If you’ve ever wondered what difference a home battery actually makes to the way your home interacts with the grid, the Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO) has some new real data.
The latest Quarterly Energy Dynamics report includes a comparison of 20,000 Australian households, examining how households with rooftop solar and households with solar and a battery imported and exported electricity in the second quarter of 2026.
The comparison shows how dramatically a battery can reduce a home’s dependence on the grid during the busy evening time, when power demand is typically highest.
How did AEMO compare houses?
AEMO analyzed two groups of 10,000 single-family homes connected to the national electricity market.
One group had rooftop solar panels with less than 20 kW but no battery. The other had similarly sized solar arrays paired with batteries installed between July and December 2025. By comparing how the two groups imported and exported electricity over an entire quarter, AEMO was able to see the difference the batteries made in everyday operations.
The daily electricity profile of houses with batteries looked significantly different.
Instead of exporting most of their excess solar energy in the middle of the day, battery houses retained more of that energy. As a result, they remained net exporters into the afternoon and did not become significant grid importers until much later in the evening than solar-only homes.
This time shift changes both when households use their own solar power generation and when they rely on the grid.
Average household electricity imports and exports for homes with rooftop solar plus battery and homes with rooftop solar only. Source: AEMO Quarterly Energy Dynamics Q2 2026.
A 73% reduction in evening network imports
The biggest difference was recorded during the evening peak between 4 p.m. and 9 p.m.
In the sample, homes with batteries imported an average of just 0.3 kW from the grid during these hours, compared to about 1.0 kW for homes with solar power alone.
Do not confuse these average power values (kW) with energy consumption (kWh). They are a measure of how much grid power an average home used at a given time during the evening peak.
In other words, homes with batteries drew 73% less electricity from the grid during the evening peak than comparable homes using only solar power.
That’s an impressive number, but it’s worth understanding exactly what it means.
This does not mean that battery owners have reduced their overall electricity consumption by 73% or reduced their bills by that amount. Instead, it shows how much less electricity they had to draw from the grid during the time when demand is usually highest.
This is important for the electricity system. Having more households rely less on the grid during evening peak hours will help reduce the strain on the grid when it is needed most.
Small changes at home add up across the board
The study also helps explain some of the broader trends AEMO observed in the national electricity market during the quarter.
Wholesale electricity prices fell sharply, gas production reached its lowest level in more than two decades in the second quarter and grid batteries increasingly dominated market prices in the evenings.
While many factors have contributed to these changes, AEMO says the growing number of home batteries is reshaping demand by charging during the day and reducing grid imports during peak demand.
Real world evidence
There is no shortage of models that show what home batteries are supposed to do.
The difference is that AEMO did not model future behavior. It measured what thousands of Australian households were actually doing.
For anyone curious about how batteries are changing the way a home interacts with the grid, this comparison provides one of the clearest real-world snapshots yet.
If you’re interested in knowing what these results could mean for your home, check out our home battery guide for battery types, costs, discounts and key things to consider before you buy.
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