Average Electric Bill in North Dakota
Residential · 12-month average, September 2025 – August 2026.
That works out to about $1,596 a year. Among the 50 states and DC, North Dakota has the 37th highest average residential bill.
Data current through August 2026 — the latest available from the U.S. EIA, which publishes monthly figures on a roughly two-month delay.
What makes up the bill
Price × usage = bill, exactly: 12.35¢/kWh × 1,077 kWh ≈ $133. A state can land high on either factor — North Dakota pays below the national rate but uses much more power than average.
Compared with nearby states
| North Dakota | $133 | |
|---|---|---|
| U.S. average | $158 | |
| South Dakota | $141 | |
| Minnesota | $121 | |
| Montana | $115 |
North Dakota is $25 a month below (-16.0%) the U.S. average of $158. Neighboring states share fuel mixes, weather, and often a grid operator, which makes them a closer benchmark than the national average.
Trend since 2008
Each point is a trailing 12-month average, which strips out the summer/winter swing and leaves the underlying trend. Bills start in January 2008 because that is when EIA began reporting customer counts.
Seasonal swing
- Highest month
- $172
- January 2026
- Lowest month
- $107
- October 2025
- Swing
- $65
- peak minus low
- Latest month
- $130
- August 2026
Actual bills are far from flat: North Dakota peaks in January 2026 and bottoms out in October 2025. The headline figure above is the average across all twelve months.
North Dakota electricity bills in context
The average monthly electricity bill in North Dakota is $133, the 37th most expensive of the 50 states and DC. This falls well below the national average of $158, putting North Dakota 16% cheaper than the country as a whole. The state achieves this lower bill despite using more electricity than average—1,077 kWh per month against a national average of 876 kWh—because its price of 12.35¢/kWh is substantially lower than the national rate of 18.07¢/kWh. The low rate more than offsets the higher usage.
Over the past year, the average bill has risen from $123 to $133, an increase of 7.8%. Looking back further, the bill has climbed 17.8% since August 2021 and 58.9% since December 2008. Seasonal swings are pronounced: the bill peaks in January 2026 at $172 and falls to its lowest in October 2025 at $107, a swing of $65 around the twelve-month average.
Among North Dakota's neighbors, the bill sits between Minnesota at $121 and South Dakota at $141, while Montana's $115 is the lowest of the four.
Written from the EIA figures on this page, covering data through August 2026.
Frequently asked questions
›How much is the average electric bill in North Dakota?
›Is the electric bill in North Dakota higher than the national average?
›Why is electricity relatively cheap in North Dakota?
›When is the electric bill highest in North Dakota?
›How does North Dakota compare with neighboring states?
How this is calculated
EIA’s retail-sales dataset reports, for every state and month, total residential revenue and the number of residential customers served. The average monthly bill is simply the first divided by the second — total spending across all households, spread evenly over all accounts.
bill = revenue ÷ customers · averaged over 12 months (September 2025 – August 2026)
Two caveats worth knowing. It is an average, so it blends apartments with large houses — a typical household in North Dakota may pay well above or below $133. And it counts what was actually billed for electricity, including fixed service charges, so it is not the same as multiplying your own usage by the advertised rate.
Looking for the rate rather than the bill? See North Dakota electricity prices by sector.