If you are on this page, you are probably somewhere between “my power went out and I am annoyed” and “I want a system in place before the next storm season.” Everything in this category falls into one of two very different buckets, and picking the wrong one wastes money in opposite directions.
The first bucket is portable power stations — battery packs, essentially, sized anywhere from a large power bank up to a mini home battery on wheels, sometimes paired with a portable solar panel. You plug things into them directly or run an extension cord to a few circuits. No permit, no electrician, no gas line. You buy it, you charge it, you use it. The tradeoff is capacity: even a large unit is built to run a fridge, some lights, a laptop, and a phone charger for a few days, not your whole house indefinitely.
The second bucket is permanently installed backup — whole-house standby generators (gas or propane) and hardwired home battery systems. These are wired into your electrical panel through a transfer switch, and in most jurisdictions that work has to be done, or at minimum signed off, by a licensed electrician, with a licensed gas fitter involved for gas-fired units, plus a permit and inspection. That is not a suggestion — it is how these systems are legally and safely installed. In exchange for that complexity and up-front cost, you get power that can run your whole house, often automatically, for as long as fuel or grid conditions hold out.
Buying the wrong one for your actual situation is expensive either direction. Spend a few thousand dollars on a portable setup when what you actually need is whole-house backup for a well pump, sump pump, and HVAC during multi-day outages, and you will be back shopping again after the first bad storm. Spend a five-figure sum on a standby generator installation when a portable power station would have covered your actual outage pattern — a few hours, a handful of times a year — and you have paid for capability you will never use. The posts below are organized to help you figure out which bucket you are actually in before you start comparing specific products.
Free tool: tick the appliances you need during an outage and get the running and starting watts to shop for. Generator size calculator →
Buying Guides & Comparisons
Once you know which category you need, these posts compare specific products and brands within it.
- Best Solar Generators for Whole-Home Backup (2026) — a roundup of portable solar generator and power station options sized for whole-home style backup use.
- EcoFlow Delta Pro vs. Bluetti AC500 vs. Jackery Explorer: Head-to-Head — a direct comparison of three specific portable power station models.
- Best Whole-House Standby Generators (Gas/Propane) — a roundup of permanently installed gas and propane standby generator options.
- Standby Generator Brand Comparison: Generac vs. Kohler vs. Champion vs. Cummins vs. Briggs & Stratton — how the major standby generator manufacturers compare.
Which Backup Category Actually Fits Your Home
If you have not settled on portable vs. permanent yet, or you have and now need to size it correctly, start here.
- Portable Power Station vs. Home Battery Backup: Which Fits Your Home? — a direct comparison of the two categories to help you figure out which one fits your situation.
- Best Backup Power for a 3-Day Outage — addresses the sizing question a lot of buyers skip: how long an outage you are actually planning for.
- How Many Solar Panels Do You Need to Recharge a Home Battery? — breaks down how much solar capacity it takes to keep a home battery charged.
- Backup Power Costs by Region: Where the Outage Risk Actually Justifies a Standby Generator — a regional look at where actual outage risk is high enough to justify the cost of a standby generator.
- Home Battery vs. Generator by Climate: Which Backup Strategy Fits Your Region? — which backup strategy tends to make more sense depending on your regional climate and outage patterns.
Planning: Timing and the Bigger Picture
These two zoom out from any single product — one on when to buy, one on how backup power fits into your home’s other systems.
- When to Buy a Whole-House Generator: Seasonal Pricing and Pre-Storm-Season Timing — how seasonal demand and pre-storm-season timing affect pricing and availability.
- Building a Whole-Home Resilience System: How Water, Power, and HVAC Work Together — how backup power fits together with water treatment and HVAC as one resilience plan rather than three separate purchases.
Financing, Incentives, and Resale Value
For anyone treating this as the significant purchase it actually is, these cover the money side beyond the sticker price.
- Financing a Standby Generator or Home Battery System: What Your Options Actually Cost — explains how common financing categories work mechanically, without recommending a specific lender.
- Federal and State Incentives for Backup Power in 2026: What’s Actually Live — a look at which incentive programs are currently active.
- Do Backup Generators and Battery Systems Increase Home Resale Value? — an honest look at whether this purchase comes back at resale.
Not Sure Where to Start?
If you just want reliable power for the fridge, some lights, and your devices during outages that typically last a few hours to a day, start with Portable Power Station vs. Home Battery Backup — that covers the no-permit, no-electrician side of this category. If your outages regularly stretch multiple days, or you have a well pump, sump pump, or medical equipment that cannot go down, read Best Backup Power for a 3-Day Outage before you shop, since it walks through the sizing question that trips up a lot of buyers. And if you live somewhere with real hurricane, wildfire, or ice-storm risk and are seriously considering a whole-house standby generator, Backup Power Costs by Region and Home Battery vs. Generator by Climate will help you confirm your region’s risk actually justifies that investment before you start comparing specific brands and models.
Whichever path fits, remember that anything in the “permanently installed” bucket — a whole-house standby generator or a hardwired home battery system — needs a licensed electrician (and a licensed gas fitter for gas-fired units), a transfer switch, and local permitting. That is not optional paperwork; it is what makes the installation legal and safe.