By Alexandru Goncear, Owner and CEO, ElectON Enterprise. Washington electrical contractor license ELECTEL765MN.
A lot of people call hoping for a ballpark on a panel upgrade. I do not give one over the phone, and it is not because the number is a secret. A Seattle panel job can be a one-day swap in a basement, or a project that involves City Light, a new mast through the roof and a panel that has to move out of a closet. Any number I guessed on the phone would be wrong for one of those.
What I can do is show you how the price gets built. The ranges below come from the kinds of panel jobs we quote most often in Seattle. They are rounded on purpose and very approximate. Use them to check whether a quote you already have is in a sane range, not as a price for your house.
The short answer
These ranges include the SDCI permit and typical materials. Washington sales tax and any Seattle City Light charges come on top.
| Job | What it usually includes | Approximate cost in Seattle |
|---|---|---|
| Panel repair | Finding the problem, replacing failed breakers or a damaged connection | $300 to $1,200 |
| Panel replacement, same size and location | New panel and breakers, grounding fixes, surge protector, permit and inspection | $2,500 to $5,500 |
| 100 to 200 amp upgrade, overhead service, straightforward | All of the above plus a new meter base, service entrance and often a new mast | $5,500 to $9,000 |
| Upgrade with complications | The panel moves, the mast is rebuilt through the roof, the service is underground, or there is a lot of old wiring to sort out | $10,000 to $18,000 and up |
| Subpanel instead of an upgrade | Feeder from the main panel, subpanel, breakers, permit | $1,500 to $4,000 |
| Load management device | A device that keeps an EV charger from overloading the service | $300 to $800 |
Repair, replacement and upgrade are three different prices
Most of the confusion about panel pricing comes from three different jobs that all get called a panel upgrade.
A repair fixes what is there: a breaker that has failed, a loose or overheated connection, a damaged main breaker.
A replacement swaps the panel and its breakers but keeps the same service size, so the meter and everything on City Light’s side stay where they are. SDCI permits and inspects it, and the work itself is usually one day. That is the scope of a standard electrical panel replacement.
An upgrade changes the size of the service, usually from 60 or 100 amps to 200. The meter base, the service entrance and often the mast change too. City Light has to approve it through its own application, and the schedule depends on City Light as much as on us.
When two quotes for “a panel upgrade” are thousands of dollars apart, check that first. Half the time one contractor priced a replacement, the other priced an upgrade, and nobody said so.
The line items, and roughly what each one adds
This is what sits inside a Seattle panel quote, roughly in order of how much each line moves the total.
Labor
The biggest share by a wide margin. A straightforward replacement is a long day for an electrician and a helper. An upgrade usually takes a day or two, plus a return trip for the City Light cut-over. Licensed electricians around Puget Sound bill somewhere north of $100 an hour, and Washington labor costs sit well above the national average. Figure roughly $1,500 to $3,500 of labor on a replacement and $2,500 to $5,000 on an upgrade. A panel wedged behind a furnace in a 1920s basement pushes either number up.
The panel itself
Less than people expect. A good 200-amp panel runs roughly $300 to $700. The brand matters less than whether it has enough spaces for what you plan to add over the next ten years.
Breakers
This is the line that surprises people. Standard breakers are cheap. The AFCI and GFCI breakers the current code calls for on many circuits cost several times as much, often $50 to $80 each. On a whole house, the breakers can cost as much as the panel or more. Older panels had none of this, so it is a real added cost, and a full replacement quoted with “standard breakers” is worth asking about.
Meter base, service entrance and mast
Nothing on a straight replacement. On an upgrade this is often the single biggest jump: a new meter socket, heavier service conductors and, on a lot of older Seattle houses with overhead service, a new mast and weatherhead. Roughly $1,000 to $3,000.
Grounding and bonding
Roughly $200 to $800. Ground rods, bonding to the water and gas piping, and fixing whatever a previous owner improvised. In older houses where the water line from the street was replaced with plastic, the ground clamp on the basement pipe often no longer connects to anything useful, and that has to be corrected before the inspector will sign off.
Surge protection
Roughly $200 to $500 installed. The current code requires a surge protective device when the service equipment on a house is replaced, so on these jobs it is no longer an optional extra.
SDCI permit
Usually a few hundred dollars. Inside city limits, the electrical permit comes from SDCI, not L&I. SDCI raised most of its fees for 2026, so a permit number from a friend’s job a few years ago may be low. If a quote does not show the permit, ask why.
City Light charges
City Light requires payment before it connects an upgraded service, and the amount depends on what has to happen on its side of the meter. Some contractors fold it into their price and some leave it out, so ask. A straight replacement has no City Light charge, because the service is not changing.
Moving the panel
Roughly $1,500 to $5,000 on top, sometimes more. Panels in clothes closets, bathrooms or tight spots behind a water heater do not meet today’s rules, and a replacement generally has to. Moving it to a garage or an outside wall means new feeders, longer runs and sometimes rerouting circuits.
Patching
Usually priced separately. Plaster in a Craftsman, siding where a meter moves, drywall where the old panel used to be. Anywhere from a couple hundred dollars to a couple thousand, depending on the finish.
Sales tax
Washington charges sales tax on construction labor as well as materials, and the rate in Seattle is a little over 10 percent, depending on the address. On an $8,000 upgrade that is roughly $800. It should appear as its own line on the quote.
Four typical Seattle panel jobs, priced roughly
These are composites of the panel jobs we quote most often in Seattle, not any one customer’s bill. The numbers are rounded, include the SDCI permit, and leave out sales tax and City Light charges.
A 1920s Craftsman in Wallingford on a 60-amp fuse panel
The service goes to 200 amps. The fuse box comes out, a new panel goes in the basement, the overhead mast and meter base are replaced, and the grounding is rebuilt from scratch. Every circuit gets the protection the current code asks for. Roughly $7,500 to $11,000. If there is still knob and tube in the walls, that is a separate project, and we usually plan it as a staged whole-house rewire once the service is done.
A 1960s Lake City rambler with a Federal Pacific panel
Gas heat, a gas water heater and no EV yet, so the load calculation says 100 amps is still enough. The Stab-Lok panel comes off the wall and a modern panel goes in the same spot at the same size. One day of work, power off for part of it, and no City Light application. Roughly $3,000 to $5,000.
A 1970s West Seattle split-level with the panel in a hall closet
The owners want a heat pump and an EV charger, so the service goes to 200 amps. Because the panel sits in a closet, it moves to the garage wall, which means new feeders, longer runs for several circuits and patching in the hallway. Roughly $11,000 to $16,000. This is the kind of job where a second opinion is worth having, because careful quotes and careless ones split furthest apart here.
A 2010s townhome with a nearly full 150-amp panel and a new EV
The panel is in good shape but almost out of spaces. The load calculation shows the service can carry a charger if a load management device keeps it from running flat out while the rest of the house is busy. The device, a dedicated charger circuit and, if needed, a small subpanel for space come to roughly $1,500 to $3,500, against $6,000 or more for a service upgrade. Townhome upgrades also get complicated when the meters are grouped together. More on chargers is on our EV charger installation page.
How long it takes, and where City Light fits
A straight replacement is a permit, one day of work and an inspection, usually all inside a week or two. SDCI issues many residential electrical permits online the same day.
An upgrade runs on City Light’s clock as well as ours. In order, it goes like this:
- We submit City Light’s online service application, with the load calculation and site details it asks for.
- City Light allows four to six weeks for initial processing, and a representative follows up within five to ten business days after that.
- We do the work under the SDCI permit, and SDCI inspects it first. City Light cannot do its part until that inspection passes.
- City Light does its own inspection, takes payment for its charges and schedules the connection.
City Light also says crew availability, outage response and supply chain problems can stretch its timelines, and its new or upgraded service page has the current details. If you need 200 amps before a heat pump or an EV arrives, start the application well before you order the equipment.
Ways to spend less without cutting corners
Get the load calculation before anything else. A house with gas heat and no EV may be fine at 100 or 150 amps, and the calculation can save you an upgrade you do not need.
Look at load management. City Light asks customers to consider managing load before upsizing, and a device that shares capacity between an EV charger and the rest of the house costs roughly $300 to $800.
Add a subpanel if the main panel is healthy and the service has room to spare. It will not fix a Federal Pacific or Zinsco panel, though. Those need to come out.
Do the extras while the panel is open. A circuit for a future EV charger or heat pump costs a fraction of what it does on a return trip.
Check rebates directly with the program. Washington has offered rebates toward panel upgrades for income-qualified households, usually tied to electrification work, but terms and funding change, so confirm with the program rather than taking a contractor’s word for it, including mine. The federal tax credit that used to cover part of a panel upgrade ended for work done after 2025.
How to compare two Seattle quotes
If you are collecting quotes from more than one of the residential electricians in Seattle, WA you found, line them up and check that both answer the same questions:
- Is it a replacement or an upgrade?
- Are AFCI and GFCI breakers included, or standard ones?
- Is grounding and bonding in the scope?
- Is the surge protector included?
- Is the SDCI permit in the price?
- Are City Light charges included or separate?
- Is patching included?
- Is sales tax its own line?
A quote that skips half of these is not cheaper. It is incomplete. For comparison, we also broke down what the same work costs in Tacoma, where Tacoma Power issues the permits and the utility timeline is much longer.
Common questions about panel upgrade costs in Seattle
How much does a 200 amp panel upgrade cost in Seattle?
Very roughly $5,500 to $9,000 for a straightforward upgrade with overhead service, and $10,000 or more when the panel has to move, the mast needs rebuilding or the service comes in underground. Sales tax and City Light charges come on top.
How much does it cost just to replace a panel?
Roughly $2,500 to $5,500 when the service size and the panel location stay the same. That includes the permit, the breakers the current code requires, grounding fixes and a surge protector.
How long will my power be off?
For a replacement, several hours on one day. An upgrade adds a separate window for the City Light cut-over. We tell you the window before we start, and we do not leave a house without power overnight.
Can I just replace the breakers in my Federal Pacific or Zinsco panel?
Generally no, and I would not do it. Replacement breakers for those panels are a mixed market, and the concern is the design of the panel, not one bad breaker.
Do I really need 200 amps?
Not automatically. The load calculation decides. Plenty of Seattle houses with gas heat are fine at 100 or 150 amps. Houses adding a heat pump, an EV charger and an induction range usually are not.
Getting a number for your house
We come out, open the panel, look at the meter and the service entrance, run the load calculation and give you a written, itemized price. There is no trip charge, and the price does not change unless the scope does. When the service is changing, we file the City Light application alongside the SDCI permit so neither one sits waiting on the other. You can read more about how we work across Seattle, or request an estimate or call (253) 508-7529.
About the author
Alexandru Goncear is the owner and CEO of ElectON Enterprise and a Washington-licensed electrician working on residential systems across King, Pierce and Snohomish County. He writes every estimate himself and stays the point of contact through permitting, the work and the final inspection.
ElectON Enterprise. Kent office, closest to Seattle: 1609 Central Ave S Suite E, Kent, WA 98032. Headquarters: 36007 9th Ct SW, Federal Way, WA 98023. Phone: (253) 508-7529. Monday to Friday, 8:00 AM to 5:00 PM, with emergency service 24 hours. Washington electrical contractor license ELECTEL765MN.