Our best tariffs for electric cars

Intelligent Octopus Go is a smart tariff with peak and off-peak pricing. Customers benefit from a low price night rate for their EV and home energy use of 7p/kWh between 11:30pm and 5:30am. Outside these hours your unit rate will vary by region.

Intelligent Octopus Go is a variable tariff, which means that the price you pay can rise and fall with the cost of wholesale energy. We'll always give you reasonable notice of any changes to the pricing of flexible tariffs.

To find Intelligent Octopus Go rates for your area, go to this page. Intelligent Octopus Go rates are changing from 1 October 2024. You can find the new rates by region here.

When we schedule your charging, you’ll always benefit from the low 7p/kWh for both EV and home, even if we ask your car to charge outside of the standard night hours. If you need to charge more urgently you can trigger a bump charge, which is billed at your normal unit rate.

You can find out more about Intelligent Octopus Go rates on our Intelligent Octopus Go Home Page.

The Go tariff features two unit rates:

• A peak unit price – the price you'll be charged per unit of energy you use most of the time, between 00:30 and 05:30. This rate varies depending where you are in the UK.
• An off-peak unit price – what you'll be charged per unit of energy used between 00:30 and 05:30. This is 8.5p / kWh, no matter where you are.

There's also a standing charge, which again varies depending where you live in the UK.

Energy rates change by region. You can check what unit rates and standing charge apply in your area on this page. Octopus Go rates are changing from 1 July 2024. You can check the new rates by region here.

Intelligent Octopus Go's smart feature and the flexibility service means we can adjust charging patterns to avoid expensive half hourly spikes and charge when it's cheapest. This allows us to guarantee a slightly cheaper rate. Not all car and charger models are compatible yet - Octopus Go works with all EVs and chargers.

Intelligent Octopus Go is compatible with over 280 cars from top EV brands and selected chargers. You can check on the IO landing page if your EV or charger is supported.

Don't have a home charger yet? Our Octopus engineers can install a charger for you.

Since the start of Intelligent Octopus Go in 2022, we've added more and more devices. Find out more about the journey here.

If you were not eligible for Intelligent Octopus Go, this may be because:

• You don’t have an iPhone (iOS v14.0 or later) or Android (v7 or later)
• You are using a car or charger that we’re not yet compatible with
• You don’t have a smart meter, or you do, but we're not able to connect to your smart meter
• Your smart meter is sending us daily or monthly readings, instead of half-hourly
• You are not on supply with Octopus yet

Octopus customers can download our mobile app without being eligible for Intelligent Octopus Go.

All charges managed by Intelligent Octopus Go are charged at off-peak rates - no matter when.

If you need to overwrite Intelligent Octopus Go settings to manually schedule a charge during peak hours, you'll be charged at peak rate. Any charging scheduled during off-peak hours is charged at the off-peak rate.

Letting Intelligent Octopus Go handle your charging means your car will automatically be charged when the grid is greenest and always at off-peak rates.

Unit rates vary by region. You can find your rates here

If you need an urgent charge outside your scheduled charge you can trigger a bump charge. Any usage during a bump period will be charged at whatever rate is active during that time, i.e. off-peak between 11.30pm - 5.30am, and your peak rate for any charging outside those hours.

Don’t worry, you’ll always get the off-peak rate no matter when the smart charging happens.

Of course, Outgoing Octopus and Smart Export Guarantee (SEG) are both compatible with Intelligent Octopus Go.

You’ll receive a payment for your export (price is dependent on the tariff you choose) and will still be able to benefit from our smart charging schedules.

Your monthly statements are the best way to keep track of your charging costs.

We’re also working on adding your charging costs to the Octopus app. In the meantime, you can find this information in third party apps like Octo-Aid.

IHDs don’t always work with our smart tariffs like Intelligent Octopus Go - you can read more about why here.

One of the ways we’re able to offer you a really good rate to charge your EV is because we enrol you in a flexibility service when you join Intelligent Octopus Go. This means you won’t be able to join any other flexibility service whilst on the tariff.

Switch to Intelligent Octopus Go from an existing Octopus tariff here and connect your EV to complete your signup in our mobile app

1. Confirm your car and charger are eligible
2. Accept our T&Cs
3. Authorise the Octopus app to control your car or charger
4. Complete a test charge
5. You’re good to go

Follow these step-by-step guides to sign up:
- if you have a Tesla
- if you have an Ohme charger
- if you have a Zappi charger

Yes, we need access to half-hourly meter readings to bill you correctly.

Currently iPhones (iOS v14.0 or later) and Android (v7 or later) or tablets.

No, you can only have one car connected to Intelligent Octopus Go smart charging at a time. If you have a second electric vehicle, then you can charge during this 6-hour off-peak window by manually setting it to charge at these times.

Alternatively, if you have a compatible charger, you can connect your charger instead, and we'll be able to smart charge any of your electric cars.

No, the tariff is linked to a single property.

Yes. Go's innovative pricing is only possible through smart meter tech. We need to be able to link to your smart meter automatically too, which means to get on Go, you must:

a) already be supplied by Octopus

b) have a SMETS2 or Secure SMETS1 smart meter that we can take half hourly readings from

Not with Octopus yet?

Join Octopus Energy on an interim tariff through this link, and we'll contact you to book a smart meter appointment once you've switched.

Yes, Outgoing Octopus is now compatible with Octopus Go!

Previously, you couldn’t be on Outgoing Octopus and Octopus Go at the same time – you could only benefit from Outgoing Lite at 8 p/kWh or Smart Export Guarantee at 4.1p/kWh.

Go is a smart tariff. This means that you need to have a SMETS2 or Secure SMETS1 smart meter installed before you can join the tariff. Trouble is, we're not allowed to book you an installation appointment until you've fully switched to us, which means you do need to sign up to Octopus on a standard tariff first in the interim.

All our tariffs have great, competitive rates, and you shouldn't have to wait too long for a smart meter.

Join Octopus Energy on an interim tariff through this link, and we'll contact you to book a smart meter appointment once you've switched.

If you've got any other questions, do get in touch for further information on this.

Register your interest for a smart meter here.

Once you've registered your interest, our team will be in contact when we have an appointment in your area.

Fear not. We have partnerships with a few different smart charging trailblazers, like Ohme, the UK's first smart home charging cable, which can automatically turn charge mode on when the 'off-peak' charging period kicks in.

Get in touch with Octopus Electric Vehicles for info on a state-of-the-art smart charger.

Of course! During this 5 hour off peak period, any electricity you use will be charged at 8.5p/kWh.

You can even automate stuff to come on using smart plugs and neat, simple to set up integrations with Alexa and IFTTT – check out some smart home hacks from our brilliant customers.

No. Octopus Go is an electricity tariff, created for drivers to charge their electric cars. This kind of smart tariff passes on the benefits of the UK electricity market's wholesale prices, which are highly variable through the day. Wholesale gas prices don’t really vary throughout the day, so a Go gas tariff wouldn't really be able to have that same amazing off-peak rate.

If you're a dual fuel customer, we can supply you gas too, of course. Just choose one of our standard gas tariffs, which you can get a quote for any time at www.octopus.energy/quote.

Yes! Choose 'electricity only' at signup.

Number one and most important: no matter what your IHD says, your off-peak period stays between 00:30 and 05:30.

Why is my IHD saying something different?

This SHOULD be straightforward – but some customers have noticed that their in-home display (part of the smart meter infrastructure) shows the cheap rate kicking in at 01:30 following a clock change.

On your bills, it'll say the cheap period starts at 00:30. This is obviously pretty confusing, and makes it hard to know which is correct. The challenge is that the IHD is not “determining” anything. It’s just displaying some information, and in the journey from Octopus to DCC (the government’s data company, which handles smart meter data), to TMA (a company who connect Octopus’s smart meters to DCC), to the comms hub (a regulated device which carries the signal to the smart meter), to the smart meter itself, to the IHD (which sits on a different network, established by your electricity meter) there are many steps – each of which may pass the time signal as it is, or may “helpfully” correct it from GMT to BST etc.

There are quite a few different ways to get a message to the IHD and some are simpler than others, but allow less functionality – so we’re trying to use the smartest way... but it’s also the most complex.