If you swap a gas, oil or LPG boiler for a heat pump in England or Wales, the government will knock a fixed sum off the bill before you pay a penny. That scheme is the Boiler Upgrade Scheme, usually shortened to BUS, and it is the main grant most households use to bring the cost of a heat pump down to something closer to a new boiler. The money goes to your installer, not to you, so the discount is already baked into the quote you sign. This guide covers the grant amounts, who can claim, what has changed in 2026 and the small print that catches people out.
The short answer. The Boiler Upgrade Scheme pays £7,500 towards an air source or ground source heat pump, or £5,000 towards a biomass boiler, for homeowners and small landlords in England and Wales. Your MCS-certified installer applies for you and takes the grant straight off the price. The scheme runs to 2030, and from 21 July 2026 off-gas-grid homes can claim £9,000 instead of £7,500.
Free download
Grab the Home Energy-Saving Checklist
A plain, one-page checklist of the moves that actually cut a UK bill, worked against the current £1,723 Ofgem cap at 26.32p a unit. No fluff, no gadgets to buy. Pop your email in and it lands in your inbox, along with the odd no-nonsense tip.
Free, one click to unsubscribe. The download starts the moment you sign up.
What the Boiler Upgrade Scheme actually pays
The Boiler Upgrade Scheme gives a single fixed grant per property, set by the technology you install rather than by your income or the size of your home. The amounts in 2026 are:
| Technology | Grant | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Air source heat pump | £7,500 | The most common choice |
| Ground source heat pump | £7,500 | Includes water source pumps |
| Air-to-air heat pump | £2,500 | New for 2026, must also provide hot water or meet set conditions |
| Biomass boiler | £5,000 | Rural, off-gas-grid properties only |
Grant amounts from the GOV.UK Boiler Upgrade Scheme guidance, checked June 2026. Always confirm the current figure before you commit.
From 21 July 2026 the government is raising the air and ground source grant to £9,000 for homes that are off the gas grid, meaning those heated by oil or LPG. That uplift is temporary and is expected to last until the end of March 2027. The grant is a flat discount, so it covers a bigger share of a cheaper install than an expensive one. A heat pump quoted at £12,000 leaves you £4,500 to find after a £7,500 grant; the same grant against a £9,000 quote leaves £1,500.
Who can claim it
The scheme is open to homeowners and small landlords in England and Wales. Scotland runs its own equivalent through Home Energy Scotland, so the figures here do not apply north of the border. To qualify you need to tick a short list of boxes:
- You own the property, whether you live in it or rent it out. Most domestic and small non-domestic buildings count.
- You are replacing a fossil fuel system such as a gas, oil or LPG boiler, or replacing direct electric heating. You cannot use it to replace an existing heat pump.
- The new system must be installed by an installer certified by the Microgeneration Certification Scheme, the MCS.
- The heat pump must be sized to meet the full heating and hot water demand of the property, not bolted on alongside the old boiler.
One change worth knowing about in 2026 is that you no longer need a valid Energy Performance Certificate to apply, and there is no longer a hard rule blocking the grant if your EPC recommends loft or cavity wall insulation. Your installer assesses whether the building is suitable as part of the survey. That said, insulation still matters enormously for how cheaply the heat pump runs once it is in. Sorting out loft insulation and draughts first means a smaller, cheaper pump and lower bills, so it is worth doing regardless of what the grant rules now require. If you want to understand how an EPC is put together, that has its own guide.
How to apply, step by step
This is the part that surprises people: you do not apply yourself. The Boiler Upgrade Scheme is installer-led, which means the MCS-certified company doing the work applies to Ofgem on your behalf and the grant is deducted from your quote before you pay. Your job is to find a good installer and check the paperwork. The process runs roughly like this:
- Get quotes from at least two or three MCS-certified installers. Use the MCS website to confirm a firm is genuinely certified rather than taking their word for it.
- The installer carries out a heat loss survey and designs a system sized to your home. A proper survey, not a quick glance, is the single best predictor of whether the heat pump will work well.
- The installer applies to Ofgem for the grant and receives a voucher tied to your property.
- They install the system, you pay the balance after the grant has been taken off, and they redeem the voucher.
Because the discount appears in the quote, the headline numbers you compare between installers already include the grant. Ask each one to show the full price and the grant separately so you can see the true cost of the work. One grant is allowed per property, so you cannot stack it across two installs.
Does it actually make a heat pump cheaper to run
The grant cuts the upfront cost, but the running cost is a separate question and the one that decides whether the switch pays off. A heat pump uses electricity, which at the Ofgem cap is far dearer per unit than gas, so the maths only works because a heat pump delivers roughly three to four units of heat for every unit of electricity it draws. That ratio is its coefficient of performance. Here is a rough comparison for a home using 11,500 kWh of heat a year, the kind of figure a typical three-bedroom house might run through.
| System | Assumed efficiency | Energy needed | Annual fuel cost |
|---|---|---|---|
| Gas boiler | 90% | 12,778 kWh gas | £937 |
| Heat pump (COP 3.2) | 320% | 3,594 kWh electricity | £938 |
| Heat pump on a heat-pump tariff (~15p) | 320% | 3,594 kWh electricity | £539 |
At 26.32p per kWh electricity and 7.97p per kWh gas, Ofgem cap October to December 2026. Heat-pump tariff figure is illustrative and changes with the market.
On the standard cap, a heat pump and a gas boiler land in much the same place for fuel. The saving comes from a dedicated heat-pump electricity tariff, which prices the extra demand far below the cap. That is where the real difference shows up, and it is covered in more depth in heat pump running cost versus a gas boiler. To understand why the per-unit rates and standing charges matter so much, the guide to reading your energy bill breaks the numbers down.
What the grant does not cover
The £7,500 is generous but it is not the whole job. A few costs sit outside it:
- Radiators and pipework. Heat pumps run cooler water than boilers, so some homes need larger radiators or a few upgrades to get even heat. The grant does not separately fund this, though a good installer builds it into the quote.
- A hot water cylinder. Combi boiler homes with no cylinder usually need one fitted, which adds cost and takes up space.
- Running the system well. Getting the most out of a heat pump means setting a low, steady flow temperature and leaving it to run gently, which is a different habit to a gas boiler. The flow temperature guide explains why that matters.
For most households the realistic out-of-pocket cost after the grant lands somewhere between £2,000 and £7,000 depending on the property, the radiators and whether a cylinder is needed. Get that number in writing before you decide.
The bottom line
The Boiler Upgrade Scheme is the simplest heat pump grant going, because you do not chase the paperwork and the money comes straight off the price. If you own a home in England or Wales, are replacing a fossil fuel boiler and use an MCS-certified installer, £7,500 off an air or ground source heat pump is yours to claim, rising to £9,000 for off-gas-grid homes from 21 July 2026. The grant fixes the upfront cost; a heat-pump electricity tariff fixes the running cost. Treat them as two separate decisions and the switch can stack up well. Schemes like this change their amounts, end dates and rules regularly, so confirm the current figures on the GOV.UK Boiler Upgrade Scheme page or the Ofgem scheme guidance before you sign anything.