Sense Home Energy Monitor Reviews

I was charged Canadian sales taxes by Sense.com for the purchase of one electricity monitor to be shipped to my Canadian address. However, Canada Customs will not release the shipment unless I pay provincial and federal sales taxes.

I am waiting for an explanation from Sense.com.

Bottom Line: No, I would not recommend this to a friend

I have had this device for years, it is slow to learn and identify devices and has a hard time staying online. I have moved our WiFi router and Comcast Boost Pods many times but the Sense constantly drops off. Save your money. It's just bells and whistles with no reliable data.

Bottom Line: No, I would not recommend this to a friend

I have had two Sense Home Energy Monitors for well over a year now. I have been totally frustrated that the monitors will not detect things that we use frequently in my home and you cannot simply tell Sense what is on during a low electrical usage period. My worst frustration is that Sense cannot tell the difference between my microwave and my wife's hairdryer.

The Sense support team is not very helpful with this issue, and they have been working on it quite a while. Don't expect to actually talk to someone from the company. They basically force you to send them an email. They respond, but their response has not let led to a solution for my microwave and hairdryer. There are numerous other things the devices have not detected over the years. Reporting stinks too. Exporting data to a spreadsheet would seem to be an easy thing to do, but not with Sense.

Bottom line, very poor product and certainly not worth $300 with its current functionality.

Bottom Line: No, I would not recommend this to a friend

I've had the Sense Solar for about six months now, and really appreciate the product. I have an older solar system that is not networked, and with the Sense, I can now see up to the second energy production from my phone. It's great! It's also educational to see the power production in comparison to our power consumption in the same graph. The home device discovery continues to identify products within our home, and teach us how they use power. Seeing our power consumption has changed our behavior a little bit, and we're using less power now than before Sense. Overall, the device does what it says, and the experience gets better as the Sense team improves the visualizations in the app and online.

Bottom Line: Yes, I would recommend this to a friend

I've had Sense for 15 months. My neighbor and a friend each bought another solution. Within 30 days they returned the other products, attempting to be informative because I was having so much success during my first month. They each had more success understanding their power usage in less than a week than they had with one month of their previous purchase. I feel lucky that I chose Sense to begin with.

Bottom Line: Yes, I would recommend this to a friend

I had read all the reviews on this site back when I first heard about Sense, and was prepared for the worst but was just too curious not to try it. So I just went with my gut and took a chance on it.

Sense has been in my home for over two years now and I'm grateful to have it. It has detected most of the big loads like my dryer, window ACs, our sump pump, and the refrigerator, as well as a spare refrigerator we used to keep in the garage, but I actually stopped using after realizing how much it was costing me. It's also identified some random stuff that took me a while to figure out and name, like an "appliance light" which turned out to be the light inside my fridge. That might not seem like a big deal, but I actually use it to set up an alarm for when the door might be left open. The alarms you can set in the app have also been good for my sump pump because that should only cycle on for 30 minutes or so during a heavy rain. This has been nice to have when I'm away from home, and I find myself checking in on the app when I am away just to make sure nothing unusual is going. Aside from the alarms, I really don't care much about looking at the individual appliances now, I just look at the main view and see how much electricity my home is using at any given time. That's enough info to know whether something has gone wrong.

They still have a lot of work to do on the app and training, but I hope this kind of thing is going to be standard in electrical meters in the next few years. In the meantime, if you have a high electric bill like I did and aren't sure why, I think it's worth it to get one of these and start watching your use every day. Don't expect it to do everything automatically for you or you'll be disappointed. But if you take it for what it is, I think you'll still find it's a good value. I'm not positive, but I think it's paid for itself by now with just little things like my spare fridge and other stupid things I had plugged in that were just sucking energy without doing anything.

Sorry to everyone else here who had such a bad experience. Might be worth trying it again now that they've been around a bit longer.

Bottom Line: Yes, I would recommend this to a friend

Great for seeing energy usage in your house in real-time. Helped me find three major household power usage offenders and fix:

- A baseboard heater that was on all the time (or Always On in Sense nomenclature).

- A set of attic lights that I never converted to LEFs and were left on all of the time.

- An old refrigerator that was using 3x as much as all the others in the house.

And no, I really wouldn’t have found these with a Kill-A-Watt.

Bottom Line: Yes, I would recommend this to a friend

We installed Sense with the help of a professional electrician 5 months ago. It didn't take much effort to contact the electrician and had them come to install. But to be honest, I kept questioning myself - is this a product worth $300 + installation fee?! So far we have been with Sense for 5 months. And I can confidently say, the money is well spent! The product started helping us save money and improve house safe since Month #1!

One of the biggest gain from Sense - it helped us save money! I love my kitchen light because they are so bright and lights are warm. This is always my first light to turn on when I arrive home and I always leave them open even if I am not in the kitchen. But after Sense installed, I was surprised to see these lights are 380w! They are 42 times higher than my hue light (9w). Now, I will avoid leaving the kitchen light or similar lights on in my house if unnecessary. Without Sense, I don't think I will ever look at my energy in a quantitive way. Also, we start paying attention to high energy consuming product such as oven/stove, try to use them in a more efficient way, such as use the right stove based on pot size (1700w difference)! Without seeing the numbers on the app, we will never know how we can do better on energy saving! Sense is teaching me how to save money, and also how to change my bad energy habit.

Another big gain from Sense - helps me check if my home is safe or not! One time we were on a road trip and my sister suddenly said she was not sure if she turned off the stove before we left. She was very worried and said we had to come back to check while we were 100 miles away from home. But when I looked at my Sense App, it told me my current energy usage was only 90w and none of the stove is being used. There are many these moments - was my iron on while I left? Did I closed my garage door? Was my heat working while we were not at home...these are all answered by Sense!

I am a big IOT fan and we have so many different IOT products at home. But I would say my best investment so far is Sense! It is not only a fun or good to have product, it is a must-have product, we can see ROI on the energy bill and home safety!

Bottom Line: Yes, I would recommend this to a friend

I wanted to spend less on electricity but I never knew how the different lights and devices were adding up. The Sense device showed us that we have some light fixtures that use a ton of power, so we've been more thoughtful about when to use those. It's a neat app and fun to add new devices as they pop up.

Bottom Line: Yes, I would recommend this to a friend

Setup was straightforward and enjoying the real-time monitoring of our energy usage.

I love technology, but this has exceeded my expectations. It was very easy to install and in 15 minutes I knew exactly how many Watts my home was using. Now, I purchased this to understand my daily energy usage as I was upgrading my portable emergency generator but really didn't know where to begin in calculating every plug, refrigerator, freezer, or lightbulb in my home.

Bottom Line: Yes, I would recommend this to a friend

I read some mixed reviews but wanted to try it out for myself. They have a good return policy so I thought I'd go for it. The install was easy, and within a day or two, it was finding devices in my home. It's now found the vast majority of my big energy users, including a fridge that was costing me a lot every month. It didn't figure out all of my appliances right away - you have to give it some time - but it was worth the wait! Check it out if you want to figure out why your energy bill is high. The app is great and easy to use too.

Bottom Line: Yes, I would recommend this to a friend

I'm not sure what these other reviewers here on HighYa were expecting, and maybe they just had a dated unit, but I installed Sense (took 12 minutes), and Sense started pumping-out info. It isn't instantaneous. I had about 12 devices identified in a week and just yesterday, three months later, Sense is still discovering devices and profiling their energy consumption. My bill is high and I can't understand...or couldn't understand, why. Now I get it. The cable boxes, and the dehumidifier (I'm in Florida, remember!), were surprisingly consumptive.

This product will pay back within a year and gave me the info I needed to take some actions that produced savings. Even more importantly to me now, I can see what's going on with the AC in the condo when I'm up north for the summer. I've had two leaky AC systems that produced higher and higher energy bills (and caused damage from water leaks to the unit below ours), and with Sense, I expect I can nip those type of problems in the bud. If I only avoided one of those issues, where I had to pay to repair the downstairs neighbor's drywall because my AC unit was "overworking" (something Sense would have flagged), I'd have saved $1200...about four times the price of Sense alone.

Bottom Line: Yes, I would recommend this to a friend

I have had this for a year and no technician at sense could tell me why it was not working. I upgraded my router with a Google Wi-Fi mesh (now this is a HIGHLY recommended product by the way). It wouldn't recognize the new Wi-Fi at first (I had to have support reset it for me), then magically it started working. A lot of hassle, but I'm glad it seems to be doing what was promised. I just feel like I wasted a lot of time messing with it. Support should have been able to figure out how to fix it. Huge hassle, it feels like the product is still in BETA.

Bottom Line: No, I would not recommend this to a friend

I eagerly ordered this item about two years ago. It has had to be totally been reset two or three times, which means all previous data is trashed. You start over from the beginning.

Pool pump - never found, ceiling fans - never found, lights - never found, toaster - never found, range - never found, but I somehow have six refrigerators in my house along with five heat pumps and about seven heat devices (which cannot be duplicated). 3000 watts of "phantom" aggregate devices constantly plague me and challenge me as to what they are.

This device is NOT ready for prime time. If I could go through the house and turn each device on, I could name it and be done. They are trying to use ME for researching the devices ability to find things, and it never finds things. Wait about 20 years before this thing is actually ready, but by then something else will come along. Do not waste your money.

Bottom Line: No, I would not recommend this to a friend

I installed it myself and it was very easy. The app was nice. I had no luck for a week, and their tech support said one clamp needed adjusting, so I did, and they said it was then fine. The first item it found was the motor, and I figured out it was my sump pump. I sent the alarms to notify me if it was not activated for 30 or if it remained on for more than 5 minutes.

It was ok until I started using the stove and the app then began telling me my sump was stuck on. I checked it, and it was fine. Turning the stove off, I started to get alarms that my pump was not running, but again, it was fine. It kept detecting that my gas garage heater has a heating element, not a motor. Their CEO says one of the first things it should detect it a refrigerator since it cycles on and off. It never detected it, or the freezer, or my furnace, which has been running almost constant due to this cold winter so far.

I have returned it before I am stuck with a $300.00 brick.

Bottom Line: No, I would not recommend this to a friend

I've had the system installed for nearly three months. It has found useless items like the fridge light. 65% of power was not detected. It hasn't even grouped my AC, which uses about 40% of my total power. I sent multiple emails and am always told: "we are working on a big fix". Clearly, this thing is not close to being ready for release. We should be paid for being Guinea Pigs. Useless product.

Bottom Line: No, I would not recommend this to a friend

I purchased my Sense in early January 2017 with high hopes. It's an easy install for anyone with a little experience behind their circuit breaker door.

It is a nice looking iPhone app. I hooked it up and waited to see what was using what. It's almost the end of August, and I'm still waiting.

Yes, I've been through the mill with what passes for their tech support, which is basically re-initiating the database on their side to accommodate their "new" code. It can easily find a garage door opener, a microwave, and even your fridge, but that's about where it stops. It finds many "components" of larger or more complex units (like a heat pump), but it's essentially useless information that is not summarized or presented in any way you can make "sense" of. You can track the impact of devices turning on or off, but you can't assign that "signature" to a device name. If you could, it might be possible to create useful information.

Right now I'm stuck with essentially a $300 app on my phone that I can get a few minor bits of info from, but it's impossible to use it or analyze it to save money by tracking down energy hogs.

Unfortunately, Sense makes no sense to buy. Great idea, great marketing, but no execution. If you want to spend $300 to know when your fridge light comes on, by all means, go for it.

I'm fed up with it and their excuses.

Bottom Line: No, I would not recommend this to a friend

I had zero problems setting the thing up after work yesterday. Cut house power, opened up the panel, popped in new 220 breakers, and followed the instructions. I opted for the solar module too. Took just a few minutes and it's dead easy (no sense paying an electrician to stick in a breaker for heaven's sakes). Turned power back on, then downloaded the app and connected the device via wifi no problem.

The only disappointment was that it hasn't yet detected any devices. But it was somewhat informative to go around the house and try turning different things on and off. It responds immediately when the A/C fires up or the sump pump runs for a second you know instantly!

As far as solar, the Sense system was in agreement with my inverter readout to within one or two Watts! That's pretty amazing. I guess we'll see what it can detect. It says to wait a week or two and I will. A little underwhelmed so far.

I'd have trouble recommending a $350 device to anyone else though, unless it gets a whole lot smarter over time. I guess we'll find out.

Bottom Line: No, I would not recommend this to a friend

I bought the Sense Home Energy Monitor, and after a month I still can't get it to work.

First, the initial monitor Sense failed and had to be replaced. That was two visits by my electrician, first to install the original, then to replace the failed original.

Second, when I try to set up the solar feature (I have solar), it fails every time. A third visit by my electrician established that all of the solar connections were fine, so it seems that Sense is the problem.

I've spent about $500 for three visits by my electrician. Sense help is no help at all. Everything they recommend doesn't work.

I've concluded that this system is a piece of junk. My advice is not to waste your money.

Bottom Line: No, I would not recommend this to a friend

Sense is based on a very clever idea. The packaging and product design are great, installation was smooth, and the iPhone app looks and feels good visually.

Unfortunately, at least in my home, it doesn't provide any meaningful information. Like many large homes, there are dozens of electrical devices in the house, some rather complex (like a furnace), and others dead-simple (like an oven). After more than four months of continuous operation, Sense has identified only a few, with nearly everything else falling into an "always on" bucket, "other," or various unnamed devices, motors, and heaters, not to mention five refrigerators. Sadly, I am no closer to knowing details of my home's energy usage (except the total) than I was before installing Sense.

The execution of the idea is good; I think the idea itself falls short of being practical. I think what's needed is an electrical panel that has individual metering for each circuit, so you can directly gather data on the most power-hungry consumers of electricity.

Bottom Line: No, I would not recommend this to a friend

As a licensed master electrician, ImI would advise homeowners not to buy this device. I bought it, and I'm on week 12, but I've had to do some extensive investigating to find the devices in my home, which I don't advise non-licensed people to do. Basically, it is a waste of money.

Bottom Line: No, I would not recommend this to a friend

I purchased Sense Home Energy Monitor in December of 2016. It arrived within a week or two of ordering. Installation was simple if you're comfortable working with electrical wiring. I'm handy and don't feel an electrician was needed for the installation as long as you follow the directions (in order).

After the install, the configuration with the app was a snap, and Sense was connected to my WiFi. Immediately I could see the total electrical usage in my house. Individual devices did not immediately show up, and I knew they would not based on the reviews I had read and from the info on Sense's website.

The device has been installed for just under a month now, and I have 11 devices detected. Dryer, interior fridge light, furnace blower, furnace fan, garage opener, microwave, an exterior motion detection light, washer, well pump, water heater, and an unknown heat source.

With a 30-day return policy, I'm a little concerned that this is all I can see at around 20 days. I've written support, but I'm expecting explanations similar to those on their blog.

I'm still hopeful, and I understand that it takes a lot of data to analyze what's happening in my home, I just wish they had a longer return window as it would make me much more comfortable with a new product that so far is living short of its expectations.

At this point, the jury's still out on if the Sense Home Energy Monitor will live up to its promises, but I think I'll stick with it and find out.

Bottom Line: Yes, I would recommend this to a friend

I installed the Sense Home Energy Monitor in October. Since then it has detected (and I named) the dryer, dehumidifier, and a food dehydrator. In addition, it has detected three microwaves (I only have one), one light, five unnamed devices, six unnamed motors, and ten unnamed heats. It says it has detected the furnace, but the furnace is running right now, and Sense says it is not. It also says the AC was running last night and has an average run time of two minutes and 11 seconds.

After three months, what is running right now is "Always On" for 305 watts, "Unnamed device 4" for 44 watts, and "Unknown" for 905 watts. I expected more.

In addition, I got a call from Comcast (security assurance department or something) who tells me that the Sense Monitor is responsible for thousands of DNS queries, amounting to a DoS attack, coming from my router. I can't verify that as being accurate, but I didn't appreciate the phone call regardless. I contacted Sense and am awaiting a response.

Bottom Line: No, I would not recommend this to a friend

I bought the Sense Home Energy Monitor and waited anxiously for its arrival (took about two months).

I received it at the beginning of December and arranged to have my electrician come out and install it a week or so later. We quickly discovered a problem. The clamps that come with the unit to encircle the power lines that feed to the breaker box were not large enough to go around the TWO lines that I have at each location (I guess I have a "parallel" service, so I have two lines at each of the two locations).

The electrician had a hand-held monitor that was large enough to circle both wires (along with each individually), and we confirmed that only doing one would not suffice, along with using a clamp that does not completely encircle the wires.

I looked for a phone number so we could talk to Sense Home Energy Monitor's support while the electrician was there. I could not find a number anywhere. So I tried the next best thing and sent an email to the support, which said there would be a response in "one business day." Two business days later, still no response. So I sent an RMA request and bingo! Now I heard back.

I then proceeded to have a series of emails back and forth with absolutely no technical help. Finally, I gave up and sent another RMA request and returned the device.

I think the idea is outstanding. However, technical support is just awful. There is no ability to call while your electrician is there, which would be helpful because many will charge a service call if they have to return. I had to pay $115 for him to basically do nothing, since we couldn't install the unit. The promised one-day turnaround time on email support was not met, and I only got a response when threatening a return.

Avoid, unless you want to be frustrated.

Bottom Line: No, I would not recommend this to a friend

I have two units and have spent HOURS trying to get them to work properly. In the end the unit worked, is pretty cool, has a lot of potential but can be a serious pain in the butt. You must first connect to the unit via Bluetooth. This is only used to send it the WiFi configuration data. That's it. If it works then you're in good shape. If not you're screwed. By the way, once you have it set to WiFi do not make any changes to the WiFi network or password. At this time I cannot get it to connect again with any change, I must always go back to the original network and password. Will see what they come up with. There is almost no diagnostics or user inputs. When it figures out it has a device it allows you to give it a name and that's it. No teach/ learn mode. You cannot delete a device once it finds it. This means you can't move it to another panel without a factory reset command from the cloud/ tech support. I'm an early adapter but way too many hours (20+) with near zero support - long delay emails.

Bottom Line: No, I would not recommend this to a friend

I installed Sense on 11/16/2016. I was shocked (haha) at the amount of continuous electricity use and frequent spikes in use. Within a couple of days, it identified an "unknown heating device", which turned out to be a small electric water heater that we installed when the home was built, supplemental to our natural gas tankless water heater, to circulate hot water to a distant bathroom.

Watching a few more days revealed a consistent 20+ KWH/day of electricity use by this one item. That equates to about $72/mo for this thing to run, or 1/3 of our winter electricity bill. And I can only assume much higher use in the summer, as the plumbing runs right alongside the A/C supply ductwork, enclosed in the finished basement ceiling.

I will be switching to an alternative method of circulating the hot water (on demand call for hot water with Z-Wave occupancy sensor and a recirculating pump, appx $500 investment). This is similar to the original investment, but without the ongoing operating cost (I believe this will drop the energy need by 95%, plus the gas heat costs significantly less than electric).

The monitor has also identified our microwave oven, sewer grinder pump and our downstairs fridge. It also identified an unknown device which has turned out to be one of the HVAC fans.

I'm anxiously awaiting for it to discover/discern other devices. I'm surprised it has not yet identified our electric dryer, washing machine, curling irons, garage door openers, the 2nd fridge and freezer, and any lights as of yet. I'd like to see this discovery occur more quickly.

A 2nd big surprise is to see just how little most of the high wattage devices consume over time. I'll know more as others are discovered and tracked separately over a longer period of time. But the microwave and grinder pump, while requiring larger circuits to run, are only on for relatively short periods of time and therefore don't accumulate as much usage as smaller items that run for longer durations. (Makes total sense but the display from the Sense Monitor makes this very clear).

A 3rd big surprise is the amount of "always on" usage. This is currently 1,099w. Computers (several), routers/switches, chargers, radon exhaust fan...seems high so I hope to identify a simple change to reduce that as well.

So in summary, this thing has already revealed enough electricity usage that I can eliminate that It will have paid for itself. Maybe our situation is an exception. It's slow to identify new devices (would have rated 5 stars if it had identified significantly more devices to date) but it has given me a much deeper awareness of the sources of my energy use. And that's what I was looking for.

Bottom Line: Yes, I would recommend this to a friend

I installed the sense energy monitor in late September. I can see overall energy use, on a moment by moment line chart, comparison since installed and a few 'bubbles'.

I had expected that the device would start recognizing my devices or isolating them so I could identify but that has not happened yet. On the line chart it is clear to me (since I caused the energy use) when the garage door operates, my coffee grinder turns on, an up-tick when the washer is in use.

I can also see some middle of the night use that I would love to understand!

The bubbles are a disappointment, the device has yet to identify what is running. There is a bubble for always on - a bubble for unknown and finally a bubble for my microwave - but that's it. The device has yet to identify any other device.

Perhaps I am impatient? Anxious to see what another two weeks bring!

Would I recommend? The jury is out. The optimism about the device is sliding.

Bottom Line: No, I would not recommend this to a friend