Killed My Home’s Power to Test EcoFlow’s Backup Station. The Result Surprised Me
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It was a weird morning. I woke up, let the dogs out, then ran out to do some errands. Once I was back home, I headed straight to the garage and turned off the main circuit breaker. Not what you’d normally do upon returning home, right?
When it came to testing the EcoFlow Delta Pro Ultra X , — DPUX for short — and the EcoFlow Smart Home Panel 3, I had a unique problem: My house basically never loses power. I live in the suburbs of Chicago, where natural disasters don’t really happen, and my power lines are buried, so weather doesn’t affect them either. That left me with only one choice: I had to simulate my own blackout.
How I faked my own personal blackout
Creating my own blackout was pretty easy, actually. I have a normal breaker box in my garage, with an EcoFlow Smart Panel 3 installed as a subpanel. So to simulate the blackout, I only had to kill the breaker that fed the panel.
But let’s back up here (no pun intended). I’ve been using EcoFlow hardware — a smart panel and battery backup — since the winter of 2023. I originally had a Delta Pro Ultra and Smart Panel 2 installed in my home that winter. The units I’m testing now are the next generations of that hardware.
In the purest case of irony in recent memory, my home actually did lose power just last week — and I wasn’t home for it. I was shopping and got a notification on my phone indicating that the battery was running low. By the time I got home, the grid was back up.
EcoFlow’s Smart Panel 3 played a key role
The Smart Panel 3 is a huge improvement over its predecessor. The smart panel can accommodate up to 32 circuits, which is more than enough for my 100-amp home. You’d have to check your local ordinances and codes — and I am not an electrician — but I believe you could have the Smart Panel 3 installed as a main panel if you wanted. The main reason I had it installed as a subpanel is that the Smart Panel 2 that preceded it was not capable of acting as a main panel. When it came time to install the Smart Panel 3, rewiring the entire setup would have been a headache.
Speaking of the installation, my panel was installed by an EcoFlow-certified electrician. The company has a number of contractors nationwide who are trained to install this gear. That’s a stark contrast to my initial installation. My first electrician, who installed my previous system, needed to consult the reviewer’s guide to help with the installation.
Adam Doud/CNETAnyway, feeding the Smart Panel 3 is the DPUX. This is a pretty large battery and inverter, roughly the size of two of the best large coolers stacked on top of each other. It rolls around on wheels, so you could, in theory, wheel it out into your front yard to power something if you needed, but its main purpose is to supply power to your home.
The Smart Panel 3 gives you a ton of data and control over your power. I do not have a solar setup, but one way a system like this could help you is by charging via solar during the day and powering your home at night. You could also configure the Smart Panel and the DPUX to provide power to your home when rates are peaking and switch back to the grid when rates are lower.
Running the test
I wanted to test how things would go if I lost power completely. I shut off the breaker at 8:53 a.m., then I simply went about my day. No one in my family noticed when the power dropped out — the DPUX can switch on and provide power in about 20 milliseconds. It wasn’t even enough of a drop to force a reboot of my computer or modem. I sat down at my desk and started doing my job.
The EcoFlow app lets you control a lot of the power in your home. You can turn circuits on and off as needed. When your battery kicks in, your circuits can be prioritized into three categories: Must Have, Nice to Have and Not Necessary. This allows you to shut down unnecessary circuits and avoid draining more power than needed. The app will even estimate how long the battery will last with each category enabled. I have my “Nice to Have” circuits set to shut down when the DPUX’s charge falls to 50% to help extend battery life. In this test, my DPUX reached 50% around 1:00 p.m.
I had two circuits set to shut off at that point, only for testing purposes, and it worked like a charm. I didn’t leave them off for two reasons. First, I wanted to see how long this battery would last under extreme circumstances. Second, I need to chat with my electrician because the labels he gave me don’t seem to match what is actually being powered. So, you know, whoopsie.
When the battery reached 50%, I only had two circuits shut down, one of which was my dishwasher, which I wasn’t planning to run anyway.
Through the app, I was able to monitor how much power I had left and generally keep an eye on things while I worked. I finally switched the breaker back on when the battery reached 19%, which was at the 7-hour, 51-minute mark. That’s not bad, considering it got me through a full workday with juice to spare.
Throughout the day, I was powering my refrigerator, a smaller beverage cooler, two electric coolers in my living room, plus all the lights, TVs and computers throughout my home. My computer tower is a Legion Tower 5i with a GeForce RTX 4070 with three monitors, so you could say my office uses a fair amount of power on its own. If I had been more conservative — for example, switching to a laptop, turning off some lights or disabling the fuses for the bedrooms in the house — I could have gone much longer.
Is the EcoFlow Delta Pro Ultra X worth its price?
Adam Doud/CNET
ECOFLOW Delta Pro Ultra X
All this comes at a price, of course. My system, as reviewed, costs $10,999. For that, you get an inverter, two batteries and the Smart Home Panel 3 (a $3,299 unit on its own). That doesn’t include installation. You can also add additional batteries if you’re so inclined, and they’ll work with solar hookups if you have panels. The new generation of hardware and installers feels like everything got upgraded. That’s rare in a tech review, and happy news.
By comparison, the Tesla Powerwall 3 starts at 13.5 kWh, which is more than the 12.28 kWh that the DPUX offers. The Anker Solix E10 offers a similar package with the power module, two batteries and a smart inlet box for $6,699, which is a lot less expensive than the package I reviewed. All of these systems are expandable, with EcoFlow’s and Anker’s being stackable. The Powerwall, in the meantime, is expandable, as long as you have the wall space.
Overall, I’m very satisfied with how this battery performed. With my current setup, I anticipate being able to last a full day without power, and I can expand my system in the future as needed. If my house ever loses power for real, I’ll certainly be more conservative with power, but I’m confident that I’ll have a lot of lead time before things really go dark.
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