Ohme Home Pro vs Sync Energy Wall Charger 2

The £139 question

The Ohme Home Pro costs £539. The Sync Energy Wall Charger 2 costs £400. Both deliver 7.4 kW on single-phase, both carry a three-year warranty, both are OZEV-approved, and both offer solar diverting. The £139 gap buys one thing of substance: how cleverly the charger talks to your electricity supplier.

• Ohme Home Pro — direct API integration with Octopus and British Gas. The charger follows half-hourly price movements on its own. Built-in 4G SIM for three years. 5-metre cable.
• Sync Energy Wall Charger 2 — schedule-based tariff support via TariffSense. 7.5-metre cable, built-in PEN fault protection, IK10 impact rating, backed by Luceco PLC. £139 cheaper.

Where the Ohme earns back its premium — and where it doesn't

The Ohme's party trick is its direct link to supplier APIs. On Octopus Agile, where rates shift every thirty minutes, the charger slots your charging into the cheapest windows without you setting a thing. At Agile's typical overnight lows — around 5p/kWh — even modest mileage accumulates savings that cover £139 inside a year.

On Octopus Intelligent Go, the Ohme is the officially recommended charger. It unlocks the full six-hour off-peak window at 8p/kWh and can extend charging into additional cheap slots the supplier releases dynamically. The Sync Energy can be set to charge during Intelligent Go's fixed 23:30–05:30 window, but it won't pick up those bonus half-hours.

Switch the tariff to something with a fixed off-peak block — Octopus Go at 8.5p/kWh from 00:30–05:30, EDF GoElectric at 6.99p/kWh from 23:00–06:00, E.ON Next Drive at 8p/kWh from midnight to six — and the Ohme's API advantage evaporates. A schedule is a schedule. The Sync Energy handles that identically, for £139 less.

Cable, build, and the things you notice on the wall

The Sync Energy arrives with a 7.5-metre tethered cable. That is the longest of any charger on the site — longer than the Tesla Wall Connector's 7.3 metres, and substantially longer than the Ohme's 5-metre standard. If your consumer unit sits on the opposite side of the house from the driveway, or you park two cars and need reach, the Sync Energy removes a headache the Ohme creates. Ohme offers an 8-metre cable upgrade, but it costs extra and pushes the gap wider still.

Build quality diverges in interesting ways. The Sync Energy carries an IK10 impact rating on top of IP65 weatherproofing — relevant if the charger sits on an exposed front wall or beside a tight parking space. It also includes built-in PEN fault protection, which typically removes the need for a separate earth rod during install. That can shave £50–£100 off the installation bill, narrowing the total cost gap even further. The interchangeable fascia plates — nine colours — are a small touch, but they suggest a manufacturer thinking about kerb appeal rather than treating it as an afterthought.

The Ohme counters with a built-in 4G SIM, included for three years. If your Wi-Fi signal dies before it reaches the driveway, this matters. The Sync Energy relies on Wi-Fi or Ethernet, and user reports on its Wi-Fi reliability have been mixed. If the charger will sit far from the router and running an Ethernet cable isn't practical, the Ohme's cellular fallback is a genuine differentiator — or you can specify the Sync Energy's 4G variant, though that adds to the price.

The OZEV grant and what it does to the maths

Both chargers are OZEV-approved. Eligible renters and flat owners can claim £500 off. For the Sync Energy at £400, the grant covers the unit outright and contributes toward installation costs too. For the Ohme at £539, the grant brings the unit down to £39. Either way, the grant reshapes the arithmetic considerably — though the Sync Energy benefits more in absolute terms, since the grant exceeds its price.

Which to buy

Buy the Ohme Home Pro if:

• You are on Octopus Agile or Intelligent Go and want the charger to chase cheap half-hours without intervention
• Your Wi-Fi doesn't reach the driveway and you'd rather not run Ethernet
• You value the per-session cost tracking and Ohme's more polished app

Buy the Sync Energy Wall Charger 2 if:

• You charge on a fixed off-peak window — Go, GoElectric, Next Drive — where a schedule does the same job
• You need the longest possible cable reach without paying for upgrades
• You want to spend as little as possible on a smart, OZEV-approved charger with solar diverting and PEN protection included

For most buyers on a fixed off-peak tariff, the Sync Energy is the more sensible purchase. It does everything required, costs £139 less, and arrives with 2.5 metres more cable. The Ohme earns its premium only when the tariff demands a charger that thinks in half-hours — and on Agile, it earns it decisively. Match the charger to the tariff, not the other way round.