Compare Business Electricity Prices and Suppliers

Why compare business electricity suppliers?

When it comes to switching business electricity suppliers, comparing prices across different providers is the first step. If you also supply gas to your premises, our our business gas guide works in the same way and many businesses review both at once. With Clearsight Energy, it takes a few minutes to see what’s available from the market and where your current deal sits.

There are a few good reasons to compare business electricity prices rather than just rolling over your existing contract. Here’s what to look at when comparing business electricity providers.

All of this applies whether you’re a multi-site operation or a single office. Most small businesses we work with are surprised at how much variation there is between electricity providers once they actually compare. A shop, a small warehouse, an office suite — they’re all eligible for competitive rates, and the process takes the same couple of minutes regardless of size.

Comparing business electricity providers with us is straightforward. Click the compare now button, enter your details, and you’ll receive quotes from a range of electricity suppliers.

How business electricity prices are worked out

Two businesses on the same industrial estate can pay very different rates for the same electricity. That isn’t a billing error. Commercial electricity isn’t sold from a published price list, and there’s no Ofgem price cap on business supply. Every quote gets built around your consumption, your meter type, your credit profile, and where your site sits on the network.

Your unit rate is only part of the story. The price you actually pay is made up of five moving parts: the unit rate in pence per kWh, a daily standing charge for being connected, network and policy costs bundled into the rate such as DUoS and TNUoS, the Climate Change Levy, and VAT at 20% (or 5% if you qualify as a low user or a charity). Most of those are fixed costs you can’t shop around on. The unit rate and the contract terms are where the saving actually lives.

Bigger sites have more to weigh up. Your agreed capacity in kVA, your load factor and your maximum demand all feed into the number a supplier puts in front of you. If you’re on a half-hourly meter, the supplier can see exactly when you draw power across the day, and that shapes the rate too.

What you might pay for business electricity in 2026

Across the quotes we ran on our supplier panel in June 2026, the most competitive business electricity rates averaged around 22p per kWh, starting from about 21p. Larger sites tend to win keener unit rates, though they carry bigger standing charges. The table shows the average of the five most competitive deals for a typical business in each size band that month, before VAT and the Climate Change Levy.

These are averages of the most competitive quotes, not a single outlier. Standing charges climb with consumption, which is why we compare the total annual cost rather than the headline unit rate. The figures apply to standard meters. Half-hourly metered sites, usually the largest users, are quoted separately, because more of their cost sits in network and capacity charges than in the unit rate.

These figures are indicative. Business electricity isn’t sold from a fixed price list, so your own number depends on where you are in the UK, what your business does, your credit profile, how much you use, and where wholesale prices sit on the day you fix. The figures here come from real quotes we ran in June 2026 and aren’t a live offer.

How business electricity actually works

Five things shape your business electricity bill, and each of them is worth understanding before you sign a new contract. The unit rate per kWh you pay. The fixed daily standing charge. Non-commodity charges (TNUoS, DUoS, BSUoS and the levies) that make up roughly a quarter of the total. The Climate Change Levy and VAT on top. Our line-by-line breakdown of how business electricity bills are calculated walks through each component with a worked example. If your standing charge has jumped sharply over the last few years, our explainer on business electricity standing charges covers why that has happened and what is normal for your size of business. For VAT specifically, including when the reduced 5% rate applies, see our guide to VAT on business electricity.

Choosing a supplier

There are around 30 active business electricity suppliers in the UK. The major names compete on different things — price stability, customer service, multi-site portfolio capability, green credentials, smart meter data quality. Our overview of UK business electricity suppliers covers who the major players are and what to look for. For EDF specifically, our deeper guide on EDF business electricity rates walks through their contract types and how their pricing compares.

Meter and capacity basics

Every business electricity supply has a unique 21-digit MPAN that identifies it. You will need it for every quote and switch. Our MPAN checker validates the format and decodes each section so you can be sure you have the right number before you submit it. For larger commercial sites, the supply capacity (Available Supply Capacity or ASC) is set in KVA. Our KVA calculator handles conversions between kW, KVA and amps for both single-phase and three-phase supplies.

Compare and switch in minutes

Once you know what you are looking at, switching is straightforward. Most contracts complete in 4–8 weeks. We handle the comparison, the Letter of Authority, the MPAN lookup and the paperwork. You stay in control. Same supply, same meter, new supplier on better terms.

Business electricity contract types

Most businesses end up on one of four contract types. Which one fits comes down to how much price movement you can live with and how much time you’ve got to manage it.

If your contract lapses, you roll onto an out-of-contract rate. If there’s never been a contract on the meter at all, you’re on a deemed rate. Both sit well above a negotiated price. There’s a timing trap here that catches plenty of businesses. You usually have to give notice inside a set window before your end date, and miss it and you get rolled over onto worse terms. Knowing your renewal date is half the job.

Why business electricity prices move

Electricity pricing in the UK still takes its lead from gas. Gas-fired power stations often set the wholesale price at the margin, so when gas markets jump, electricity follows. Wind output, demand on cold still evenings, and the interconnectors moving power to and from Europe all push the curve around week to week. Policy and network costs layer on top, and those tend to drift up over time rather than down.

None of that is something you control. What you can control is when you fix and for how long. Timing a fix on a softer part of the curve, and matching the contract length to where the market is, is where a broker earns their keep. If you’re setting up a brand-new supply or upgrading one, that’s a different process again, covered in our guide to new business electricity connections.