2025 Residential
29.46¢/kWh
+70.3% vs US avg
Rhode Island residential electricity costs 29.46¢/kWh in 2025
According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration retail-sales series (2025 annual frequency), residential electricity in Rhode Island costs 29.46¢/kWh, 70.3% above the national average. Since 2016, the rate has changed +58.2%.
Where Rhode Island sits: according to EIA's annual retail-sales series, its residential rate changed +58.2% between 2016 and 2025, the 5th steepest of 51 jurisdictions (the 50 states and the District of Columbia), a steeper move than 92% of the other 50. Ranked on the same 2016 to 2025 window for every state; see the methodology.
Trajectory peers
Which states followed a similar residential price path?
Each state begins at an index of 100 in 2016; the comparison then measures how closely its annual path follows Rhode Island through 2025. This compares the shape of the EIA series, not the price level, and does not claim that two states share the same market or causes.
Closest path shapes
Nearest matches after each state starts at an index of 100
- Massachusetts +60.4% since 2016
- Connecticut +46.8% since 2016
- New York +50.1% since 2016
- Texas +40.8% since 2016
- District of Columbia +78.5% since 2016
- Hawaii +47.8% since 2016
- Florida +38.8% since 2016
- Maine +75.5% since 2016
Other gentler paths
Nearest unused states with a smaller 2016–2025 rise
- Indiana +37.7% since 2016
- Oregon +44.2% since 2016
- New Hampshire +33.6% since 2016
- Mississippi +34.0% since 2016
- Illinois +41.1% since 2016
- Virginia +34.5% since 2016
Calculated from 51 jurisdictions covering the complete 2016–2025 annual window. Directional lists exclude states already shown as the closest matches, so every name appears once.
Reading the Rhode Island Price Trend
According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration's retail-sales series, RateWatt currently holds 2,040 annual state-sector records spanning 2016 through 2025. These are statewide annual averages, not individual utility quotes. See the methodology for source scope and refresh cadence.
Rhode Island residential electricity moved from 18.62¢/kWh in 2016 to 29.46¢/kWh in 2025, a cumulative change of +58.2% over 10 reporting years. The more recent five-year window changed +33.8% since 2020; comparing the two windows describes whether the pace changed, but does not establish why. Against the national residential benchmark of 17.30¢/kWh, Rhode Island now sits 70.3% above the U.S. average for 2025.
Commercial customers in Rhode Island paid 23.46¢/kWh in 2025, while industrial customers paid 21.74¢/kWh. Sector differences can reflect customer mix, consumption volume, tariff design, and cost allocation; this statewide series does not identify which factor drives a state's gap. Here the residential-to-industrial multiplier is about 1.4x, one descriptive benchmark for comparison with peer states.
EIA reports 4 generation sources for Rhode Island; ranked by share of generation they run natural gas, solar, wind, petroleum. Of the 11 sources EIA reports somewhere in the country, Rhode Island records no generation from biomass, coal, geothermal, hydro, nuclear, other or pumped storage. That is an absence in the published series, not a statement that no such capacity exists. This price series and that generation series are published separately and are not joined here, so nothing on this page attributes a price movement to a fuel mix. Adjacent entries in the alphabetical state browser are Pennsylvania and South Carolina; their pages carry the same series on the same basis. EIA publishes the annual series once per year and revises prior years without renumbering them, so a figure here can change when a later release restates it.
The annual figure hides a 23% swing across the year
Every price above this point is an annual average. EIA's monthly series for Rhode Island shows those years are not flat: averaged across the monthly record, July settles near 25.42¢/kWh and November near 32.07¢/kWh, a spread of 23.3% around the state's own monthly mean. That puts Rhode Island among the 7 of 51 states whose within-year range exceeds a fifth of their average. For a state in this group the annual number is a summary of a wide year rather than a figure any single month sat on.
Within-year profile computed from 36 monthly observations across 3 complete calendar years in EIA's residential series (monthly data begins 2023-01). Partial calendar years are excluded so a newer partial tail cannot bias January–May against later months. Peak and trough are the highest and lowest month averages across that record, not a forecast; the spread is quoted against this state's own monthly mean.
How often the rate has actually fallen
The climb has one interruption: across 9 year-on-year steps, Rhode Island's residential rate fell exactly once, in 2017, by 0.30¢. Every other step was upward.
One of the steadiest price paths in the country
Rhode Island is in the quarter of states whose recent five years most closely match their own long-run pace: about 6.0% a year lately against 5.2% a year across the full record, a difference of just 0.8%. The published series describes that relative steadiness but does not identify its cause.
Both figures are compound annual rates over EIA's published residential series, so the five-year and full-record windows are directly comparable; the national comparison ranks all 51 states and DC on the same measure. Annual state-level averages, not individual bills.
2025 Rate
29.46¢/kWh
vs National Avg
+70.3%
5-Year Change
+33.8%
Since 2016
+58.2%
Price Trends, Rhode Island vs National Average
Annual Average Prices
| Year | Residential | US Avg |
|---|---|---|
| 2025 | 29.46¢/kWh +2.8% | 17.30¢/kWh |
| 2024 | 28.65¢/kWh +6.0% | 16.48¢/kWh |
| 2023 | 27.02¢/kWh +16.4% | 16.00¢/kWh |
| 2022 | 23.21¢/kWh +4.1% | 15.04¢/kWh |
| 2021 | 22.30¢/kWh +1.3% | 13.66¢/kWh |
| 2020 | 22.01¢/kWh +1.3% | 13.15¢/kWh |
| 2019 | 21.73¢/kWh +5.7% | 13.01¢/kWh |
| 2018 | 20.55¢/kWh +12.2% | 12.87¢/kWh |
| 2017 | 18.32¢/kWh -1.6% | 12.89¢/kWh |
| 2016 | 18.62¢/kWh | 12.55¢/kWh |
Provider record
Largest bundled residential providers EIA reports for Rhode Island
EIA-861 table 6 lists 8 reporting entities here for 2024, ordered by residential customer count. A provider's appearance is not evidence that it serves every address or that a household can choose it.
| Provider | Ownership | Residential customers | EIA average price |
|---|---|---|---|
| The Narragansett Electric Co | Investor Owned | 332,540 | 28.26¢/kWh |
| Pascoag Utility District | Municipal | 4,373 | 16.52¢/kWh |
| Sunrun Inc. | Behind the Meter | 3,252 | 26.92¢/kWh |
| Sunnova | Behind the Meter | 2,246 | 22.75¢/kWh |
| Block Island Utility District | Political Subdivision | 1,629 | 39.66¢/kWh |
| Tesla Inc. | Behind the Meter | 95 | 22.31¢/kWh |
| EverBright, LLC | Behind the Meter | 81 | 20.80¢/kWh |
| Palmetto Solar, LLC | Behind the Meter | 2 | 56.43¢/kWh |
“Average price” is EIA's reported residential revenue divided by sales, not a tariff, plan offer, or bill quote. Source: EIA Electric Sales, Revenue, and Average Price, table 6.
Frequently Asked Questions
Are electricity prices going up in Rhode Island? ▼
How does Rhode Island's electricity price compare to the national average? ▼
What do businesses pay for electricity in Rhode Island? ▼
Where does this price trend data come from? ▼
Energy Guides
Where Rhode Island's figures come from
Data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration. Prices in cents per kilowatt-hour (kWh). Annual averages.
Related
Read our methodology , how this data is sourced, computed, and verified.