🔗The Referral Code
Octopus doesn't issue promo codes you type into a box. Every customer gets a unique referral link with a randomly generated name — ours is nimble-wombat-490 — and the referral is carried by the link itself.
That distinction matters more than it sounds, because it's where most people lose the £50. They arrive at the Octopus sign-up form looking for a “referral code” field, can't find one, conclude the offer must be fake or expired, and complete the application anyway. The credit never attaches, and it cannot be added afterwards.
💷What You Get
The £50 isn't divided. You receive £50 as the person joining, and the person who referred you receives £50 as well — Octopus funds both halves. That's worth stating plainly because a lot of pages describe it as “£50 each” in a way that reads as though someone is giving up half of something.
It arrives as account credit, not cash. It offsets your energy bills until it's used up. If you close your account in credit, the balance is refundable like any other credit on the account.
📝How to Use It
Follow the referral link
Click through to share.octopus.energy. The referral is attached at this point — don't open octopus.energy separately in another tab and start there.
Get a quote
Enter your postcode and roughly how much energy you use. If you don't know, a recent bill or an estimate based on your home's size is fine — it only shapes the quote, not what you eventually pay.
Complete the application in the same session
Address, current supplier, bank details for the Direct Debit. Don't clear cookies or switch browsers partway through; that's what breaks the tracking.
Wait for the first Direct Debit
Your switch completes in around two to three weeks. The £50 is applied automatically after your first payment is taken.
⏱️When the Credit Arrives
The credit is applied after your first Direct Debit has been taken — in practice two to four weeks after the switch completes, so allow around a month to six weeks from signing up. It appears on your account as a credit line, visible in the app and on your first or second statement.
If it hasn't appeared six weeks after your first payment, contact Octopus directly rather than us. They can trace whether a referral was attached to your account at sign-up, and that's something only they can see. Their customer service is the part of the business that wins the awards — you'll usually get a person.
✔️Who Qualifies
You qualify if…
- You're joining Octopus as a new customer
- You started the application from a referral link
- Your household hasn't claimed a switching offer before
- You complete the switch and your first payment goes through
You don't if…
- You switched via a price comparison website
- You're already an Octopus customer
- Your household has already used a switching offer
- You started the application without following a referral link
The comparison-site exclusion catches the most people. Octopus already pays a commission when you arrive via a comparison service, so the referral scheme doesn't stack on top. If you've been researching on a comparison site, close it and start fresh from a referral link.
Terms are set by Octopus Energy and can change. Ours reflects the scheme as it stands in August 2026 — check the current terms on Octopus Energy's own refer-a-friend terms before relying on any detail here.
🏢Business and Charity — £75
Business and charity customers get £75 rather than £50, through the same mechanism — a referral link, credit applied after the first payment. The eligibility rules work the same way, including the comparison-site exclusion.
Business energy contracts differ from domestic ones in ways that matter well beyond the referral credit: they're not covered by the price cap, they're usually fixed term, and switching windows are tighter. Our Octopus for Business guide covers all of it.
🤝Why This Page Exists
We get £50 too. That's the whole business model.
When you switch through our link, Octopus credits you £50 and credits us £50. We'd rather tell you that up front than have you work it out. It's also why the rest of this site is written the way it is: we have no reason to talk you into the wrong tariff, because the credit is identical whichever one you choose.
What we don't do is pretend Octopus is perfect. Our Octopus Energy review covers the criticisms as well as the awards, and several of our guides will tell you to stay put — if you're mid-fix with a cheap rate elsewhere, or you'd lose a benefit by moving. Read how we make money for the full picture.
Octopus Energy supplies 7.3 million UK households, holds a 4.8/5 rating on Trustpilot from over 800,000 reviews, and has been Which? Recommended for nine consecutive years. Switching takes about five minutes and there are no exit fees on any Octopus tariff, so it's a reversible decision.