GivEnergy Monitor App | Getting Started

Layout of the main screen

Get Connected

Unless the app has managed to connect automatically to your inverter, on opening the app for the first time, you will be asked to enter the IP address of your Inverter.

If you have followed the Connecting Guide, you should know this address. You will need to enter 4 numbers separated by dots.

Advanced tip: If you have an advanced network and want to enter a hostname rather than numbers, you cannot do it here. Just enter 1, press OK, then go to settings where you can use a full alphanumeric keyboard to change the hostname.

Starting from the top

The green top bar holds the following 4 icons:

Pause / Play - Use this to stop the automatic 10 second refresh of the screen whilst you examine the figures more closely or take a screenshot.
Keep screen on - For when you want the screen to stay on so you can just look at it whenever you need. Best to make sure the device is plugged into a charger!
Settings cog - There is a separate Guide to Settings.
Help - Wherever you see a question mark icon, it means you can press it to see an explanation.

In the centre of the bar, the serial number of your Inverter will be displayed. If you want to share screenshots, there is a privacy option in settings, which you can see being used here.

When the connection with the Inverter fails the serial number will be replaced with NO CONNECTION. When this happens an error is recorded on the line below the bar. The errors are shown as the number of errors and the total cycles as a fraction. If the error rate is less than 1%, as shown here, all is well. An error rate over 10% needs investigation!

Speed shows how quickly the Inverter is responding. Between 200ms and 400ms is normal. A speed less than 200ms or greater than 3000ms, indicates that the IP Address is wrong or some fault with your network. A speed around 1500ms indicates a problem with your Inverter or Dongle.

The Circle of Power

If there is no circle, it either means there is no connection to your Inverter, or no power is being generated or used.

Normally however, the circle shows how much power is being generated and used. Power coming in is on the left, in this case Solar (yellow), and power going out is on the right. Most of the power is charging the battery (blue), a small amount is lost as heat by the Inverter (orange), and the appliances in the house are consuming power (green).

Because the circle only shows proportions, a bar across the centre shows the absolute total power flowing in your home.

The Legend

Below (or to the side in landscape orientation) the circle of power is a legend showing the values used to create the circle of power.

If you have a Hybrid Inverter, the Solar line will show 2 readings representing the 2 strings of panels. I have 14 panels, wired as 2 identical strings of 7. The fact that both readings are essentially the same, tells me that all my panels are working correctly.

Grid voltage is worth checking because if it goes too high, your Inverter will stop operating.

Battery charge percentage is not always accurate; use the voltage as a second check. If the voltage is below 48V, your battery doesn't have much charge left. Battery voltage is temperature dependant, so the temperature is also shown.

Inverter power consumption varies according to the model of Inverter. The figure shown is about right for my Gen1 3.6 Hybrid, however don't assume that it is accurate for yours. Take all the figures as a guide only.

The Battery Bar

Near the bottom of the screen is the battery bar which shows graphically the battery percentage. Using the battery capacity and target time, which are both set in settings, combined with the current percentage and (dis)charge rate, an estimate of the time when full or empty is calculated.

This can be useful during the day to adjust the charge rate to avoid clipping generation (Hybrid Inverters only). And during the evening it can be used to forecast if the battery will last until the start of a cheap(er) overnight tariff.

Finally, an additional icon bar is shown if the COLLECT STATS option is enabled in settings. There are 5 icons:

A circle to return to the main screen.
A graph of recent data at one minute intervals.
A data table of recent one-minute data
A calendar icon to access longer term graphs and data tables.
A battery icon, to access detailed battery data. The same data can also be accessed by tapping the battery bar.