Global Electricity Prices: Statistics and Facts 2026

Electricity prices in 2026: what drives the bill

The price a household pays for a kilowatt hour has three parts: the cost of generating the power, the cost of the networks that carry it, and taxes and levies set by governments. Each part varies widely between countries. Generation costs depend on the fuel mix and on gas prices, which set the marginal price in many markets. Network costs depend on geography and investment needs. Taxes reflect policy choices, such as funding renewable energy or protecting low-income households.

Because these parts are so different, there is no single global electricity price, and comparisons need care. Official statistics use different units, currencies and tax rules. This report therefore presents each source on its own basis: Eurostat for the 27 EU countries, the Energy Information Administration for the United States, Ofgem for Great Britain, Hydro-Quebec for 22 North American cities, the Australian Energy Regulator for Australia and the IEA for wholesale and industrial comparisons.

The broader structure of the power sector, including generation and capacity, is covered in our report on the global electricity market. Here the focus is on the prices that households and businesses actually pay.

EU household prices: 0.2896 euros per kWh

Eurostat collects household electricity prices twice a year for a standard consumer using 2,500 to 4,999 kWh a year. In the second half of 2025, the EU average was 0.2896 euros per kWh including all taxes, and the euro area average was 0.2999 euros. Ireland had the highest price at 0.4042 euros, followed by Germany at 0.3869 euros, Belgium at 0.3499 euros and Denmark at 0.3312 euros.

Almost four times apart: a household in Ireland paid 0.4042 euros per kWh, 3.7 times the 0.1082 euros paid in Hungary.

The cheapest electricity was in Hungary at 0.1082 euros, Malta at 0.1282 euros and Bulgaria at 0.1355 euros, all countries where governments regulate or subsidise household tariffs. Outside the EU, Norway households paid 0.1922 euros and Turkey 0.0636 euros, while Liechtenstein paid 0.3062 euros. Between the second half of 2024 and the second half of 2025, prices rose most in Romania (58.6 percent), Austria (34.3 percent) and Ireland (32.7 percent), and fell most in Cyprus (14.7 percent), France (12.5 percent) and Denmark (11.9 percent).

Adjusted for purchasing power, the ranking changes sharply. Measured in purchasing power standards, electricity was most expensive for households in Romania, Czechia and Poland, where incomes are lower, and cheapest in Malta, Hungary and Finland. National detail for the two largest markets is covered in our reports on electricity in Europe and the French electricity industry.

The EU trend: 34 percent higher than in 2019

The EU average household price was stable at about 0.217 euros per kWh in 2019 and 2020. It rose to 0.2415 euros in the second half of 2021 as gas prices climbed, then to 0.2768 euros in late 2022 after Russia cut gas supplies to Europe. Prices peaked at 0.2916 euros in the first half of 2024 and have since stayed close to 0.29 euros.

A new plateau: EU household prices rose 34 percent between the second half of 2019 and the second half of 2025 and have stayed near 0.29 euros since 2023.

The IEA calculates that household electricity prices rose 36 percent on average in the EU between 2019 and 2024, against 26 percent in the United States. Preliminary Eurostat data for the first half of 2026, available for 13 countries, show some declines: Germany fell to 0.3618 euros, France to 0.2485 euros and the Netherlands to 0.2440 euros, while Belgium rose to 0.3575 euros. An EU average for the first half of 2026 had not yet been published.

Taxes and levies: 28.9 percent of the EU bill

Taxes and levies explain a large part of the differences between countries. On average, they made up 28.9 percent of the household price in the EU in the second half of 2025. The share was highest in Denmark at 49.1 percent, which is why Danish electricity is expensive even though wholesale prices there are moderate. In Luxembourg and the Netherlands the share was negative, at minus 6.3 percent and minus 5.2 percent, because tax credits and support payments to households were larger than the taxes charged.

For businesses, Eurostat excludes VAT and recoverable taxes, so the remaining tax share is smaller. It was highest in Poland at 36.0 percent and Cyprus at 29.9 percent, and lowest in Lithuania at 0.2 percent and Luxembourg at 0.5 percent. Wider energy costs in the region are compared in our report on energy prices in the EU.

Business prices: 0.1837 euros per kWh in the EU

Non-household consumers, mostly businesses, pay less per kWh than households because they buy larger volumes and are connected at higher voltages. For a medium-sized business consumer using 500 to 1,999 MWh a year, the EU average was 0.1837 euros per kWh in the second half of 2025, excluding VAT and recoverable taxes. The highest prices were in Ireland (0.2552 euros), Cyprus (0.2429 euros) and Germany (0.2264 euros), and the lowest in Finland (0.0748 euros) and Sweden (0.0970 euros).

Nordic advantage: Finnish businesses paid 0.0748 euros per kWh, about a third of the price paid in Ireland or Germany.

The EU business average rose from about 0.12 euros in 2019 to a peak of 0.2151 euros in the first half of 2023, then eased to 0.1837 euros. The IEA says that prices for energy-intensive industries in Europe in 2025 were still on average roughly double those in the United States and more than 50 percent higher than in China and India, a gap that weighs on the competitiveness of chemicals, steel and aluminium producers.

United States: a record 17.30 cents per kWh

In the United States, the EIA reports average residential electricity prices of 12.65 cents per kWh in 2015, almost unchanged until 2020 at 13.15 cents. Prices then rose quickly: 15.04 cents in 2022, 16.00 cents in 2023, 16.48 cents in 2024 and 17.30 cents in 2025, a record. The EIA forecasts 18.20 cents in 2026 and 18.59 cents in 2027.

Up 37 percent in ten years: US households paid 17.30 cents per kWh in 2025, against 12.65 cents in 2015, with most of the rise since 2021.

All sectors are getting more expensive. The average commercial price was 13.41 cents in 2025 and the industrial price 8.62 cents, giving an all-sector average of 13.63 cents. In July 2026 the residential price reached 18.31 cents, 4.9 percent higher than a year earlier, and the all-sector average 14.99 cents, up 4.4 percent. Growing demand, including from data centres, and network investment add pressure on US prices, as covered in our report on data centers.

Households pay twice industry: US residential customers paid 17.30 cents per kWh in 2025, twice the 8.62 cents paid by industry.

Broader US energy costs, including gasoline and natural gas, are covered in our reports on energy prices in the US and electricity in the United States.

US states: from 11.5 cents in North Dakota to 42.9 cents in Hawaii

Prices vary more between US states than between most EU countries. In 2024, the latest year with full state data, Hawaii had the highest residential price at 42.86 cents per kWh, because most of its power comes from imported oil. California followed at 31.97 cents, then Massachusetts (29.35 cents), Connecticut (28.75 cents) and Rhode Island (28.65 cents). The cheapest states were North Dakota (11.51 cents), Idaho (11.52 cents), Nebraska (11.53 cents), Louisiana (11.73 cents) and Washington (11.90 cents).

A 3.7-fold spread: Hawaii households paid 42.86 cents per kWh in 2024, against 11.51 cents in North Dakota.

Cheap states have large hydroelectric resources, as in Idaho and Washington, or abundant coal, gas and wind, as in North Dakota, Nebraska and Louisiana. Expensive states either import fuel or have high network and policy costs, as in California and New England. Monthly data for July 2026 show the same pattern for all sectors combined: California at 30.71 cents and Massachusetts at 26.56 cents, against North Dakota at 9.09 cents and New Mexico at 9.52 cents.

North American cities: Montreal cheapest, San Francisco most expensive

Every year Hydro-Quebec compares residential electricity bills in 22 major Canadian and US cities, using rates in effect on April 1. For a customer using 1,000 kWh a month, Montreal had the lowest price in 2025 at 8.29 Canadian cents per kWh before taxes, followed by Winnipeg at 10.53 cents and Vancouver at 12.60 cents, all supplied mostly by hydropower.

Hydro wins: Montreal, Winnipeg and Vancouver have the cheapest power, while San Francisco households pay more than seven times the Montreal price.

The most expensive cities were San Francisco at 59.94 cents, New York at 52.48 cents and Boston at 47.87 cents. Toronto, at 15.57 cents, was the cheapest large city outside the hydro-dominated provinces. The comparison shows how much the source of power matters: cities with hydropower pay a fraction of what cities relying on gas and with expensive networks pay.

United Kingdom: price cap of 26.32 pence per kWh

In Great Britain, Ofgem sets a quarterly cap on the unit rate and standing charge that suppliers can charge households on default tariffs. For October to December 2026, the cap for electricity paid by direct debit is 26.32 pence per kWh with a standing charge of 54.83 pence per day. The typical dual-fuel bill is 1,723 pounds a year, up 4 percent. VAT on electricity bills has been reduced from 5 percent to zero from October 1, 2026 to March 31, 2027.

Stuck near 26 pence: the UK electricity cap has moved between 24.5 and 27.7 pence per kWh since late 2024.

Standing charges are a large part of UK bills: 54.83 pence per day adds about 200 pounds a year before any electricity is used. From July 2026, Ofgem lowered its typical consumption assumptions to 2,500 kWh of electricity and 9,500 kWh of gas a year, so typical bills before and after that date are not directly comparable.

Australia: default offers fall for 2026 to 2027

In Australia, the Australian Energy Regulator sets the Default Market Offer, a maximum annual price for standing-offer customers in New South Wales, South East Queensland and South Australia. For 2026 to 2027, the residential flat-rate offer falls in most areas: by 3.4 percent to 1,899 Australian dollars a year in the Ausgrid area of Sydney, by 5.0 percent to 2,604 dollars in the Essential Energy area, and by 7.2 percent to 1,988 dollars in South East Queensland. South Australia rises 1.4 percent to 2,334 dollars.

Mostly lower: four of five network areas see lower default offers in 2026 to 2027, led by a 7.2 percent cut in South East Queensland.

Australia shows the effect of cheap solar power on wholesale markets. The IEA reports that average wholesale prices in Australia in the second quarter of 2026 were about 45 percent lower than a year earlier, while prices in the EU and Japan rose more than 30 percent.

Wholesale prices: Europe pays about twice the US level

Wholesale prices, the price at which generators sell power, drive retail bills with a lag. The IEA estimates that the average EU wholesale price in 2025 rose about 10 percent to roughly 95 dollars per MWh. That was about twice the level in the United States and India, 65 percent above Australia and 25 percent above Japan. Futures markets in January 2026 pointed to about 95 dollars per MWh again in 2026 and about 85 dollars in 2027.

The gap widened again in 2026. In its mid-year update, the IEA reported that spot wholesale prices in the EU and Japan rose more than 30 percent year on year in the second quarter of 2026, driven by spikes in LNG prices during the Strait of Hormuz crisis. US prices were largely unchanged and Indian prices rose by less than 10 percent. Because many European power markets set prices from gas plants, gas shocks pass quickly into electricity, a link covered in our reports on gas prices and Russian natural gas.

Energy subsidies keep prices far below cost in some countries. The IEA estimates that fossil fuel consumption subsidies worldwide totalled 620 billion dollars in 2023 after passing 1 trillion dollars in 2022, when subsidies for natural gas and electricity more than doubled. The OECD and IEA put total government support for fossil fuels at 916 billion dollars in 2024, down from 1,031 billion dollars in 2023.

What a year of electricity costs: an illustration

Prices per kWh are easier to grasp as an annual bill. The table below applies each published price to the same consumption so that markets can be compared on equal terms. For the EU, it uses 3,500 kWh a year, the midpoint of the Eurostat band. For Great Britain, it uses the 2,500 kWh that Ofgem now treats as typical, plus the daily standing charge. These are BusinessStats illustrations, not official bills, and they ignore differences in how much electricity households actually use.

The same amount of electricity costs almost four times as much in Ireland as in Hungary. In practice, US households use far more electricity than European ones because of air conditioning and electric heating, so their actual bills are higher than the table suggests even though the price per kWh is lower than in most of Western Europe. In Great Britain, the standing charge alone is about a quarter of the illustrative bill, which is why low-use households pay a high effective price per kWh.

Outside the EU, Eurostat data show households in Norway paid 0.1922 euros per kWh in the second half of 2025, Serbia 0.1190 euros and Turkey 0.0636 euros, among the lowest prices in Europe, while Liechtenstein paid 0.3062 euros.

Outlook: higher bills in the US, volatile prices in Europe

Three trends will shape electricity prices to 2027. In the United States, the EIA expects residential prices to keep rising, to 18.20 cents in 2026 and 18.59 cents in 2027, as utilities invest in networks and demand grows. In Europe, household prices have stabilised near 0.29 euros, but the 2026 gas price shock shows how exposed the region remains, and the gap with US industrial prices is a policy priority. In markets with large solar and wind fleets, such as Australia, wholesale prices are falling during sunny hours, while network charges rise.

Nuclear and renewable expansion will shape the long-run cost of power, as discussed in our report on global nuclear energy. For households, the most important factors remain where they live, how their country taxes energy and how much of their power comes from gas. Inflation effects on the wider economy are tracked in our report on inflation in Europe.

Electricity prices in eight numbers

Questions about what electricity costs around the world