Octopus Home Mini

TheElectricCow

Petriix said:

Surely the biggest benefit is that you can see live usage on the app? You can see what's happening from anywhere and respond to any issues. The IHD is fine if you happen to be standing next to it, otherwise it's useless. 

Funnily enough, my first thought when I read about this was something along the lines of “so it’s an IHD but you’ve got to use an app? Well that seems pretty useless why would I want to look at my phone to see my energy usage when the helpful little box in my kitchen is already displaying it”

Of course it’s just a matter of perspective there’s no right or wrong way to read your energy usage, but I found it interesting at least how the idea of it being app based can make it more appealing to some and off-putting for others.

Don’t get me wrong I do like the improvements it seems to make over the IHD especially with making more same day historical usage available, but at the same time even while I try to embrace new “smarter” technology it’d also be just another thing I don’t want clogging up the screen space on my phone. 

Perhaps my opinions are a bit dated though I still haven’t gotten used to these new flat cards the banks are pushing these days without the embossed numbers.

Raxiel

I registered my interest last month when I found out it was a thing. Not heard anything since then. How long had you been waiting?

Does it have a separate app or add to the Octopus energy app?

I'm interested in one because, while we do have the IHD, it only shows pretty limited info at a time, and scrolling through the options is a bit fiddly. It lives in the kitchen, but when I'm upstairs WFH, sometimes I'd like to know what the current usage is. Particularly export. I can check the inverter app, but that only tells me what the panels are putting out, before inverter losses and all the other incidental consumption. If I know the export is over 1.2kW I know it's time to go down for a free cuppa.

marlot

>> Does it have a separate app or add to the Octopus energy app?

It shows as part of the Octopus app, on the usage page.  You get a new tab 'live', and it replaces the 'daily' tab with readings from the electricty meter.  You lose the 'daily' for gas.  

vic_sf49

Raxiel said:

I registered my interest last month when I found out it was a thing. Not heard anything since then. How long had you been waiting?

Does it have a separate app or add to the Octopus energy app?

I'm interested in one because, while we do have the IHD, it only shows pretty limited info at a time, and scrolling through the options is a bit fiddly. It lives in the kitchen, but when I'm upstairs WFH, sometimes I'd like to know what the current usage is. Particularly export. I can check the inverter app, but that only tells me what the panels are putting out, before inverter losses and all the other incidental consumption. If I know the export is over 1.2kW I know it's time to go down for a free cuppa.

I'm thinking the same as you... Having my old IHD and a mini running at the same time, will provide useful data in different ways, depending where I am in the house.

Not got a mini yet, but I registered my interest a few months ago.

I like BrightApp, but that (and Octopus) only updates once a day at about 1am. It'll still have its uses, as the way it displays past usage is easy to look at.

wild666

Does it work on SMETS 1 meters or is it only for SMETS 2 meters?

Raxiel

wild666 said:

Does it work on SMETS 1 meters or is it only for SMETS 2 meters?

My understanding is, it connects to the HAN (zigbee) in the same way the IHD and gas meter do, and acts as a bridge to your domestic Wi-Fi, so the SMETS generation (The WAN side) shouldn't have any bearing on how it works.

Cirrus1

vic_sf49 

Not got a mini yet, but I registered my interest a few months ago.

I like BrightApp, but that (and Octopus) only updates once a day at about 1am. It'll still have its uses, as the way it displays past usage is easy to look at.

I registered for a mini in December. If it arrives in due course that’s nice, but an indefinite wait is not for me. I bought a Glow/Hildebrand device. Bright now gives me nearly live data. Electricity updates every 5 seconds and gas every 30 mins. Really pleased with it.

BeerSavesMoney

Raxiel said:

wild666 said:

Does it work on SMETS 1 meters or is it only for SMETS 2 meters?

My understanding is, it connects to the HAN (zigbee) in the same way the IHD and gas meter do, and acts as a bridge to your domestic Wi-Fi, so the SMETS generation (The WAN side) shouldn't have any bearing on how it works.

I currently have a Secure brand SMETS1 and it works with this!

Tallmark

A key difference between the mini and traditional IHDs is that it provides much more frequent energy usage data to Octopus than they receive from a smart meter:  “The Home Mini can then relay very granular meter readings (tens of seconds vs 30 minutely) directly to Octopus and to you via the Octopus mobile app.” This will presumably enable Octopus to refine their flexible energy tariffs and charging. They don’t get that with an IHD.  

Bob2021

Just received mine albeit in likely response to my email support query over a couple of days of shart gas meter readings not being recorded - not too sure what the Mini van do about it unless it's the IHD at fault. Either way I'm still going to use the IHD for daily cost totals and the Mini for drill down (albeit annoying gas readings are every 30 minutes and that's what I need to monitor in near real time).