Hearthsum

The honest sums for your home's energy

What solar actually costs in the UK, who actually gets it paid for, what your panels actually earn and how long it actually takes, from official sources, dated, with the working shown. Nobody is going to ring you.

Figures on this page last checked 24 October 2026. Each carries its own receipt with its own date.

Hearthsum publishes what home energy schemes and equipment cost and who qualifies, taken from government, regulator and supplier sources and rebuilt whenever a figure changes. Every figure carries a receipt: the source, a link, and the date we last checked it. We do not ask for your details, so we cannot sell them. When a scheme has nothing for you, we say so, because a page that only ever says yes is not worth reading.

Where a number is allowed to come from, why the site rebuilds each day, and what happens when a figure is wrong: how we check our figures.

Two dates most guides have not noticed

Closing
67 days
ECO4 measures must be installed by 31 December 2026. It is a real date, set in law, and not a reason to sign anything today.
Then it costs more
157 days
0% VAT on solar and batteries ends 31 March 2027. It goes to 5% the next day.

The pages

Solar panel cost

What certified installations on existing homes actually cost, by system size, from the government's own record. Not a quote.

Grants

What actually pays for panels where you live, nation by nation, and three things that are not solar grants.

Free solar panels

Who actually gets panels for nothing, and what the adverts usually mean. No form, no phone call.

Export rates

Every supplier's Smart Export Guarantee rate, read from their own pages and sorted by who is allowed to have it.

Payback

The Energy Saving Trust's figures untouched, then our sum with every input linked. Two answers, both with receipts.

Heat pump noise

37 in England, 42 elsewhere, and why the guides argue. The MCS noise sum as a calculator you run yourself.

Heat pump cost

What heat pumps actually cost installed, from the government's record of grant-funded jobs, and what the grant takes off.

About

Not an installer, not a lead generator. What Hearthsum is and why nobody will ring you.

Export rates by supplier