Smart Meter Data: What Is Collected and Who Can See It

A smart meter automatically sends your electricity and gas meter readings to your supplier, so you no longer need to submit readings yourself and your bills are based on accurate readings rather than estimates¹. What it sends is narrow: the only information the meter holds is how much energy you have used and what tariff you are on. Personal information such as your name, address and bank details is not stored on the meter². Readings travel over a secure, standalone network rather than the internet, and your supplier can ask for them monthly, weekly, daily or half-hourly depending on what you have agreed³.

Who can see the data is similarly limited. Only your supplier, or third parties you have explicitly permitted, can see how much energy you are using and when². The network that carries the readings, operated by the Data Communications Company (DCC), never sees or keeps the data itself: it transports the readings securely straight to your energy supplier⁴. This page sets out what is collected, at what frequency, who may access it, and how you change or withdraw your permissions.

What your meter records and what stays private

At the simplest level, smart meter data is commonly described as either "message contents" or "system data"⁴. Message contents are the readings themselves: how much electricity and gas your home has used. System data is the operational information the network needs to keep the meter working and communicating. Neither category includes anything that identifies you personally.

The meter does not hold your name, your address or your bank details, and it does not transmit them either². Independent guidance confirms the same point: personal details like your name, address and bank account details are not stored on, or transmitted by, your smart meter⁵. The only information a smart meter holds is about how much energy you have used, and what tariff you are on⁷.

It is worth being clear about what is not a smart meter at all. Energy monitors and smart thermostats are consumer devices you buy yourself, and they are not linked to your energy accounts and do not send any information to your energy supplier⁸. If you use a clip-on monitor or a smart thermostat, that data stays within your own devices unless you deliberately connect it to an online service. Separately, companies operating in the energy sector do hold datasets related to smart metering: Electralink, for example, stores data on smart meter installation numbers and location, supplier switching, and industrial and commercial consumption, among other datasets⁹. Those are business and network records held by organisations, not the contents of your meter.

For a household weighing up monitoring, the distinction matters. The meter's own record is deliberately thin, which limits what anyone could learn from the meter itself. The richer picture of your home, such as which appliance is running at which time, comes from devices you add yourself, and those are covered in home energy monitors and consumer access devices.

Reading frequency: every half second up to once a month

Automatic meter readings provide your energy supplier with monthly, weekly, daily, or even half-hourly readings³. Monthly is the minimum: your supplier must receive at least a monthly reading so it can bill you accurately. Daily and half-hourly sharing are optional, and you choose whether to allow them⁵.

The meter itself records more finely than it sends. Your smart meter records your electricity use in near-real time, and every half hour for gas⁵. At the technical limit, smart meter data can be recorded at half-second intervals¹⁰. That level of detail exists within the metering system, but it is not what lands on your supplier's desk unless you have agreed to frequent sharing.

Frequency is not a technical curiosity, it is a privacy question. When smart meter data is collected at 10 to 30 minute intervals, occupancy and activity patterns can be inferred: when the house is empty, when someone is awake, when the kettle goes on¹⁰. This is the reason the consent rules treat half-hourly data differently from monthly data, and why you, not your supplier, decide how often readings are shared.

If you would like to change your preference for how often you share meter readings, you can do so by contacting your supplier directly⁷. Households on time-of-use tariffs, or using an app that needs granular data, generally need half-hourly sharing; households that prefer to share the minimum can stay on monthly. The trade-offs are covered in smart meters and time-of-use tariffs and how often smart meters send readings.

Who has access to your information

The default answer is: your supplier, and nobody else. Only your supplier, or third parties when given explicit permission from you, can see how much energy you are using and when². Independent guidance puts it the same way: only you and your energy supplier can access the data smart meters share⁷.

Beyond that default, access is rule-bound and purpose-bound:

• Distribution Network Operators (DNOs), the companies that run the regional electricity networks, can access smart meter data for regulated purposes only, and before doing so they must agree a privacy plan with Ofgem⁹. Smart meter data recorded at 30 minute intervals can be obtained by DNOs in aggregated and anonymised form¹⁰.
• Third parties signed up to the Smart Energy Code can access smart meter data of any granularity, but via opt-in consent only, with regular reminders of that consent, and based on confirmation that the request for the third party service comes from you⁹.
• Other authorised DCC users, such as switching websites, can be given permission by you to access your consumption data directly from your meter via the DCC¹¹.

The pattern across all three is the same. Network operators get limited, anonymised access for running the wires, and only under a privacy plan agreed with the regulator. Anyone else needs your explicit, opt-in permission, with reminders, and the request must be shown to come from you. Nobody gets to browse your consumption data as of right.

Supplier uses: bills, tariff plans and grid performance

Ofgem sets out three uses for the data you share through your smart meter: to bill you for the energy you use; to offer you new products and services, for example new tariffs, if you have given permission for this to happen; and to help make the energy system more efficient by recording demand more accurately¹. The same three uses appear in Ofgem's consumer guidance and its smart meter pages¹².

Billing is the core purpose, and it is the one that needs no separate permission. With smart meters, energy suppliers get accurate and reliable readings automatically over the DCC network, which means you are billed only for the energy you have actually used¹⁴. Bills based on accurate readings rather than estimates end the estimated-bill problem that used to follow households from supplier to supplier¹.

The second use, offering you products and services, is conditional on your permission, which is what separates a tariff recommendation from marketing you did not ask for¹. The third use, system efficiency, is about the grid rather than your home: more accurate recording of demand helps the energy system match supply to consumption. Since 1 October 2024, suppliers have also been required to provide free energy insights to all smaller smart meter consumers, so the data flows back to you as well as to the supplier¹⁵.

One point of clarification on apps. Your supplier may offer you an app or online portal to see your energy usage data. While these use the internet, they do not change the way your smart meter talks to your supplier⁷. The meter-to-supplier channel remains the closed DCC network regardless of what you use at your end.

Choosing what you agree to

Government guidance on your rights is direct about where control sits: you have control over who can access the energy use data from your smart meter, including how often and for what purpose, except where it is required for regulated purposes such as billing¹⁶. Billing is the exception; almost everything else is your call.

The legal footing for that control is data protection law. Smart meter data is classified as personal data, owned by the consumer, and the consumer is the source of consent for any onward data-sharing⁹. That classification is what makes your choices enforceable rather than a courtesy.

In practice, the choices you hold are:

• How often your meter sends readings: monthly as a minimum, with daily or half-hourly as options you can change by contacting your supplier⁵.
• Marketing: whether your supplier can use your meter readings for sales and marketing purposes⁵.
• Third-party sharing: whether to share data with other organisations, like price comparison websites⁵.

Each of these can be changed later. If you agreed to half-hourly sharing when you had a time-of-use tariff and later move to a flat rate, you can ask your supplier to reduce the frequency. If you authorised a comparison site years ago and no longer use it, you can withdraw that permission. The consent question is covered in more detail in what consent you give for smart meter data readings.

Safeguards for your information

Smart meter data is wrapped within two layers of encryption before it is sent over a dedicated communications system, an approach backed by the National Cyber Security Centre and in line with governance and data protection standards³. The DCC network applies the same two-layer wrapping, and a communications hub in your home creates a home area network to carry readings from your meter⁴.

The most important structural protection is separation. Smart meters do not use the internet, and they have their own closed, dedicated communications system². The network operates entirely separately from the potential pitfalls of the public internet, and it operates to security levels endorsed by the National Cyber Security Centre, part of GCHQ⁴. This is why a smart meter neither needs your WiFi nor can be attacked through it, a point expanded in do smart meters need WiFi and smart meter security.

The second protection is that the network operator does not hold the data. The DCC network never sees or keeps the data; it transports it securely straight to your energy supplier⁴. There is no central warehouse of household consumption records sitting with the network operator, and no retention of your readings by the company that carries them. Millions of smart meters are connected to the DCC's secure network, bringing consumers and energy suppliers closer together⁴, but the pipe is not the store.

Through this network, smart meter data can be shared securely between authorised users, helping to support smart energy services and innovation across the energy sector¹⁸. Authorised is the operative word: the security architecture and the consent rules work together, so data moves only between parties that are either regulated or explicitly permitted by you.

The Consumer Consent Solution: a single point of control

Managing permissions supplier by supplier and app by app is clumsy, and Ofgem has been working on a fix. The Consumer Consent Solution has one overall objective: to develop a consent solution that enables consumers to share their energy data simply and securely with relevant service providers and third parties, whilst promoting transparency and empowering consumers in the energy sector¹⁹. Its purpose is to enable consumers to share their energy data with trusted third parties to receive tailored services to manage their energy bills¹⁸.

The scope has been settled in stages. Ofgem's 2025 decision set the starting dataset: the solution will start with smart meter consumption data and expand to other datasets as the Delivery Body's resources and priorities allow²⁰. The impact assessment published in January 2026 confirmed that the initial scope applies to domestic and small business smart meter data only, with scope to expand to cover non-domestic meters and advanced meters in future iterations²¹.

The DCC sees itself as the natural home for this. As custodians of smart meter data, the company states it is underpinned by a clear consumer consent capability²². The direction of travel is not new: as long ago as 2016, evidence to Parliament noted that consumers can also authorise other DCC Users, such as switching websites, to access their consumption data directly from the meters via the DCC¹¹. The Consumer Consent Solution gathers that scattered permission-giving into one place, so a household can see in a single view who has access, at what granularity, and can switch it off again. The detail is on our page about the Consumer Consent Solution.

Rollout progress and the fate of traditional meters

The formal rollout framework has now concluded. It ran between 1 January 2022 and 31 December 2025 as a four-year obligation on suppliers⁶. The wider programme is much older: the smart meter rollout has been underway for over 12 years²⁴. The next deadline is the end of 2030, by which suppliers are expected to complete the rollout²⁵.

For households, the live question is what happens to older meters. First-generation SMETS1 meters used a third-party communications network to send metering information to the energy supplier, and the DCC has been running a programme to migrate them onto its own network²⁶. The DCC has worked with Citizens Advice to provide a tool that allows you to check whether your smart meter has been migrated onto the DCC network²⁶; all you need is your gas and electricity MPANs (meter point administration numbers) and your postcode⁸. The background is in SMETS1 and SMETS2 meters.

The programme has also had to deal with meters that stop communicating. The DCC is working to support customers affected by non-communicating smart meters, alongside the 2030 completion goal²⁵. If your meter has gone quiet, the steps are in smart meter not sending readings.

The cost-benefit picture is tracked officially. The programme's costs and benefits report records customer benefits of 5.4 billion pounds at 2011 prices, discounted to 2019, at a 2023 dead-stop, and 9.2 billion pounds at 2024 prices, discounted to 2025, on the same dead-stop basis, alongside demand-shifting benefits of 0.9 billion pounds at 2011 prices at a 2024 dead-stop²⁷. The programme has also committed to reviewing opportunities to use observed data in place of model assumptions ahead of reporting on the rollout to end 2025²⁷.

Smart meter data and your home's energy self reliance

The data provided by your smart meter puts you in control of your energy usage, meaning you can take energy-saving steps to reduce your CO2 emissions²⁸. That is the independence case for smart meter data in one sentence: the measurements make your consumption visible, and visible consumption is consumption you can act on.

The device that delivers that visibility is the in-home display, a portable touchscreen unit that shows near real-time energy usage data²⁹. Typically, a smart meter displays data on an in-home display unit, offering transparency about energy use³⁰. Smart meters put consumers in control of their energy use for the first time, allowing energy efficiency measures that help save money on bills, offset price increases and reduce carbon emissions³¹. Since October 2024, suppliers must provide free energy insights to all smaller smart meter consumers, so even households without a working display can see their usage through their supplier¹⁵.

The honest account includes the dependencies. A smart meter does not make you independent of the grid, of your supplier, or of the DCC's national network: the meter's value depends on a closed network operated by one company, and on your supplier honouring the consent rules. Half-hourly data, the most useful for shifting your usage, is also the most revealing, which is why it sits behind your explicit permission. Used well, the data lets you cut waste, join flexibility schemes, and size a solar or battery system from real figures rather than guesses, as covered in using energy data to size a system and smart meters, monitoring and energy independence.

Support and how to raise a dispute

Your supplier is the first port of call for almost everything. If your smart meter stops working, contact your supplier: they are responsible for maintenance and will fix or replace your meter as needed³². If you suspect an issue with your smart meter, or your energy supplier identifies one, they should promptly investigate, resolve it themselves or with third parties, and keep you informed¹⁶. The in-home display should have been offered and demonstrated at installation, and the display itself is covered in in-home displays and broken in-home display replacement.

Beyond your supplier, Citizens Advice is the official consumer service for England and Wales, reachable on 0808 223 1133, or 0808 223 1144 for the Welsh language line, Monday to Friday, 9am to 5pm³³. Citizens Advice offers information and support on struggling to pay bills, problems with your energy supplier or supply, saving energy at home and getting a better energy deal; in England you can also call 0808 144 8844 for help with affording your bills³⁴. If your complaint with your supplier is not resolved, the Energy Ombudsman handles smart meter disputes, and private renters whose energy bills are in their name can choose to have a smart meter after checking their tenancy agreement and letting the landlord know³⁵. Your general consumer rights, including protection from unfair treatment, sit alongside these energy-specific routes³³.