Anyone else running a Victron Multiplus with a small UK solar setup — what's your idle draw like?

Just been doing some measurements on my Multiplus-II 24/3000 and I'm a bit surprised by the standby consumption. With no loads attached and the inverter just ticking over in search mode, I'm seeing around 15–20W being pulled constantly. Over a 24-hour period that's nudging 400Wh just to keep the thing alive, which feels like a lot when my whole system is only 400Ah of lithium and a 600W panel array.

I know Victron's own figures quote about 11W for the 24/3000 in search mode but I'm consistently measuring higher than that on my CT clamp. Wondering if it's the temperature (it's in a fairly cold outhouse at the moment, around 5°C most mornings) or whether mine might have a fault. The unit is about 18 months old and otherwise working fine — no alarms, nothing unusual in VRM.

Has anyone found a meaningful difference between using search mode versus just leaving the inverter fully on, in terms of actual battery drain over a day? And is there a threshold of continuous load where it stops making sense to bother with search mode at all? Would love to know what real-world numbers people are getting rather than spec sheet figures.

Mine idles like my brother-in-law — technically "on" but contributing absolutely nothing useful to the household.

Seriously though, the search mode on the Multiplus-II is a bit of a dark art — worth tweaking the search sense level in VictronConnect because the factory default is surprisingly conservative and can keep it spinning harder than needed.

Running a 24/3000 myself and got mine down to around 11W in proper low-load search mode once I'd dialled it in. Made a noticeable difference overnight when the Fogstar cells aren't getting topped up.

Also worth checking your minimum SOC cutoff in the DVCC settings if you're on a Cerbo — sometimes it's doing more work than you think just maintaining comms.

Ran into exactly this on the narrowboat last winter. The Multiplus-II 24/3000 in search mode was quietly nibbling about 11-13W from my Fogstar Drift 200Ah lithium — doesn't sound much until you're moored up for three grey days with panels barely producing.

What made a real difference was dropping the search mode sensitivity right down in VictronConnect, so it stops hunting so aggressively for phantom loads. Also worth checking your AC out cabling — I had a dodgy neutral connection that was making mine work harder than it needed to.

The honest truth with narrowboats (and I suspect vans aren't much different @VanBarry) is that the Multiplus earns its keep the moment you switch anything on. That idle draw is just the price of having proper inverter quality rather than running some sketchy Chinese unit that'll cook your batteries.

@VanBarry what figures are you actually seeing? Worth clarifying whether you're measuring at the battery terminals or from the AC side, as that'll skew comparisons.

On my setup (garden office, Multiplus-II 48/3000) I get roughly 15–18W idle in search mode at the battery — drops noticeably if I lower the search sensitivity threshold in VictronConnect. That made a meaningful difference over a UK winter when solar input was patchy and I didn't want the inverter constantly waking up and hunting.

Also worth checking your dynamic cutoff settings — I found the defaults weren't ideal for my Fogstar 48V lithium bank and the inverter was doing odd things in low-load conditions.

If you've got a Cerbo GX you can log the idle consumption over 24hrs and get a proper baseline rather than spot measurements, which can be misleading.

@VanBarry good timing on this thread — I've been keeping notes on mine for a few months now. Running a Multiplus-II 48/3000 here and in proper search mode I'm typically seeing around 11-15W at the battery terminals depending on temperature. Colder nights it creeps up a bit.

One thing worth checking is your search mode sensitivity setting in VEConfigure — I found dropping the threshold down meant it was triggering less frequently and the average draw came down noticeably. Also make sure you're on reasonably recent firmware as Victron have quietly improved the search mode behaviour over the last couple of releases.

@BreezySparky raises a fair point about measurement location too — there's a meaningful difference between what the Multiplus reports internally and what you'll see at the terminals once you factor in any DC cabling losses.

Hey @VanBarry, good thread! I've got a Multiplus-II 24/3000 running on my static setup in Wales and I've noticed search mode makes a real difference. With search mode off I was seeing around 18–20W idle draw at the battery terminals, but flicking search mode on dropped it down to roughly 11–13W in my experience — though it does occasionally miss smaller loads waking up, which is a trade-off worth knowing about.

Worth also checking your VE.Configure settings — I found tweaking the AC input current limit and making sure dynamic current limiter was sorted helped slightly too. What's your battery voltage sitting at during these measurements? I've noticed the idle draw creeps up a touch when the 24V bank dips below about 25V, which might skew comparisons between folk.

Curious what @Ian1968 is seeing on the 48V system too — that'd be a useful comparison.

Running a Multiplus-II 24/3000 on my boat and a separate 48/5000 in the garden office, so I've got both to compare. Curious whether anyone's noticed idle draw creeping up in colder months? I'm seeing slightly higher figures over winter on the boat unit and wondering if that's the inverter itself or just measurement noise from my BMV-712.

@Ian1968 — interested in your 48V notes. Does yours seem more efficient at idle compared to the 24V units, or is it roughly comparable as a percentage of capacity?

Also, has anyone played with the search mode sensitivity settings in VictronConnect? I've bumped mine up a notch but not sure if I've actually shifted the baseline draw or just changed how quickly it kicks on.