10 Ways to Cut Your Power Bill With Solar (Beyond Just Installing Panels)

You did the right thing. You got solar panels installed, watched the inverter light up, and expected your power bills to drop off a cliff. But a few quarters later, the bills are still uncomfortably high. Maybe they went down a bit, but not by the amount you were promised, or the amount you were hoping for.

You are not alone. This is one of the most common frustrations we hear from Australian solar owners. The good news is that the panels themselves usually are not the problem. The problem is how the household uses electricity around them.

Here are 10 practical things you can do to get more from the solar system sitting on your roof right now.

Hot water is the single biggest energy hog in most Australian homes, accounting for roughly a quarter of total electricity use. If your hot water system heats overnight on a controlled load tariff, it is completely missing your solar production window.

The fix depends on what type of system you have. If you have a conventional electric tank, your electrician can switch it from the off-peak circuit to a daytime timer so it heats between 10am and 2pm using free solar. If you are considering a heat pump, those are even more efficient and pair brilliantly with solar during the day.

We have a detailed comparison of the options in our guide to heat pumps versus solar diverters. It covers the costs, the pros and cons, and which approach makes sense depending on your setup.

Your washing machine, dryer, dishwasher, and pool pump are all substantial loads. Running them in the evening means they draw from the grid at 30 to 40 cents per kWh. Running them between 9am and 3pm means they run on solar for free.

Most modern appliances have a delay-start function. Set your dishwasher to run at 11am. Program your washing machine to finish by 2pm. Put the pool pump on a timer. These are small changes that cost nothing but can shift hundreds of kilowatt-hours per year from grid to solar.

For a deeper look at load shifting strategies, including how much you can realistically save, see our guide on how to maximise solar self-consumption.

If you are on a time-of-use tariff, you are probably paying the highest rates between 3pm and 9pm. That is exactly when most families get home, turn on the aircon, cook dinner, and run the dryer. Your solar panels have stopped producing, so every watt comes from the grid at peak prices.

The evening peak is where the real damage happens on most solar households' bills. Understanding this pattern is the first step to fixing it. Even small shifts, like pre-cooling the house at 2pm instead of 5pm, can make a noticeable difference.

We wrote a full breakdown of this in The Evening Peak Trap, including what it costs and how to work around it.

Your solar app says you generated 25 kWh today and your self-consumption is 80%. Great. Then the quarterly bill arrives and it is $600. What happened?

The truth is that most solar monitoring apps only show what your inverter produces. They do not always account for what you actually import from the grid, and they rarely factor in time-of-use pricing. So you might be consuming 80% of your solar, but if the other 20% of your usage happens at peak evening rates, the bill still stings.

Our article on why your solar app does not match your power bill explains the common gaps and what to look for when comparing app data to your actual bill.

This one is a mindset shift. A lot of solar owners are still focused on maximising their exports, trying to find the retailer with the best feed-in rate. But even the best feed-in tariffs in Australia right now sit around 5 to 7 cents per kWh. Meanwhile, you are paying 30 to 40 cents to buy that same electricity back in the evening.

The maths is simple. Using your own solar is worth 4 to 10 times more than exporting it. Every kilowatt-hour you keep in the house is a kilowatt-hour you do not buy back later. Chasing a slightly higher feed-in rate while ignoring self-consumption is leaving real money on the table.

For the full picture on why the export game has changed, read Feed-in Tariffs Are Dead: What Now?

If you already have a battery, or you are thinking about getting one, a Virtual Power Plant (VPP) can be far more profitable than a standard feed-in tariff. VPPs aggregate home batteries across the grid and dispatch stored energy during peak demand events. In return, you get paid a premium for the energy your battery provides.

Some VPP programs pay 10 to 20 times the standard feed-in rate during grid stress events. It is not guaranteed income, but over a year, VPP payments can meaningfully improve the economics of a home battery.

We compared the numbers in VPP vs Feed-in Tariff, including which VPP programs are available in each state.

An electric vehicle is one of the biggest loads you can add to a household. Charging a typical EV uses 8–15 kWh per session, which is roughly what an entire house uses in half a day. If you plug in when you get home at 6pm, that is all peak-rate grid power.

The smarter play depends on your situation. If you are home during the day, charging from solar between 10am and 2pm is the cheapest option by far. If you are out during the day, off-peak overnight charging (usually 15–20 cents per kWh) beats peak rates. Some households do a mix of both.

We ran through all the scenarios in Solar + EV Charging: Daytime vs Off-Peak.

If you have a battery and you are on a time-of-use plan, battery arbitrage can be a genuine money saver. The idea is straightforward: charge your battery with cheap solar during the day, then use that stored energy during expensive peak hours in the evening instead of buying from the grid.

The spread between off-peak and peak rates in some parts of Australia is 30 cents or more per kWh. Over a year, running your battery through a daily charge and discharge cycle on those rates can save $500 to $1,000 depending on your battery size and usage patterns.

For a detailed look at how the numbers work, including which tariffs make arbitrage worthwhile, see our guide on battery arbitrage in Australia.

Batteries are the most talked-about upgrade for solar owners, but they are not always the right next step. At $8,000 to $16,000 installed, a battery needs to save you a meaningful amount each year to justify the cost before the warranty runs out.

For some households, particularly those with high evening usage, time-of-use tariffs, and an EV to charge, the case is strong. For others, especially those with modest bills or flat-rate plans, a battery might not pay for itself within its warranty period. It is worth running the numbers honestly before committing.

We did a full cost-benefit analysis in Are Solar Batteries Worth It in 2026? to help you figure out where you stand.

This one sounds obvious, but a surprising number of solar owners are on the wrong plan. If you have solar and you have shifted most of your usage to daytime, a flat-rate tariff might actually cost you more than a time-of-use plan. Or you might be on a plan with a decent feed-in rate but terrible usage rates, which makes no sense if your self-consumption is high.

Check your bill. Compare the rates. Use the government's Energy Made Easy comparison tool (or Victorian Energy Compare if you are in Victoria) to see what is actually available. You might find that switching plans saves you more than any hardware upgrade.

Pay attention to daily supply charges too. Some plans lure you in with high feed-in rates but charge $1.20 or more per day just for the connection. The total cost, not any single rate, is what matters.

None of these tips require you to spend a fortune. Several cost nothing at all. The common thread is understanding where your electricity actually goes, when it gets used, and how your tariff prices that usage. Once you see the pattern, the fixes tend to be obvious.

Start with the free stuff: shift your hot water, run your appliances during solar hours, and check that your electricity plan actually suits a solar household. If you have already done all of that and bills are still higher than expected, that is when a battery conversation starts to make sense.

Your panels are doing their job. The trick is making sure the rest of your home is set up to take advantage of them.