Is OhmConnect Legit? Can You Really Get Paid to Use Less Energy?

It can help you to reduce energy when it’s most expensive and start saving on your electricity bills. It will let you know when electricity is most expensive and help you to use less.

By saving energy, you’ll be saving money, which means lower bills. You can earn cash just for saving energy too.

Here’s a brief step-by-step guide to how it works.

1. Sign up

The first step is to sign up. You can head on over to the OhmConnect website to sign up here. Just enter your zip code to get started.

PGDE&, SCE, SDG&E, AND Con Edison electric service customers are eligible.

OhmConnect is only available to residents of California, New York, and Texas residents who have a participating utility provider.

This limited availability is one of the main cons of this side hustle, but it’s a good money-making option if you live in one of these states.

2. Earn money

Once you sign up for OhmConnect and sync your energy provider with your account, it will be able to tell how much power you’re using at a given time.

You’ll be encouraged to use less power and earn money for doing so.

You do this through OhmHours, and AutoOhms (you can also earn for referring friends.)

OhmHours and AutoOhms are energy saving events, which are usually an hour in length, but are sometimes more or less, in which OhmConnect has committed to the grid that its members will save energy.

Below, I’ll cover how each money-making option works.

Here are the ways you can earn with OhmConnect.

OhmHours

An OhmHour is a brief window of time, usually on weeknight evenings, when the demand on the energy grid is so high that utility companies would rather pay their customers to reduce usage, rather than the alternative of running an expensive “peaker” plant.

Peaker plants, also known as peaking power plants, generally run only when there’s high demand.

The grid lets OhmConnect know that a time of intense demand is coming up and OhmConnect will notify you about it via email or SMS.

Then, you can reduce your energy usage by turning off devices and/or automatically powering down smart devices.

If you allow your connected devices to remain off for the hour, you’ll get credit and will be one step closer to your monthly payment.

You’ll earn Watts that you can withdraw for cash, enter to win prizes or use to score smart home tech in the Rewards Marketplace.

You used to have to power off everything manually to get earn with OhmHours, but now you can automatically participate in OhmHours. You don’t need to run around the house powering down appliances. You can now connect those appliances to smart plugs and OhmConnect will power them off and back on during your energy saving events.

So, you can connect a smart home device, or many of them, and earn passive income during OhmHours and AutoOhms.

Basically, an OhmHour is where you turn off appliances for an hour or so during designated times that OhmConnect prompts you to so that you use less energy and earn rewards.

AutoOhms

Connected smart devices get you access to shorter, simpler, energy-saving events called AutoOhms. With AutoOhms, you earn a flat rate for every plug and thermostat that turns off. The more you connect, the more you’ll earn.

You can connect a smart home device, or many, and earn a passive income during AutoOhms.

Refer friends

OhmConenct also allows you to earn money when you refer a friend.

You simply share your unique referral link with friends and family, and you’ll earn money each time one of your referrals links their utility account to OhmConnect.

There’s no limit to how many people you can refer to OhmConnect.

You can earn $20 for every person that you refer to OhmConnect and your friend earns money just for getting started.

Also, the referral program is useful for those who don’t live in an eligible area, but still want to earn money with OhmConnect.

Those who don’t live in California, New York, or Texas, but want to earn money from OhmConnect can still participate in the referral program.

If you refer an eligible California, New York, or Texas resident to OhmConnect, and they connect their utility and save energy, you will get paid and so will your friend.

3. Get paid

Whenever you save energy during an OhmHour or an AutoOhm, you’ll earn Watts. Watts are worth money or rewards in the OhmConnect Rewards Marketplace.

You can withdraw your Watts as gift cards to a variety of stores or Watts can be cashed out via PayPal. You can also donate your Watts to charity.

Also, there are weekly sweepstakes that you can enter for prizes like Peloton bikes, appliances, gift cards, and cash prizes. It’s probably better to stick with PayPal cash or gift cards though because you can guarantee your rewards.

Also, you can use your Watts to get a discount on smart devices that can help you to reduce your energy consumption even more.

How Much Can You Make from OhmConnect?

The amount of money you earn depends on the size of your home and how well you save energy.

According to OhmConnect, the key to earning consistent rewards is to use connected devices, such as smart thermostats and smart plugs. The company states that it has found that members who use a smart thermostat or two smart plugs are the ones who earn the most each month.

Here are some examples from Reddit on earnings from OhmConnect users:

• “Last year, under the old system, I accrued about $400. This year, barely $100. Safe to say, OhmConnect doesn’t feel worth it anymore.”
• “I’ve redeemed my watts this summer for $30 cash and $75 in Amazon gift cards.”
• “2021 = $175 2020 = $449 2019 = $307 2018 = $551 2017 = $152 This is my yearly earnings since I joined in April 2017. My energy usage pattern has been about the same year to year.”
• “So far in 2022 I’ve heard enough watts to redeem approx $25 in Amazon gift cards”
• “I’ve made around $1220 in referrals and around $300 in Amazon gift cards / PayPal gift cards.”
• “I’ve been in the program for almost 3 months now and haven’t made enough to cash in a $10 Amazon card.”
• “We are earning far less than what we were getting last year. By this time last year I had over $400. This year I have just $137. They do not pay out like they use to. We had and ohm hour last night and my potential earnings were $1.37. Just to let you know $1.00 of that was from my smart plugs and thermostat. So basically if I didn’t have those, all I would have earned is $.37. We use to make $5.00 to $10.00 for an hour last year. They are keeping all the money now. It isn’t about getting people to save energy anymore it is about how much money they can make.”

You can also earn from referring friends and family. OhmConnect says that it knows of members who have easily cleared $5,000 in one year through referral rewards and that there’s even a case of a member who made $41,000 in one month. But the company does say that those results are not typical.

How Does OhmConnect Make Money?

OhmConnect gets paid by utility companies for reducing energy usage during periods of peak usage. Then, it passes some of the money on to you in exchange for using less energy.

Is OhmConnect Legitimate?

OhmConnect is a legit company that pays you to reduce your energy usage during peak usage. There are lots of people online who have actually been paid by OhmConnect, so this company actually pays out.

The company is accredited by the Better Business Bureau (BBB). It actually has an impressive A rating from the BBB. The reviews from customers on the BBB aren’t as great as the company only has 1.5 stars on there.

OhmConnect has 3.7 stars on Trustpilot, which is a rating of “Average.” So, that’s not the best rating.

On Reddit, the company is pretty well rated overall. Most users say that it does pay out. Just don’t expect to earn a ton of money.

Overall Verdict

OhmConnect is a good site if you want to reduce your energy usage and earn a little money in the process. You won’t earn a lot of money from this and the amount that users are earning seems to have gone down recently, according to reports on Reddit.

Still though, OhmConnect is still worth a try if you live in an eligible area and don’t mind powering off your devices. You’ll reduce your energy usage and earn a little cash in the process.