How Often Does the Power Go Out in Texas? (2026 Outage Data)
Texas's own EIA-reported outage minutes, ERCOT's grid history since Winter Storm Uri, and how to turn that pattern into a standby, portable, or battery decision.
Setup Type
Quick answer: In an ordinary year, without a named storm, the average Texas utility customer loses power for about 2.2 to 2.9 hours total, roughly 1.2 to 1.4 separate interruptions, per EIA's own state-level reliability data for 2019 through 2024. That is close to the national background rate. The number that actually matters is the storm-year number: 2024 averaged 26.9 hours per customer statewide and 2021 averaged 24.9 hours, both driven almost entirely by one or two named events (Hurricane Beryl and a May derecho in 2024, Winter Storm Uri in 2021). Texas's outage risk is not a steady drip, it is a small number of large, dated events, and that pattern, not the yearly average, should decide standby versus portable versus battery.
Best for
Texas homeowners who want real outage-frequency data before sizing a backup power budget, not a marketing claim about how unreliable the grid is.
Wrong fit
Buyers who already have their outage pattern figured out and just need cost or brand numbers. Start with the real cost or best-brand guides instead.
Tradeoff
Texas's ordinary-year reliability is unremarkable. Its storm-year reliability is some of the worst in the country. Buying for the average year underbuilds for the outage that will actually hurt.
Texas does not have uniformly bad power. It has an ordinary grid that behaves like most of the country's, and a handful of dated, well-documented events that erase that record for the year they happen in. Here is what the government's own reliability numbers show, what caused the bad years, and how to use that pattern instead of the average when you size backup power.
We don't sell generators. We save you from buying the wrong one, and in Texas that starts with knowing whether your risk looks like a normal year or a storm year. For the cost side of the decision, see what a standby generator actually costs installed in Texas. If you have not yet picked a lane, standby vs portable vs battery walks the fit question in full.
The data: an ordinary Texas year vs. a storm year
The U.S. Energy Information Administration collects SAIDI (System Average Interruption Duration Index, the total minutes an average customer is without power) and SAIFI (System Average Interruption Frequency Index, how many separate interruptions that customer has) from every state's utilities every year, and publishes two versions of each: one including "major event days" (named storms and other extreme events) and one excluding them.
Year
Hours without power, all events
Hours without power, ordinary days only
Separate interruptions, all events
Separate interruptions, ordinary days only
2024
26.9
2.6
2.29
1.40
2023
9.7
2.5
1.89
1.39
2022
3.4
2.6
1.70
1.40
2021
24.9
2.9
3.33
1.38
2020
7.0
2.2
1.64
1.22
2019
4.3
2.4
1.66
1.28
The "ordinary days only" columns barely move across six years: 2.2 to 2.9 hours, 1.2 to 1.4 interruptions. That is Texas's actual background grid reliability, and it does not stand out nationally. The "all events" column is a different story: it triples, quadruples, or in 2024 roughly ten-times the ordinary-year number, and it does that in exactly the years a named storm hit. 2022, with no major statewide event, is the cleanest read on Texas's baseline: 3.4 hours, barely above the ordinary-day figure.
Suggested citation: Generator Guide, "How Often Does the Power Go Out in Texas?," EIA SAIDI/SAIFI analysis 2019-2024, checked September 23, 2026.
What actually caused the bad years
None of Texas's outage spikes are a mystery. Each one is a single named event with its own public report.
Event
Date
What ERCOT's own grid data shows
Peak customers affected
Winter Storm Uri
Feb 14-20, 2021
ERCOT declared an Energy Emergency Alert and ordered rotating outages statewide
69% of Texans lost power at some point; average outage 42 hours
Winter Storm Elliott
Dec 22-24, 2022
No Energy Emergency Alert declared. Operating reserves never fell below 4,052 MW, well above the 2,300 MW EEA1 threshold, even as demand hit a new winter record of 74,100 MW
Localized only; grid held statewide
Summer 2023 heat
Aug-Sept 2023
ERCOT set an all-time peak demand record of 85,435 MW on August 10, then declared EEA Level 2 on Sept 6 amid a 82,705 MW September record; no controlled outages resulted either time
None statewide; conservation appeals issued, not forced outages
May 2024 derecho
May 16-23, 2024
A severe thunderstorm line, not a hurricane, damaged at least 14 transmission lines, mostly in CenterPoint's Houston-area territory
1.05 million customers at peak, per the state's own investigation
Hurricane Beryl
July 8-19, 2024
Category 1 landfall in Matagorda Bay; damage to more than 100 transmission circuits; this was a distribution and transmission-damage event, not an ERCOT generation-shortage alert
2.7 million customers at peak (2.2 million on CenterPoint alone); some outages lasted 11 days
Winter Storm Fern
Jan 23-26, 2026
No Energy Emergency Alert declared and no systemwide outages, though the U.S. Department of Energy issued a precautionary emergency order authorizing backup generation as a last resort if conditions worsened, which ERCOT ultimately did not need
Scattered, localized outages from ice accumulation only
Read down that table and a pattern emerges: Texas's grid has held during three separate stress tests since Uri (Elliott's cold, the 2023 heat records, and Fern's cold) without a statewide failure. The two events that actually darkened millions of homes since 2021, the May 2024 derecho and Hurricane Beryl, were not generation shortages at all. They were wind and storm damage to the physical distribution grid, concentrated in and around Houston. That distinction matters for where you live: a well-run generation market does not protect your house from a tree branch on a distribution line during a storm.
Why Texas can't lean on its neighbors when the grid is stressed
Texas's grid, managed by ERCOT, is one of three separate electrical interconnections in the continental United States, alongside the Eastern and Western Interconnections. ERCOT's own description: "The ERCOT grid is the interconnected electrical system serving most of Texas with limited external connections." ERCOT manages power for more than 27 million Texas customers, about 90 percent of the state's electric load. Because the ERCOT grid is not tightly tied to the other two interconnections, Texas cannot casually import large amounts of emergency power from neighboring states the way a state inside the Eastern Interconnection can lean on its neighbors. That structural isolation is part of why a generation shortfall in Texas, like the one during Uri, becomes a statewide event rather than a regional one that other states can help absorb.
What this means for your generator choice
Match the machine to the pattern that actually applies to you, not to the worst year on record or the best one.
If your household experiences the ordinary-year pattern (a handful of short outages a year, closer to the 2.2 to 2.9 hour, 1 to 2 interruption baseline above), a portable generator with a permitted interlock is usually the proportionate answer. See interlock kit vs transfer switch for the legal, permitted way to connect one.
If you are on CenterPoint's Houston-area territory or another coastal or Gulf-adjacent utility, your real risk is the wind-and-tree-damage event, not a generation-shortage event. Both the 2024 derecho and Hurricane Beryl put over a million customers out for multiple days in that footprint. That multi-day, whole-neighborhood pattern is the case for a standby system with automatic switchover, because a portable generator's fuel and attention burden gets much harder past day two or three.
If your main exposure is a winter event, size and place your equipment with carbon monoxide safety as the first decision, not an afterthought: Uri's death toll included carbon monoxide poisoning from generators run too close to the house or indoors during the exact kind of multi-day cold-weather outage a standby system is built for. Read never run a generator indoors before the next cold snap, not during it.
If your outages are short even in a bad year and multi-day runtime is not your concern, a home battery can be the lower-hassle, silent option. See the honest tradeoff in generator vs home battery.
In a year without a major named storm, an average Texas utility customer loses power for about 2.2 to 2.9 hours total across 1.2 to 1.4 separate interruptions, per EIA's own state reliability data for 2019 through 2024. That is a normal-range background rate. The real variable is whether a named storm hits: in 2021 and 2024, the same statewide average jumped to 24.9 and 26.9 hours because of Winter Storm Uri and, in 2024, a May derecho plus Hurricane Beryl.
Is the Texas power grid getting more reliable?
The evidence is mixed in a useful way. ERCOT has held the generation side of the grid through three real stress tests since Uri, cold weather in December 2022, record summer heat in 2023, and cold weather again in January 2026, without a statewide emergency outage. But the two worst outage events since Uri, the May 2024 derecho and Hurricane Beryl, were not generation failures at all. They were physical damage to transmission and distribution lines, concentrated around Houston. Generation reliability and distribution reliability are different problems, and Texas has improved more on the first than proven anything about the second.
Does ERCOT being its own separate grid make Texas outages worse?
It is a real structural factor, though not the whole story. ERCOT is one of three separate US electrical interconnections and, in its own words, has "limited external connections" to the rest of the country. That means Texas cannot lean on neighboring states for large-scale emergency power the way a state inside the Eastern or Western Interconnection can, which is part of why a generation shortfall like Winter Storm Uri became a statewide crisis rather than something neighboring grids could help absorb. It does not explain the derecho or Hurricane Beryl outages, which were distribution-line damage, a problem every state's grid has regardless of which interconnection it sits in.
Should I buy a standby generator just because of what happened during Winter Storm Uri?
Uri is the right reason to take Texas outage risk seriously, but not necessarily the reason to buy standby specifically. If your household's actual pattern is closer to the ordinary-year data (a couple of short outages most years), a portable generator with a permitted interlock covers that pattern for a fraction of a standby project's cost. Standby earns its price when your realistic pattern includes multi-day, whole-neighborhood outages, which is what both winter grid events and Gulf Coast storm damage can produce.
What we could not verify
Hurricane Beryl's death toll and CenterPoint's storm-damage cost estimate. News coverage cites figures for both, but the Public Utility Commission of Texas's own investigation report of the event does not state a death count, and we could not confirm a damage-cost figure against a PUCT or CenterPoint primary filing. We have left both numbers out rather than repeat an unverified figure.
Utility-level reliability data for CenterPoint, Oncor, and AEP Texas individually. These utilities file SAIDI and SAIFI data with the PUCT under its reliability rule, but we could not pull a current, dated, utility-specific number directly from a live primary source for this guide. The EIA figures above are statewide averages across all reporting Texas utilities, not any single utility's number.
A single consolidated history of ERCOT Energy Emergency Alerts. Neither ercot.com nor puc.texas.gov publishes one table of every EEA ever declared. Each event above is sourced to its own individual ERCOT report or release instead.
These guides are built from manufacturer documentation, public specifications, primary research where health claims matter, and repeated buyer questions that show up in real ownership and installation decisions.
Manufacturer responses can clarify pricing bands, warranty terms, support footprint, or common mistakes. They do not move a page up the shortlist on their own.
