Finn's Bytewatt Neovolt Batteries Review & Verdict
Finn Peacock has been a Chartered Electrical Engineer since 1998, and is ex-CSIRO
Advertised at up to nearly a third cheaper than some equivalent capacity and better-known battery brands, the Bytewatt Neovolt (also branded as VoltX Neovolt Ecopulse in Australia) will be a tempting option for budget-conscious buyers.
But the thing about batteries is - you really want good local support and warranty service. Of all the big purchases you’ll buy for your home, a home battery has the most potential to require support and reconfiguration down the line.
Want to connect to a VPP or Amber style service? You’ll need local support.
Suspicious that you are not getting the kWhs you paid for? You’ll need local support.
So if you can find a good local installer that will put their reputation behind this battery - it may be worth consideration. All I could find was online offers from companies I’d never heard of.
Bytewatt Neovolt Batteries: Pros & Cons
- One of the more affordable all-in-one battery systems
- Fast switchover time in a blackout - 20ms
- Can be charged by solar panels during a blackout
- Comparatively short product warranty - 5 years.
About Bytewatt Neovolt
China's Bytewatt claims 10 years of experience in inverter technology and 15 years in developing uninterruptible power supply (UPS) tech. This background has culminated in the Neovolt battery system; which may be branded as VoltX Neovolt in Australia.
Australian Contact Details
Bytewatt lists VoltX Energy as its Australian distribution partner, and VoltX's contact details are:
Address: 391c Park Rd, Regents Park NSW 2143
Phone: (02) 9052 7172
Email: [email protected]
Website
Bytewatt also have their own Australian presence:
Address: 8/275 Annangrove Rd Rouse Hill NSW 2155
Phone: 1300 901 706
Email: [email protected]
Australian website
Company Info - Bytewatt
There's not a lot of information available about Bytewatt. We know that their headquarters are in Wuzhong District, Suzhou, China. As noted above, the company has established an office here in Australia and lists two warehouse locations, one in Sydney's Regents Park that has the same address as VoltX, and another in Fairfield East.
Company Info - VoltX Energy
In 2009 "a group of mates" started selling portable generators. In 2012, they added off-grid alternative energy product online sales. The VoltX brand was introduced in 2018 and VoltX Energy in 2022, marking its entry into the home battery system business. VoltX Energy is listed as an official Bytewatt partner and states it is the only Australian distributor of Neovolt.
About The Neovolt
Whether branded VoltX or not, the Neovolt battery has the same specifications and is also called the Neovolt Ecopulse.
The Neovolt is a single-phase all-in-one system, combining battery and hybrid inverter. It's a 10.1kWh battery (9.6kWh usable capacity) based on Lithium Ferro Phosphate (LFP/LiFePO4) chemistry with the choice of two inverter capacities - 3.6kW (BW-INV-SPH3.6K) and 5kW (BW-INV-SPH5K). The Neovolt can provide surge backup power of 7.36kW or 10kW depending on the inverter model in use, and up to 6 systems can be linked in parallel.
Other Neovolt Ecopulse Specifications
- Battery dimensions and weight: 590 × 750 × 205mm and 90kg
- Inverter unit dimensions and weight: 590 × 405 × 205mm and 18 - 19.5 kg
- Inverter operating temperature range: -20~60C
- MPPTs: 2
- Battery operating temperature range - Charge: 0C - 50C / Discharge: -10C - 50C
- Natural cooling, no internal fans
- Max 10 kW PV input (5kW inverter)
- Can operate during a blackout, supplying power to selected circuits (which may be an optional extra) - 20ms switchover time
- Solar panels can continue charging battery during a blackout.
- IP65 rated
You can compare Neovolt specifications with other home energy storage systems on SQ's solar battery comparison table.
Neovolt Warranty Details
Bytewatt provides a standard product warranty of 60 months (5 years). The company also warrants that the Neovolt will retain at least eighty percent (80%) of its usable capacity for 120 months (10 years) . Among the preconditions of the performance warranty are that the ambient temperature during operation does not fall below -10 °C or exceed 50 °C. Additionally, the throughput energy per kWh must be less than 3MWh.
Being a new-ish battery for Australia, we're keen to read reviews from local customers who have taken the plunge and installed a Neovolt.
Images from customers
Bytewatt Neovolt has no solar batteries in our database
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Bytewatt Neovolt Reviews (2)
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08 November 2024
11 November 2024
The battery has been installed for over 3 weeks now and its fantastic i have not touched the grid since installation and the App that you install is so easy to use and understand, I am easily able to monitor the usage and the charging rate of the battery.
Very good experience
Let's say we took a little bit of a leap of faith by buying a Neovolt Battery from Voltx. The price made it excellent value. It was very hard to say no. We could purchase two Neovolts for less than the price of one Tesla battery (for example), and we will have close to 20kWh of storage. We knew that the battery was new to the market.
So far, all is going well. It's doing everything as advertised. Our battery does not cover our energy needs for the full night. We use it to protect us from peak and shoulder prices. It is successfully achieving this, with some tuning done in the Neovolt app. The app allows us to set when the battery discharges.
We also purchased the optional backup switchover that you mentioned in your article, Finn. It has not been used "in anger" as yet. But when we tested it by flicking off the main switch, it kept alive the 3 circuits we have backup - no problems.
If there was one thing to improve, it would be its slowish response to a heavy load (additional 3000W+). I am not sure if this is normal for batteries, as it is our first one. It will let some grid consumption through whilst it is ramping up to cover the load. This has been confirmed on our retailer app. Solar analytics also sees the micro consumption from our "Catch". It has worked out to be cents on our bill so far. It's not a big concern for us.
Overall we are very happy with our purchase and are considering buying a second battery to give us some more storage.