You’ve probably seen the ads by now. “Three hours of free electricity, every day.” It sounds almost too good to be true — and depending on your setup, it might be. Several retailers already offer free midday power in the Energex network area, and from 1 July 2026, every major retailer in South East Queensland will be required to offer it under the federal government’s Solar Sharer Offer.
But before you rush to switch, it’s worth understanding what “free” actually means in this context — because the business model behind these plans has a lot in common with credit card rewards programs.
What’s actually on offer right now
Three retailers currently offer meaningful free power windows in SEQ:
OVO Energy’s “The Free 3” gives you zero-cost electricity from 11am to 2pm daily, seven days a week. No lock-in contract, no exit fees. The catch? A daily supply charge of around $1.03–$1.09/day, a feed-in tariff of just 2.8c/kWh, and usage rates outside the free window that run significantly higher than competitive flat-rate plans — up to 65.56c/kWh at peak on their time-of-use tariff. You’ll need a smart meter.
GloBird Energy’s “FOUR4FREE” is the most generous window — four free hours from 10am to 2pm daily. Also available in QLD on the Energex network, no lock-in, smart meter required. GloBird doesn’t publicly list their rates (you need to request a quote), but the daily supply charge and peak rates are reportedly on the higher side. Controlled load circuits are excluded from the free period.
Powershop’s “EV Day” offers a narrower two-hour free window from 12pm to 2pm daily, marketed at EV owners. Red Energy’s “Red EV Saver” only offers free power 12pm to 2pm on weekends — just four free hours per week versus Powershop’s fourteen.
AGL’s “Three for Free” (10am to 1pm) launched in July 2025 but is currently South Australia only and hasn’t expanded to QLD. It also requires any battery on the property to be AGL-supplied and connected to their Virtual Power Plant — a dealbreaker for most existing battery owners.
The credit card analogy
Think of free power hours the way you’d think about a credit card that offers “free” flights. The flights aren’t really free — they’re funded by a higher annual fee, a higher interest rate, and the hope that you’ll carry a balance. The card company makes money because most people don’t change their spending habits enough to come out ahead.
Free electricity plans work the same way. The “free” hours are funded by three things: higher daily supply charges (OVO charges roughly 15–25% more than comparable retailers), higher usage rates outside the free window (often 4–10c/kWh more per kilowatt-hour), and lower feed-in tariffs (2–3c/kWh versus 5–10c from competitive retailers).
If you don’t shift a significant portion of your usage into the free window, you end up paying more than you would on a standard plan. One analysis found a household paying $435 more per year on OVO’s Free 3 compared to a competitive flat-rate plan, simply because they couldn’t shift enough usage into the midday window.
The Solar Sharer Offer: what changes in July 2026
From 1 July 2026, the federal government’s Solar Sharer Offer requires every retailer with more than 1,000 customers to offer at least three free hours daily. In SEQ, the mandated window is 11am to 2pm with a daily cap of 24 kWh — enough for most households to run everything they’d reasonably want during those hours.
That 24kWh cap comes from government regulations (the amended Electricity Retail Code and AER’s Default Market Offer determination), not individual retailers. It’s based on the energy regulator’s benchmarks for a large household shifting its full daily consumption into the free period.
The key difference from today’s voluntary plans: the AER will regulate what retailers can charge outside the free window. The Solar Sharer Offer is designed to be revenue-neutral — the same annual cost as the standard time-of-use Default Market Offer, but with rates roughly 1–4c/kWh higher outside the free window to offset the zero-rate period. The idea is that nobody ends up worse off by opting in, provided their usage patterns are roughly average.
Whether that protection holds in practice remains to be seen. But it’s a meaningful step up from today’s unregulated voluntary plans, where the cost-shifting can be brutal.
So who actually wins?
Solar-only households (no battery) should be cautious. Here’s the thing — during the 11am to 2pm window, your panels are at peak generation. A typical 6.6kW system in Brisbane produces 10–15kWh specifically during those hours on a sunny day. If your home is drawing 1–2kW and your panels are generating 4–5kW, you’re already running on free electricity — your own. The “free” grid power barely gets used, but you’re paying higher rates all evening and earning less for your exports year-round.
Battery owners are the clear winners. Charge your battery from the free grid during the middle of the day, then discharge during the expensive 4pm–9pm peak. A 10kWh battery charged for free and discharged at typical SEQ peak rates of 35–50c/kWh delivers roughly $1,150–$1,640 in annual savings. We’ll cover the exact strategy in our companion post.
EV owners who are home during the day can save $1,000–$1,600 per year by scheduling charging into the free window. But the car needs to be in the driveway — commuters whose EV sits in an office car park all day miss the window entirely.
Renters and apartment dwellers without rooftop solar are arguably the biggest beneficiaries of the mandated Solar Sharer Offer. For the first time, they’ll get access to genuinely cheap midday electricity that’s been created by their neighbours’ rooftop panels.
The bottom line
Free power hours aren’t a gimmick — they reflect a real structural shift in Queensland’s electricity market. Wholesale prices in QLD went negative or zero in roughly a quarter of all trading intervals in late 2025, and that trend is accelerating. Retailers can offer “free” midday power because it genuinely costs them almost nothing to supply it during peak solar hours.
But “free” doesn’t mean “better for everyone.” The golden rule is to compare total annual costs, not just the headline. Use the AER’s Energy Made Easy comparison tool to model your actual usage profile against these plans before switching.
If you’ve got solar and you’re considering adding a battery or EV charger, the maths just got more interesting. Read our companion post on how to actually benefit from free power hours for the practical playbook.
Matt Thompson is a licensed electrician (QLD Licence 1506792) and the founder of High Energy, a solar, battery, and EV charger installer based in East Brisbane. Got questions about your setup? Get in touch.