ECO4 Scheme 2026: Who Qualifies Before It Ends

ECO4 in 2026: The Short Version

ECO4 got a 9-month extension, and that leaves 1 deadline that matters more than anything else: 31 December 2026. Here's where each scheme stood on October 29, 2026, from the official pages.

According to the DESNZ government response published in January 2026, ECO4 was extended "to allow suppliers additional time to meet existing targets and remediate non-compliant installations". The same document says there'll be no increase in targets and no carry-over into a future scheme, because there won't be one. As announced in the November 2025 Budget, the government instead put an extra £1.5 billion of grant funding into the Warm Homes Plan for low-income households.

That's the honest backdrop: ECO4 isn't winding down gently with spare money left over. Suppliers are finishing targets they've largely met, and fixing faulty work. Read the rest of this guide with that in mind.

Who Qualifies for ECO4, and Who Doesn't

There are 2 routes in: the benefits route (called Help to Heat) and the council route (ECO4 Flex). Both need a home that actually needs upgrading, and the owner's permission if you rent.

The benefits route. According to Ofgem's homeowners and tenants page, you could be eligible if someone in the household receives at least one of these 8 benefits:

• Child Benefit
• Pension Guarantee Credit
• Pension Credit Savings Credit
• Income-related Employment and Support Allowance (ESA)
• Income-based Jobseeker's Allowance (JSA)
• Income Support
• Universal Credit
• Housing Benefit

The home's energy rating. The GOV.UK Energy Company Obligation page (opens in a new tab) says an owner-occupied home must have an Energy Performance Certificate (EPC) rating of D, E, F or G, and a privately rented home E, F or G. Social housing tenants in E, F or G homes may get insulation or first-time central heating. You can look up your rating on the GOV.UK energy certificate register (opens in a new tab).

The council route (ECO4 Flex). Councils and the Scottish and Welsh governments can refer households that don't get a qualifying benefit. Ofgem says you could be eligible through Flex if your home needs upgrading and either your combined gross household income is under £31,000, or someone in the home has a severe or long-term health condition made worse by the cold: a cardiovascular condition, a respiratory disease, limited mobility or immunosuppression. Councils can use other criteria too, so check your council's own page. Suppliers can also refer customers who are stuck in fuel debt or keep running out of prepayment credit.

Who shouldn't count on it:

• Anyone in Northern Ireland. ECO covers Great Britain only. See NI Direct's energy saving grants page (opens in a new tab) instead.
• Owners of B or C rated homes on the benefits route, and private tenants in D rated homes, per the GOV.UK rating rules.
• Tenants without the landlord's written permission. Ofgem says you must own your home or have permission from your landlord, including a social landlord or management company.
• Households hoping to combine ECO4 with another grant on the same job. Ofgem says ECO4 funding can't be blended with other government schemes such as the Warm Home Discount, the Boiler Upgrade Scheme or the Home Upgrade Grant; other work has to happen before the ECO4 project starts or after it's finished.

The single most common misunderstanding: qualifying doesn't mean you'll get anything. Ofgem says plainly that "eligibility for ECO doesn't necessarily mean that an energy supplier or installer will decide to install energy efficiency measures in your home".

What ECO4 Pays For: Grantsights Analysis of 1,043,846 Measures

ECO4 isn't a cash grant. It pays installers, through your energy supplier, to fit specific measures after a retrofit assessment of your home. Grantsights analysis of DESNZ's June 2026 statistics (Table 1.6, ECO4 measures by type, April 2022 to April 2026) shows what actually got installed.

Source: DESNZ, Household Energy Efficiency Statistics, headline release June 2026, Table 1.6. Includes ECO3 measures re-elected to ECO4 and ECO3 Interim measures. Provisional.

Those measures went into 306,624 homes, so the typical ECO4 home got about 3 measures as a package. That fits the "whole house" design: a heat pump or boiler usually arrives with insulation and controls, not on its own.

Two things stand out. First, a "free boiler" is a smaller slice than the adverts suggest: boilers and central heating were under 10% of measures, and replacements of broken boilers were just 4,079 of more than a million measures. Second, solid wall insulation, the riskiest measure on the list, made up 8.5% of installs, which matters for the quality problems covered below.

What it cost the scheme. DESNZ's Table 5.3 puts the average cost of ECO4 Affordable Warmth delivery at £21.13 for every £1 of annual bill saving, as reported by suppliers to March 2026. Table 2.3 shows suppliers had notified £238.2 million of annual bill savings by the end of April 2026, against a total ECO4 target of £224.3 million. Those notified figures include measures Ofgem hasn't yet approved, and each supplier has its own target, but the direction is clear: as a group, suppliers are close to or past the finish line.

Where ECO4 Went: Grantsights Analysis by Nation and Region

Your chances have always depended partly on where you live: Wales, with about 5% of Great Britain's households, received 12.4% of the measures. Grantsights analysis of DESNZ's Table 3.3 adds up every ECO measure installed in each nation and English region from April 2022 to March 2026 (the ECO4 period) and compares it with the number of households there.

Source: DESNZ, Household Energy Efficiency Statistics, headline release June 2026, Table 3.3 (regional table last updated May 28, 2026); household counts are the table's own mid-2025 projections. Covers all ECO measures installed in the period, which is almost entirely ECO4 and ECO3 Interim.

Wales received ECO4 work at roughly 8 times the rate of the South East, per household. The likely reasons are older, harder-to-heat housing, more off-gas homes and lower incomes, though the statistics don't break that down. If you're in London or the South East, you're in the regions suppliers reached least.

The timeline is the bigger story. Quarterly installs across Great Britain peaked at 95,680 in January to March 2024, held at 63,340 in October to December 2025, then fell to 30,321 in January to March 2026. Counted by the month a home got its first ECO4 measure (Table 1.2), the scheme reached 74,727 new homes in April 2023 to March 2024, 75,704 the following year and 62,957 in April 2025 to March 2026. Monthly first-time homes dropped from 6,802 in October 2025 to 1,215 in March 2026. Some of that fall will be revised away as late notifications arrive, but not all of it.

How to Ask for ECO4 Before 31 December 2026

If you think you qualify, here are the 6 steps the official pages describe, in order. None of them costs anything.

1. Check your EPC rating on the GOV.UK register (opens in a new tab). If your home has no certificate, an assessor can rate it, but don't pay a stranger for one on the promise of ECO4 work.
2. Check your council's page. GOV.UK says to contact your local council (opens in a new tab) to see if it's taking part. This matters most if you don't get a benefit and need an ECO4 Flex referral.
3. Contact a supplier directly. Ofgem lists 12 obligated suppliers: British Gas, E (Gas and Electricity), E.ON, Ecotricity, EDF, Octopus Energy, Outfox the Market, OVO, ScottishPower, So Energy, Utility Warehouse and Utilita. Ofgem says you can get help from any of them while staying with your current supplier.
4. Get the retrofit assessment and a written contract. Ofgem says the measures are decided by a retrofit assessment, and you should only agree to ECO measures once you've received a contract.
5. Compare offers. If a company asks for a contribution, Ofgem encourages you to shop around, and you don't have to sign anything you don't think suits your home.
6. Expect a hard stop. Measures have to be installed before the scheme ends on 31 December 2026. A heat pump or solid wall job that starts in late autumn may not finish in time, so ask the installer directly whether they can complete before the deadline, and get the answer in writing.

Realistic timing. No official page publishes an average wait from enquiry to install. With about 9 weeks left at the time of writing, and suppliers close to their targets, the honest expectation is that many installers won't take on a new whole-house job. A quick "no" isn't a judgement on your eligibility.

What Ofgem Doesn't Tell You About ECO4

Ofgem's pages explain the rules well. What they don't say outright is what those rules mean for a household asking in late 2026, when suppliers' notified savings already stand at 106% of the scheme's total target.

"Eligible" and "funded" are different things. Ofgem describes ECO as "not a grant scheme". Suppliers choose which homes and measures to fund, and how much. A supplier that has met its target has little reason to take on more work, and the notified savings (£238.2 million against a £224.3 million total target) suggest many are there.

The adverts outlived GBIS. GBIS closed on 31 March 2026, yet "free insulation" adverts still use its name. Any offer described as a Great British Insulation Scheme job today is a red flag unless it's finishing work you'd already agreed before April.

Contributions are normal, but not fixed. Ofgem says it doesn't comment on the scale or cost of consumer contributions. So there's no official "fair price", which is why comparing written quotes matters more here than with most grants.

ECO4 has a quality problem, and it's documented. A case in point: the National Audit Office's October 2025 report, Energy efficiency installations under the Energy Company Obligation (opens in a new tab), estimated that 98% of homes with external wall insulation under ECO4 and GBIS had major issues needing repair (22,000 to 23,000 homes), and 29% of homes with internal wall insulation (9,000 to 13,000 homes). If you're offered solid wall insulation this late, ask who'll inspect it and what the guarantee covers before you sign.

Your landlord's permission is the step tenants underestimate. Without it, nothing happens, and a landlord can say no. Get it in writing before an assessor visits.

ECO4 Scams and Cold Callers: How to Check an Offer

These searches attract cold callers, and some are dishonest. The official guidance comes down to 5 rules:

• Check the company yourself. GOV.UK says installers or agents might contact you directly, and if you're not sure an offer is genuine, contact your local council or the energy supplier they say they represent. Use a phone number from Ofgem's supplier list or your bill, never one the caller gives you.
• Don't hand over personal or bank details to an unexpected caller. Citizens Advice (opens in a new tab) warns that scammers pretend to be from energy companies or government departments to get personal information, and says not to use contact details or links they send.
• No contract, no work. Ofgem says only agree to ECO measures once you've received a contract, and you don't have to sign anything you don't consider suitable.
• Remediation is free. For faulty wall insulation, the GOV.UK guidance on poor quality wall insulation (opens in a new tab) says you shouldn't be asked to pay for the fix, and every genuine contact (Ofgem, TrustMark or a certification body) will quote your Unique Measure Reference from your letter.
• Report fraud. Ofgem's counter fraud page (opens in a new tab) describes its investigations into dishonest claims on the schemes it runs, and points consumers with disputes to Citizens Advice on 0345 404 0506.

If you've already had work done and you're unhappy, follow Ofgem's ECO4 complaints process (opens in a new tab) or the TrustMark route GOV.UK describes. For external wall insulation worries, Ofgem's freephone is 0808 169 4447, Monday to Friday, 9:30am to 4:30pm.

The Great British Insulation Scheme: What Happened and What's Left

GBIS ran for 3 years, from April 2023 to 31 March 2026, and won't be extended. According to Ofgem, it was open to low-income households and also to a general group living in homes rated EPC D to G within Council Tax bands A to D in England and A to E in Scotland and Wales, which made it the scheme for people who didn't qualify for ECO4.

The government's Great British Insulation Scheme release of June 2026 (opens in a new tab) gives the final provisional picture:

Source: DESNZ, Great British Insulation Scheme statistics, June 2026 (provisional). "Other measures" is the remainder of the published total.

Those 139,100 measures went to 100,900 households. Around 74,200 measures (53%) went to the low-income group, and the North West and West Midlands each took 15% of measures, followed by the North East at 13%. DESNZ says at least one more release will follow with final revisions.

One official source disagrees with another. The GOV.UK Great British Insulation Scheme page (opens in a new tab) still says "some energy suppliers are however still accepting applications", alongside the line that installations had to be complete by 31 March 2026. Ofgem's scheme page, which says the scheme "is now closed to new installations", is the clearer statement, and the January 2026 government response confirms GBIS ended as planned. Treat GBIS as closed.

If ECO4 Says No: Other Help in Each Nation

ECO4's end doesn't leave nothing, but the alternatives are run differently in each nation, and the fastest of them, England's council-run grant, usually makes contact within 2 weeks.

• England: the Warm Homes: Local Grant (opens in a new tab) is a council-run grant for privately owned homes rated EPC D to G. GOV.UK says household income must usually be £36,000 a year or less (with exceptions for some postcodes and benefits), work is free if you qualify, and councils usually get in touch within 10 working days. It depends on your council having funding.
• England and Wales, any income: the Boiler Upgrade Scheme (opens in a new tab) gives £7,500 towards an air source or ground source heat pump (£9,000 until March 2027 if your home is heated by oil or LPG and has no mains gas connection), £5,000 towards a biomass boiler and £2,500 towards an air-to-air heat pump, through an MCS certified installer. See our Boiler Upgrade Scheme guide for what's changed in 2026. It isn't means-tested, but you pay the rest.
• Wales: the Welsh Government's Nest scheme (opens in a new tab) offers free advice and, for eligible households, free improvements such as insulation, heat pumps and solar panels. Call 0808 808 2244.
• Scotland: Home Energy Scotland (opens in a new tab) runs Warmer Homes Scotland, which says it offers support worth £10,000 or more for eligible homeowners and private tenants.
• Help with bills rather than upgrades: the £150 Warm Home Discount is separate from ECO4 and usually automatic. Our Warm Home Discount guide explains who gets it this winter.

If someone in your home is disabled and needs adaptations such as a level-access shower alongside heating work, a council grant is a better fit than ECO4; see our disabled facilities grant guide. Readers in the Republic of Ireland should look at our SEAI grants guide, since ECO doesn't apply there. And ECO4 only covers homes, so a community group hoping to insulate a village hall needs a different source, such as those in our community grants UK guide.

Sources Checked

All sources were read or downloaded on October 29, 2026:

• Ofgem, Energy Company Obligation (ECO) (opens in a new tab), homeowners and tenants (opens in a new tab), ECO supplier contact details (opens in a new tab), Great British Insulation Scheme (opens in a new tab) and counter fraud (opens in a new tab)
• GOV.UK, Help from your energy supplier: the Energy Company Obligation (opens in a new tab), The Great British Insulation Scheme (opens in a new tab) and What to do if you have poor quality wall insulation (opens in a new tab)
• DESNZ, Extending the ECO4 end date: consultation and government response (opens in a new tab) (response published January 23, 2026)
• DESNZ, Household Energy Efficiency Statistics, headline release June 2026 (opens in a new tab), Tables 1.2, 1.6, 2.3, 3.3 and 5.3
• DESNZ, Great British Insulation Scheme release: June 2026 (opens in a new tab)
• National Audit Office, Energy efficiency installations under the Energy Company Obligation (opens in a new tab) (October 14, 2025)
• GOV.UK, Warm Homes: Local Grant (opens in a new tab) and Boiler Upgrade Scheme (opens in a new tab); Welsh Government, Nest (opens in a new tab); Home Energy Scotland, Warmer Homes Scotland (opens in a new tab); NI Direct, energy saving grants (opens in a new tab)
• Citizens Advice, Grants and benefits to help you pay your energy bills (opens in a new tab)