Your backup reserve is the slice of battery GridSentinel keeps in the tank - your cushion for a blackout or a price spike. The engine trades the energy above it and protects everything below.
On a Sigenergy battery this is the Backup SOC setting, and you set it in the mySigen app. GridSentinel reads it and follows it, so in GridSentinel the reserve is shown but not editable - to change it, you change your Backup SOC on the battery.
It's the lowest level your Sigenergy will drop to in normal use. Once the battery reaches your Backup SOC, it stops discharging and draws from the grid to cover your home instead - keeping that reserve intact for when you actually need it.
Because the battery enforces it itself, it holds even if GridSentinel is briefly offline or your internet drops. That's why it's the most reliable place to set your backup level.
GridSentinel reads your Backup SOC from your battery and treats it as your reserve. The engine never plans to sell or use energy below it - it only trades what's above. So your battery and GridSentinel always agree on the same floor.
Your Backup SOC arrives automatically: once when you connect your battery, and again any time you change it in the mySigen app.
Sigenergy lets us read your Backup SOC but not change it - only the mySigen app can. Rather than show you a second number that wouldn't match your battery, GridSentinel mirrors your Backup SOC and shows it read-only, with a link here. One reserve, one place to set it, no drift between the two.
When you change your Backup SOC in the mySigen app, GridSentinel picks up the new value automatically (you may need to reopen the Settings screen to see it refresh).
Yes. On a Powerwall or FoxESS, GridSentinel can write the reserve to the battery for you, so you set it on the GridSentinel slider. On a Sigenergy, the battery owns that setting, so you set your Backup SOC in the mySigen app and GridSentinel follows. Same outcome - a protected reserve - just set in a different place.
GridSentinel picks up the new value on its own - there's nothing to change on our side.
It's a balance. A higher Backup SOC keeps more aside for a blackout but leaves less for GridSentinel to trade. A lower one lets the engine earn more but keeps a smaller cushion. Many people land around 20–30%. Pick what you'd want available if the grid went down; you can change it any time.
If your battery has no Backup SOC set, GridSentinel doesn't have a reserve to mirror, so the reserve stays editable in the app and we plan around a sensible default. But the strongest, guaranteed protection comes from your battery's own Backup SOC - it's enforced in hardware and holds no matter what. We recommend setting one.