Sense: Household energy insight through utility smart meters

Sense develops household energy-analysis software for compatible utility smart meters and continues supporting its existing installed home energy monitors.

Summary

Best for
Customers of participating utilities with compatible Sense-enabled meters, and existing Sense monitor owners.
Less suited to
Buying a new Sense panel monitor directly or expecting every appliance to be identified.
Deployment
Sense-enabled utility smart meter or an existing supported home monitor, connected to the Sense app.
Data in
Household electrical measurements used to estimate and identify appliance activity.
Pricing
Pricing was not established from the reviewed technical sources; request a quote for the exact configuration.

Overview

Sense analyzes household electricity measurements to explain energy use and identify patterns associated with individual devices. Its current service description supports two entry points: compatible utility smart meters and existing Sense Home Energy Monitors. The app is the shared consumer interface, but access through a meter depends on the utility's deployed equipment and offering.

The company has ended direct sales of its panel-installed home monitor, with the final sales date set at 31 December 2025 or earlier if stock ran out. It continues supporting existing owners while concentrating on software embedded in newer utility meters. That transition is central to evaluating Sense today.

Offering

For eligible utility customers, Sense through the smart meter provides household energy information without adding the older panel-monitor hardware. Availability follows the utility's adoption of supported meters, so an ordinary smart meter is not automatically a Sense-enabled meter. The company's eligibility route is the starting point for a new household connection.

Existing Sense Home Energy Monitor owners retain app support and firmware updates. The supported installed base includes solar configurations and additional current-sensor arrangements. These are continuing capabilities for equipment already in service, rather than a claim that the original consumer hardware remains in current direct production or that every accessory is still available from Sense.

Products and platforms

  1. Sense solar monitoring

    Household solar analysis

    Dedicated-sensor and estimated-solar modes distinguished in support guidance.6

Technology

Sense's device-detection explanation describes learning electrical signatures from recurring activity. A device must produce sufficiently distinctive and consistent behaviour before it can be identified. The resulting device view therefore combines measured household electricity with an analytical interpretation of which loads are running.

Its detection limitations explicitly acknowledge that some appliances are difficult to identify. Small electronic loads and variable operating patterns do not always yield a clean individual signature. This matters when comparing Sense with separate circuit submeters: the analytical device breakdown is useful household information, but it is not equivalent to installing a dedicated physical measurement channel on every appliance.

Markets

Sense's utility and technology partnerships describe the move into next-generation meter platforms, including work with Landis+Gyr. That distribution model can bring the consumer application to homes through a utility's meter rollout instead of requiring each resident to purchase and arrange installation of a separate panel device.

For homes with solar, the solar-detection guidance distinguishes analytical estimates from installations with dedicated solar sensors. Dedicated sensor readings generally provide the stronger measurement basis. Keeping those modes separate helps households interpret production and consumption views without assuming that a software-estimated solar figure was directly measured by an additional current transformer.

Company

Sense was founded in 2013 and is based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, according to its company background and company facts sheet. The founders are Mike Phillips, Chris Micali and Ryan Houlette. Their work brought machine-learning analysis to household electricity information, initially through a consumer-installed monitoring product.

The company's current support announcement marks a subsequent change in distribution: consumer hardware sales ended while development continued for the app, existing monitors and supported utility meters. This is a shift toward embedded software and utility partnerships, not a withdrawal of support for the installed monitor population. The company continues developing detection for loads such as electric vehicles and heat pumps.

Alternatives in power metering and monitoring

What to look for in power metering and monitoring

References

  1. Sense company history and founders (opens in a new tab)
  2. Sense panel-monitor sales transition and continued support (opens in a new tab)
  3. Sense app and supported meter or monitor connections (opens in a new tab)
  4. How Sense learns appliance electrical signatures (opens in a new tab)
  5. Sense limitations on appliance detection (opens in a new tab)
  6. Sense solar detection and dedicated-sensor distinction (opens in a new tab)
  7. Sense utility-meter technology partnerships (opens in a new tab)
  8. Sense company quick facts (opens in a new tab) (PDF)

This profile does not imply a commercial relationship with Sense and may contain inaccuracies.