Monthly Cost by EPC Rating: Calculator for Every Band

The Department for Energy Security and Net Zero publishes actual annual meter readings for around 19 million gas meters and 23 million electricity meters, matched to the home's EPC where there is one. These are the medians for 2024, the latest year, priced at the October to December 2026 cap. Gas figures cover homes with a gas meter; electricity figures cover all homes, which matters for band A, as the next section explains. For bills by house type rather than band, see our average energy bills guide.

Two things stand out. The spread between the best and worst bands is smaller than most people expect: a band F home pays about £763 a year more than a band B home, not the several thousand pounds the certificate implies. And the bands are not perfectly ordered. Band A costs more than B on the meter and band G costs less than F. Both are real effects with real causes, covered below, rather than errors in the data.

• Band A: £138 a month (£1,661 a year), a small group, about three in ten of them with no gas meter
• Band B: £124 a month (£1,484 a year), the cheapest band to run on gas
• Band C: £133 a month (£1,591 a year), the standard for rented homes from 2030 and the most common band in England's housing survey
• Band D: £153 a month (£1,834 a year), the largest group among homes with an EPC in the NEED data
• Band E: £173 a month (£2,070 a year), the current legal minimum for renting
• Band F: £187 a month (£2,248 a year), the most expensive band on the meter
• Band G: £177 a month (£2,129 a year), a small sample, more than half of them with no gas meter

These are the numbers to reach for when a listing says "EPC D" and you want to know what the bills will be. They are medians, so half of homes in each band pay less and half pay more. A four-bedroom detached house in band D will sit near the upper quartile of its band; a two-bedroom flat in band D near the lower quartile. The calculator above lets you pick which, and our guide to running costs before you buy gives the bill by band for each size of home.

Band A homes pay more than band B on these figures. Part of the reason is electric heating: the NEED data holds about 78,000 band A electricity meters but only about 54,000 band A gas meters, so around three in ten band A homes have no gas, and many of those will heat with a heat pump or electric heating, which shows up on the electricity meter at 26.32p per kWh instead of the gas meter at 7.97p. The NEED electricity figures cover every home, gas-heated or not, so band A's electricity median of 2,611 kWh includes heating that in a band B house would be counted as gas. Band A homes that do have gas also use more of it than band B homes (a median of 8,354 kWh against 7,168), which the tables do not explain, and band A is a small group, so treat its row as indicative. A heat pump home is still cheap to run: on our model a well-insulated 3 bed semi on a heat pump tariff spends about £230 a year less on heating than it would on gas, before standing charges, as our heat pump running costs guide explains. But the band table cannot show that, because it prices gas and electricity separately.

Band G is the other oddity. Its gas median is lower than band F's, and the tables do not say why. More than half of band G homes have no gas meter (about 33,000 gas meters against 75,000 electricity meters), so the gas figure covers a small and unusual group, against 5.3 million gas meters in band D. Treat the G figures as indicative. Band F, with 178,000 gas meters and 324,000 electricity meters, is a reliable picture of the worst-insulated homes with heating.

The EPC on a listing prints a modelled energy cost. It assumes the whole home is heated to 21°C in the living room and 18°C elsewhere for a standard number of hours, at a fixed set of fuel prices. Real households do not do that, especially in poorly rated homes, and the difference is large.

The gap grows as the band gets worse. In band C, households pay roughly what the model says they need. In band F, they pay a little over half. The missing half is not a saving. It is rooms left cold, heating switched off in the mornings, and condensation and mould in the corners, which is why DESNZ counts a household as fuel poor when the modelled cost would push it below the poverty line. If you are buying or renting a band E, F or G home and plan to heat it properly, budget from the modelled column, not the metered one. Our condensation and mould guide covers what under-heating does to a house.

The biggest single step is D to C, worth around £242 a year, followed by E to D at £237. Those are also the cheapest steps to take, because they are usually about insulation rather than heating systems. In our points model, loft insulation to 270mm adds about 7 points and filling cavity walls about 8, so together they can lift a home from anywhere in band D into band C, for about £2,950 at Energy Saving Trust prices and often less, or nothing, with a grant. Our EPC improvement planner ranks the measures for your property by points gained per pound, our guide to improving your EPC cheaply walks through them, and the insulation calculator puts a saving on each one. If you receive a qualifying benefit, ECO4 can pay for the insulation outright until December 2026.

Above band C the steps are worth less on the meter and cost more to take. Getting from C to B usually needs a heat pump or solar panels, and while both are worth doing for other reasons, the metered saving of around £107 a year will not pay for them on its own. See how EPC points are calculated for why the top bands are so hard to reach in an older house.

Rented homes in England and Wales must currently reach band E, and the government has confirmed that every privately rented home must meet a band C equivalent standard from 1 October 2030, with no earlier date for new tenancies. On these figures a band E rental costs the tenant about £479 a year more to run than a band C one, before the under-heating gap, which is the number tenants will increasingly ask about. Our EPC guide for landlords covers the deadlines, exemptions and the cost cap, and the EPC improvement planner finds the cheapest route to C for a specific property.

If you are renting and choosing between two flats, ask for the EPC certificate rather than the band alone. The certificate lists the assessor's recommended improvements and the modelled cost for the home, and a band D flat with a modern boiler and a poor score for windows will heat very differently from a band D flat with an old boiler and good windows.

In our points model a heat pump adds about 12 EPC points when it replaces a gas boiler over 15 years old but only 4 when it replaces a newer one, so it does not always move a home up a band, and the bill effect depends on your tariff more than your band. For a well-insulated 3 bed semi, a heat pump on a standard tariff costs about the same to run as gas (about £730 against £750 a year for heating), and about £230 a year less on a heat pump tariff such as Cosy Octopus, at about 18.7p per kWh with most heating in the cheap hours, before standing charges. The costs by house type guide gives installation prices for each property, and the tariff guide explains how to get the cheaper rate. Well-insulated homes gain most, which is why the order of work is insulation first, heat pump second, and why the band D to C step above is worth taking before the heat pump rather than after.

Consumption by EPC band from the DESNZ National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework, consumption data tables 2026, tables 27c, 28c, A27 and A28 (2024 consumption year, England and Wales). Modelled required fuel costs by band from the DESNZ fuel poverty supplementary tables 2026. Band boundaries from BRE SAP 10.2. Energy prices from the Ofgem price cap for October to December 2026.