The average electric bill in Ohio was about $135 a month as of 2024, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA). That sits modestly below the national average, and it gets there in an unremarkable way. Ohio does not stand out for cheap power or for heavy use. It runs a little below the national figure on rate, on usage, and on the bill itself.
Short answer: The average Ohio household paid about $135.16 a month for electricity in 2024 (EIA), based on roughly 846 kWh of usage at an all-in rate of 15.99¢/kWh. The national average that year was $142.26 a month, on 863 kWh at 16.48¢/kWh. So Ohio used a touch less electricity than the typical U.S. home, at a slightly lower rate, and landed about 5 percent below the national bill.
There is no single dramatic driver in that story, which is itself the story. Below is the sourced breakdown, the honest version of what actually moves an Ohio bill, and the one part of it you can genuinely shop.
What the average Ohio electric bill actually is
The figure to anchor on is $135.16 a month, the average residential bill in Ohio as of 2024 (EIA). For comparison, the national average that year was $142.26. A typical Ohio home paid about seven dollars a month less than the typical U.S. home.
Treat that number as a midpoint, not a target. An average flattens enormous variation. A studio apartment in a mild October and a four-bedroom house running central air through a humid August are both "Ohio," and their bills are nowhere near each other. Your own bill depends on your home size, your insulation, how you heat, how you set the thermostat, and which supply rate you are on. The average is a benchmark, not a prediction.
One point of clarity before the breakdown. That 15.99-cent all-in rate is the total price per kilowatt-hour, and it has two parts: the delivery charge your utility bills to move electricity to your home, and the supply (generation) charge for the electricity itself. Most people do not realize those are separate, and the line between them is the whole story of what you can and cannot control. We will come back to it.
A note on vintage. EIA full-year data lags by a year or more, so 2024 is the most recent complete annual figure available. Rates drift, but the structural picture below has held for years.
What a bill looks like at different usage levels
The single biggest swing factor in any bill is how much you use. The table below applies Ohio's 2024 all-in rate of 15.99 cents per kWh (EIA) to common monthly usage bands. These are all-in figures (supply plus delivery), and they are illustrative estimates meant to show how usage drives the bill, not official segment averages.
| Monthly usage | Approx. all-in monthly bill (at 15.99¢/kWh, EIA 2024) |
|---|---|
| 500 kWh (small apartment) | about $80 |
| 846 kWh (Ohio average) | about $135 |
| 1,000 kWh (mid-size home) | about $160 |
| 1,500 kWh (larger home) | about $240 |
| 2,000 kWh (large or all-electric home) | about $320 |
The 846-kWh row is the statewide average. Everything above and below it is the same arithmetic at a different volume. A home that uses 2,000 kWh a month is not paying a different rate than one using 500; it is simply running four times as much electricity. That is why the same household can see a mild spring bill near $80 and a deep-summer or deep-winter bill well over $250 without anything being wrong with the meter. If your bill has jumped and you are trying to find out why, our guide on why your electric bill is so high walks through the usual causes, and you can model your own home directly with the electricity cost calculator.
Why an Ohio bill swings so much by season
The $135 average hides months that run well above it and months that run well below, because Ohio has real weather at both ends of the calendar. Summers across the state pull air conditioning loads up through July and August, with the humidity that makes central air run harder. Winters drive heating, and for homes with electric heat, heat pumps, or electric backup, the coldest months can rival the summer peak. The result is a usage curve with two humps, not the single summer spike a Sun Belt state sees.
That seasonality is a usage story, not a rate one. Your supply rate does not climb in August; your kilowatt-hours do. The same logic from the usage table applies: a home that drifts from 800 kWh in a mild month to 1,600 kWh in a heat wave or a cold snap is not being overcharged, it is running more electricity through the same rate. The fix for a seasonal spike lives on the usage side, which is exactly why an annual average is a poor guide to any single month's bill.
What actually drives your bill: usage, rate, and the supply/delivery split
An Ohio bill has two levers. The first is usage, the kilowatt-hours themselves, which is what the table above turns. The second is the rate, the price per kilowatt-hour. Ohio is unremarkable on both: at 15.99 cents per kWh in 2024 (EIA) it sat just under the national 16.48, and its 846 kWh of usage came in a little below the national 863. Neither lever is extreme, which is why the bill lands close to, and slightly under, the national line.
The rate itself splits into supply and delivery, and here the proportion matters. The supply portion — the part you can actually shop, measured by what Ohio calls the Price to Compare — is the larger share. Across Ohio's utilities the Price to Compare runs about 10 to 11 cents per kWh as of June 2026, and delivery plus riders make up the rest, landing the all-in price in the neighborhood of 16 cents. So supply is roughly 60 percent of the rate and delivery roughly 40 percent, not the other way around.
Two honest caveats on that split. The 15.99-cent all-in figure is EIA's 2024 annual average, while the Price to Compare figures are the June 2026 benchmark, so the two come from different years; treat the 60/40 shape as approximate, not exact arithmetic you can subtract one from the other. And the Price to Compare is supply only. It does not include the delivery charge your utility sets, which is the part of your bill no supplier can touch.
The part you can shop, and the part you can't
Here is the wedge most Ohio households miss. The delivery portion of your rate is set by your utility, and you do not choose your utility. Your address assigns it: AEP Ohio across the Columbus area and much of central and southern Ohio, Duke Energy Ohio around Cincinnati, AES Ohio around Dayton, and the three FirstEnergy companies — Ohio Edison, the Illuminating Company, and Toledo Edison — across the north and east. You cannot switch utilities, and you cannot negotiate delivery. That part of the bill is fixed for you.
The supply portion is different. Ohio is a deregulated electricity market, which means you can choose who generates your power even though you cannot choose who delivers it. If you have never made that choice, you are on your utility's default supply, and the rate to beat is that utility's Price to Compare. Ohio works differently from a state like Pennsylvania here: there is no single statewide Price to Compare. Each utility runs its own competitive auction for default supply and posts its own number. As of the June 2026 cycle, that benchmark is about 10.12 cents per kWh for AEP Ohio, the state's largest utility, and roughly 10.7 to 11.1 cents across Duke Energy Ohio, AES Ohio, and the three FirstEnergy companies. You can find your own utility's figure on your bill and compare offers against it on the state's official Apples to Apples comparison, and our guide to how energy choice works in Ohio explains the mechanics.
Be clear about what shopping does and does not do. A lower supply rate reduces the price per kWh on the supply portion of your bill only. It does not touch delivery, and it does not change how many kilowatt-hours you use. A cheaper plan on a 1,500-kWh winter home still produces a large bill, just a smaller one than the same usage at a higher supply rate. So the honest play is both levers: trim usage where you can, and make sure the supply rate you are paying is not above your utility's Price to Compare. To start shopping for your address, see the Ohio electricity switching guide, and to translate a rate into a dollar figure for your specific home, run the electricity cost calculator.
How Ohio compares to the national average
Putting the three numbers side by side makes the pattern obvious. As of 2024 (EIA), Ohio averaged $135.16 a month against the U.S. $142.26, used 846 kWh against the national 863, and paid 15.99 cents per kWh against 16.48 nationally.
In one line: Ohio is a modestly-below-average state on every measure. It does not have a cheap-power story like a hydro-rich state, and it does not have a high-usage story like the air-conditioned Sun Belt. The amount used is a little below average, the rate is a little below average, and the bill follows them down to about 5 percent under the national figure. That makes Ohio different from its neighbor Pennsylvania, where a higher-than-average rate pushes the bill up, and from Texas, where heavy summer usage does. If you want to see where Ohio sits in the national picture, our average electric bill by state guide ranks all fifty.
FAQ
What's the average electric bill in Ohio?
The average residential electric bill in Ohio was about $135.16 a month as of 2024, according to the EIA, based on roughly 846 kWh of usage at an all-in rate of 15.99 cents per kWh. That is a little below the U.S. average of $142.26 for the same year. Keep in mind it is a statewide average that masks wide variation by home size, season, and the supply rate you are on, so your own bill can land well above or below it.
Why is my electric bill higher than average?
Usually one of two reasons, and they call for different fixes. The first is usage: a larger home, electric heat, or a hot, humid summer can push your kilowatt-hours well above the state's 846-kWh average, and more usage means a bigger bill at any rate. The second is your rate: if you are on a competitive supply plan that sits above your utility's Price to Compare, or a variable rate that has climbed, you are paying more per kWh than you need to. This only applies to the supply portion of your bill; the delivery charge is set by your utility and is the same whether or not you shop. Our guide on why your electric bill is so high breaks down both sides.
How much can I save by switching suppliers in Ohio?
It depends on the gap between your current supply rate and the best available plan, and on how much you use, but be precise about what switching changes. Shopping lowers the price per kWh on the supply portion only, which is the part your utility's Price to Compare measures — roughly 10 to 11 cents per kWh across Ohio utilities as of June 2026, and about 10.12 cents for AEP Ohio. It does not lower your delivery charge, which the utility sets, and it does not reduce your usage. So the savings are real but bounded: they come from beating your Price to Compare, not your whole bill. To estimate the dollar impact for your home, compare offers against your utility's Price to Compare on Apples to Apples and run the numbers in the electricity cost calculator.