FranklinWH aPower 2 Battery Review: Flexible Whole-Home Backup

We recently installed a few FranklinWH aPower 2 batteries, and I have to say—I’m a fan. We’ve worked with a lot of solar home battery systems over the years, and FranklinWH delivers. From compatibility to real-world performance, FranklinWH has clearly built this with both homeowners and solar installers in mind.

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A Whole-Home Battery That Just Works

If you’re looking for a home battery that can power your entire house, including larger loads like central AC, the aPower 2 delivers. With a 15kWh usable capacity and 10kW continuous output, 1-2 units can run all the loads in most Virginia homes. But if you need more storage, the system is stackable up to 15 units (225kWh total).

We typically recommend 30kWh for most homes, so you don’t run out of power when you need it most.

Unlike a lot of systems that feel like they were designed in a lab (often creating issues when installed in the real-world), this one feels like it was built for real homes. It integrates seamlessly with solar, supports generator input, and uses black start functionality, meaning it keeps a reserve charge even when “empty”—an underrated feature during long outages.

The FranklinWH system is also designed to work with solar, regardless of what inverter you currently have (or intend to get). So if you have microinverters or string inverters, the aPower 2 will pair well with it, and be able to fully use your solar during an outage.

The Franklin batteries can be wall or floor-mounted, have a sleek design, and show charging & SOC information at a glance (the orange LEDs here indicate about a 35% charge, since they don’t go all the way to the top)

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Easy Commissioning, No Headaches

This is one of the most plug-and-play systems we’ve worked with. The commissioning process through the FranklinWH app was fast and flawless. While homeowners probably aren’t too concerned with how easy it is to commission, in our experience, systems that are clunky or difficult to configure tend to have more issues and bugs as well. We were happy that we could get the system up and running in a matter of minutes.

Once installed, you can easily go off-grid with no disruption—we tested it by transferring power via the app, and the lights didn’t even blink.

When we shut off the main utility power at the meter, there was a momentary flicker (as expected), but everything stayed online, including the air conditioning.

No clocks to reset. No router reboots. Just reliable backup. And when the grid came back up (because we flipped the breaker back)? It transferred back to grid seamlessly, in less than a minute.

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Smart Control and Simple Design

The aPower 2’s LED light bar is a surprisingly helpful feature. At a glance, you can tell the charge level of the battery—no need to pull out your phone just to see if you’re good to run the dryer.

The app is very intuitive as well. Great information, easy to see exactly what’s going on, and how your solar, battery, and home are using energy.

And with the Smart Circuits module, you can manage which loads are backed up during an outage. It gives you the flexibility to prioritize things like your fridge, heat pump, or officGenerator Modulee equipment, while shedding less critical loads when needed.

The optional Generator Module is one of the features we are most excited about. In the past, it’s been incredibly difficult to have a generator fully integrated into your battery-backup system. FranklinWH has made it much simpler, and removed many of the barriers to this, allowing you to use a portable generator, standby generator, or even some EV’s (F150, Silverado, Etc) to power your loads & recharge your aPower 2’s when needed.

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Built to Last

Under the hood, the aPower 2 uses Lithium Iron Phosphate (LFP) chemistry. That means better safety, longer lifespan, and more consistent performance over time compared to other battery chemistries. The 15-year warranty backs that up, covering 10,000+ cycles or 60 MWh throughput.

They’re also eligible for Solar Insure’s warranty, meaning you can get a 30-year warranty, with free battery replacement if something goes wrong.

The system is passively cooled (no fans), which means less noise, fewer moving parts, and improved long-term reliability.

Want to get a free battery proposal for your home? Talk to us today to learn more about FranklinWH, and how it can secure your energy needs.

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What’s Not Perfect?

This battery isn’t small— It’s about half the size of a doorway (45.2″ x 29.5″ x 11.8″) and weighs 357 lbs. It’s sleek and good-looking for what it is, but if you’re tight on wall space, especially in a garage or utility room, placement could be a challenge. We’re anticipating a few installs where we may have to get creative to fit these in.

They are fully rated for outdoor installation though, so exterior wallspace can help solve this issue.

Pricing is a bit uncertain moving forward, because most of their batteries are manufactured in China. FranklinWH is not an outlier in this respect, most battery systems are seeing price-hikes at the moment due to new tariffs as well as section 301 tariffs, but it is difficult to predict what it may cost in 6-12 months.

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Final Thoughts

The FranklinWH aPower 2 has become one of our go-to recommendations for whole-home backup in Virginia. It performs exactly the way we need it to, works great with new & existing residential solar installations, and gives homeowners real peace of mind—especially as outages and extreme weather become more common. If you’ve got solar already, or looking for solar + storage, this is an excellent option.

It’s not the smallest unit on the market, but we’ll take that trade-off for everything else it brings to the table.

Want to see how the aPower 2 would work with your home? Get a free solar + battery quote from Virtue Solar today.