The Best Home Batteries In 2022 – According To The Pros

If you’re looking to buy a solar battery in 2022, you’ll find at least 32 brands available in Australia. But which is best?

You could pore over the specs; looking at efficiency, backup, peak power etc. Or you could simply ask the people who install and support home batteries every day what they would trust in their own home.

The word ‘trust’ carries a lot of importance in the previous sentence. A home battery is a very dense box of energy, and lithium batteries are susceptible to thermal runaway if things go horribly wrong. That’s a fancy way of saying the worst-case scenario from a dud battery or a dud installation is an explosion and ferocious fire.

I don’t want to scare anyone from buying a home solar battery – I have one on my family home. But I do want to impress upon you the importance of buying a good brand that is well engineered, monitored and supported.

And of course, it needs to be well installed.

For the second year now, we asked installers in the SolarQuotes network which battery they would install on their own homes in 2022 if:

1. Money was no object
2. Money was tight and every dollar counted

The idea being I would tease out the best high-end and the best budget solar batteries for Australian homes as voted by the people with more skin in the game than most.

Here are the results for 2022.

Best High-End Solar Batteries in Australia (Money No Object):

We asked the installers:

What battery would you put in your own home if money was no object?

Here’s what they told us their favourite ‘high-end’ home batteries are:

Best Battery – First Place: Tesla (54% of votes)

Tesla keeps its first place from 2021 with their Powerwall home battery getting more votes than all other brands combined. That’s a solid win.

One installer commented:

“Only Tesla – have tried about 6 brands now. Only Tesla.”

That’s a reflection of the Powerwall’s best quality: – it just works, and keeps working thanks to over-the-air updates, and comprehensive monitoring. This allows remote troubleshooting by Tesla engineers if there is an issue.

The Powerwall also comes with – in my opinion – the best solar battery monitoring app.

Finally, the Powerwall easily optimises its operation with time-of-use tariffs so you can confidently ride through expensive evening peak periods on solar battery power.

The one downside: Powerwall is expensive. Expect to pay $16,000+ installed on your home, before any subsidies are applied.

Tesla Powerwall reviews from 350 Australians score an impressive 4.9 star average.

“We purchase Tesla battery system after having solar for some time because when the power went out our solar went down and we were without power, Tesla Battery does a great job it has backed up our large house and sheds on Rural Property for up to 4 days at a time during hot summer. we couldn’t be happier with it, Tesla battery was our best investment and has added property value.”

Best Battery – Second Place: BYD (13% of votes)

BYD is a Warren Buffet backed, $100 billion Chinese battery maker. In Australia, their most popular home battery is the modular BYD B-Box Premium, which ranges from 5.1 to 22 kWh and works nicely with the Fronius Gen 24 Hybrid inverter.

We have 24 BYD battery reviews on SolarQuotes with an average 4.8 stars.

“I’ve had the 7 kw BYD Mini for around 6yrs now. BYD have given it a couple of upgrades and is working fine. The only beef I have is the app is controlled from China and the lag is a bit slow and drops out. A text to BYD Australia and the rep here has it fixed in no time usually within 24hrs. Overall, a great battery.”

Best Battery – Third Place: SolarEdge (11% of votes)

This is an interesting result – because, at the time of voting, SolarEdge’s 5 kW/10 kWh Energy Bank battery was not yet available in Australia.

That means many installers trust SolarEdge hardware enough to recommend their home battery before they’ve even installed one for a customer.

As far as I can tell, this solar battery will need a SolarEdge Energy Hub Inverter, and – if you want backup – the SolarEdge backup interface box.

Here’s an artist’s impression of the home battery, inverter and backup box from SolarEdge:

Best Budget Home Batteries In Australia (Every Dollar Counts):

Best Budget Battery – First Place: Tesla (25% of votes)

It seems that many Australian solar battery installers can’t bear the thought of installing anything other than a relatively expensive Tesla Powerwall ($16,000 + installed without a subsidy), even if the customer is on a tight budget. I certainly know a few installers who would rather lose the sale than install anything else.

That’s because the Powerwall installs easily and is generally trouble-free. And because Tesla has made the app so easy to use, there’s very little customer support required after the installation.

For example – when the cellular connection in early Powerwalls stopped working, the app made the switch over to WiFi a piece of cake for the customer. Many other brands would have required a service visit.

Well done Tesla – the Powerwall is a phenomenal piece of technology – it just needs to start dropping in price instead of increasing. Please?

Best Budget Battery – Second Place: Sungrow (19% of votes)

Sungrow – who last week got gold for the best budget inverter in Australia, score silver for the best budget home battery.

Their new, stackable battery can go from 9.6 kWh to 25.6 kWh in 3.2 kWh increments. It is only compatible with Sungrow hybrid inverters.

In my opinion, this is the only truly budget solar battery on the podium. It’s about 40% cheaper per kWh than the Powerwall and about 30% cheaper than the BYD.

We have 31 Sungrow battery reviews from Australian owners with an average score of 4.7 stars.

“It’s only a week in but it all seems to be going as expected. Each night the battery drops to about 40% and quickly recharges once the sun rises. This means we have drawn little or no power from the grid since installation.”

Best Budget Battery – Third Place: BYD (9% of votes)

Like Tesla, BYD gets a gong for the best high-end and best budget home battery, reflecting the confidence that many installers have in BYD.

Here are where all the votes went for ‘Best Budget Battery 2022’:

Also check out the results for the best solar panel and best inverter brands as voted by top installers in the SolarQuotes Installers’ Choice Awards for 2022.

Original Source: https://www.solarquotes.com.au/blog/best-home-batteries-2022/