discover Water, not the Consumer Council for Water. We checked all four.
What is published is use per person per day. The Environment Agency measured 136.5 litres per person per day in England for 2024 to 2025. Discover Water, which is run jointly by Water UK, Ofwat, the Consumer Council for Water, the Drinking Water Inspectorate, the Environment Agency, Natural Resources Wales, the Welsh Government and Defra, puts England and Wales at 137 litres for April 2024 to March 2025, split 122 litres if you are metered and 175 litres if you are not.
You can multiply that by the number of people in your house. We are not going to pretend that is an official household figure, because it is not. It is our arithmetic on an official per person number, and it ignores the fact that a household of four does not use four times what one person uses. Discover Water → What your water company charges →
How to find your actual number in two minutesThe only figure that is really yours
Every one of the figures above is somebody else’s household. Yours is printed on your own bill, and it is the only number worth using.
Look for a line saying annual consumption, estimated annual usage, or kWh used. Suppliers are required to show it. If you only have a quarterly bill, multiply the kWh on it by four, which is rough but far better than guessing from bedrooms. Smart meter customers can read it from the in home display history.
Once you have that number, put it into the assistant on our front page with your postcode and it will cost every tariff we can verify at your usage rather than at an average household. Do that now →
Where this comes from, and where it could be wrongSources and limits
Consumption bands: Ofgem, decision of 27 May 2026, in force 1 July 2026. Regional cap rates: Ofgem’s published regional tables. Property level consumption: DESNZ National Energy Efficiency Data framework 2026, data year 2024, accredited official statistics. Water use per person: Environment Agency and Discover Water.
What could be wrong. The cost table is our own arithmetic on two published Ofgem figures, so it inherits anything wrong with either. It is electricity only and takes no account of gas. It uses the price cap, so a household on a fixed deal pays something else. The Ofgem bands are national and consumption varies by region as well as by home. And the water figure is a per person measurement, not a household one, so multiplying it is an approximation and we have said so above rather than hiding it.
Found a mistake? [email protected].
30 price changes logged. Every one had a date you could have known in advance.
Tell us which bills you care about and we will email you when one of them changes, with the figure, the date it starts and a link to the regulator that set it. Free, no account, one click to stop.
Email alerts are not running yet. We would rather say that than take your address and send you nothing. Until they are, the change log carries every dated change the day we find it, and you can bookmark it or follow it in a reader.