To price an electricity plan honestly you need one thing: how many kilowatt-hours your home used in each of the last 12 months. Not the average, the twelve numbers, because the shape of your year (low spring, high summer) is what decides whether credits and tiers work for you. Here is where the numbers live.
1. Your bill
Most Texas bills print a usage history, usually as a bar chart on the second page and sometimes as a table. Some providers print all 12 or 13 months as numbers. Others, such as 4Change Energy, print only three (this month, last month and the same month last year) and chart the rest without labels. A PDF of the bill from your provider’s site is better than a photo, because the printed numbers come through exactly.
WattaWatt reads either. When a bill only prints a few months, it measures the chart’s bars against the printed ones and marks those months as estimates for you to check.
2. Your provider’s app or website
Nearly every retail provider has a usage page with 12 or more months of history, often with a download. A screenshot of that chart works with WattaWatt too. If you switched providers less than a year ago, your old provider’s account may still show the earlier months.
3. Smart Meter Texas
Smart Meter Texas (smartmetertexas.com) is a free site run by the state’s utilities, including Oncor, with the data from your smart meter: monthly, daily and 15-minute readings, going back more than a year. It follows the meter, not the provider, so it has your history even if you have switched. You create an account with your ESI ID and meter number (both on your bill), then download monthly usage as a spreadsheet.
It is the most complete source, and the only one with 15-minute data, which is what you need to judge a “free nights” or other time-of-use plan.
4. New home, no history
If you’ve just moved to Texas or into a new build, you have no year to price on. Options, from best to roughest:
- Ask the previous occupant or the builder for a recent bill; the home’s usage is mostly the home’s.
- Use the Smart Meter Texas history for the address once your account is active; the meter’s past readings belong to the premise.
- Pick the closest of our three profiles on the rates pages: about 500 kWh a month for an apartment, 1,000 for a typical house, 2,000 for a large one with a pool or electric heat. Then re-check after a summer.
What to do with the numbers
Price every plan on them. By hand that means 12 bills per plan from each Electricity Facts Label; see how to read an EFL. WattaWatt does it from a bill upload or 12 typed numbers, for every plan it tracks, and shows the math. Your file is read and discarded, never stored.