// VICTRON VRM API
A worked example of a Victron VRM API dashboard
You want a worked example, not another copy of the API reference. Here’s honestly what it takes to pull Victron VRM data into your own custom dashboard — the endpoints, the polling-vs-MQTT decision, the hosting, and the upkeep that outlasts the build — and how we do the whole thing for you if you’d rather skip it. Rated 4.9 on Google.
- ● Live demo on this site
- ● Built & hosted for you
- ● Worldwide
/01 — THE SHORT ANSWER
Yes — you can build a custom dashboard on the VRM API
Yes — and it’s the right move when the stock VRM screens can’t show what you need. The official VRM API gives you authenticated, read access to your installation’s logged data; you pull it with a personal access token and render it in whatever layout, branding or device you like — which is precisely how a victron vrm api custom dashboard gets built.
What most people want next is a worked example rather than another walk through the reference. So here it is, honestly: you authenticate, discover your idSite, pull the handful of endpoints that carry the data you care about, decide how live it needs to be (polling or MQTT), then host it somewhere that keeps your token safe. None of it is exotic. The catch isn’t the first build — it’s keeping the thing alive once the novelty wears off.
VRM itself is excellent at what it does, and a custom dashboard doesn’t replace it — you keep VRM’s alarms, history and remote console. A custom view just sits alongside it, built on the same official API, for the layouts VRM was never designed to give you.
/02 — THE ENDPOINTS THAT MATTER
The endpoints you actually build on
Four or five endpoints do almost all the work. Once you have a token and an idSite, this is the map:
- Authenticate — create a personal access token in your VRM profile and send it in the X-Authorization header. No password in your code, and you can revoke it any time.
- Installations — list the sites your account can see and read the idSite for the system you’re building on. Every other call keys off that ID.
- Stats — time-series data for charts: state of charge, battery voltage, PV yield, consumption, across a start/end window at your chosen interval.
- Diagnostics — the latest logged value of every parameter the GX device reports. This is the closest thing to a ‘current state’ snapshot the API offers.
- Widgets — pre-shaped data for specific devices (battery summary, solar charger, inverter), handy when you’d rather not assemble a view from raw parameters.
- Overallstats — lifetime and aggregated totals for the ‘since install’ numbers.
Request only the parameters you’ll actually display. A tidy dashboard that pulls six values beats one that drags down everything and shows half of it.
/03 — POLLING VS THE MQTT REALTIME OPTION
How ‘live’ does it really need to be?
The single most important thing to understand: the VRM API is not a real-time feed. It serves logged data at your system’s logging interval — 15 minutes by default, configurable on the GX device. That’s perfect for charts, daily yield and lifetime totals, but it means a dashboard that only polls the API is always a little behind reality.
For a genuinely live view — state of charge ticking, load jumping as the kettle goes on — you take the other path: MQTT, which is the same stream VRM’s own real-time data uses. You can subscribe locally on the LAN to the GX device’s own broker (Cerbo GX, Venus GX or an older Color Control), or remotely through Victron’s VRM MQTT broker — the path a hosted, worldwide dashboard uses to reach live data without ever being on site. So the honest design decision is:
- Poll the API when ‘updates every few minutes’ is fine — it’s the simplest thing to build and host.
- Subscribe to MQTT when you need second-by-second live values — more moving parts (a persistent connection, and a keep-alive when you go through the VRM broker), but genuinely real-time.
One constraint worth knowing early: non-Victron data can only join the picture through the GX device. A tank sensor or a third-party meter has to reach VRM via the GX first — the API won’t accept arbitrary outside data.
/04 — RATE-LIMIT COURTESY & HOSTING
Be a good API citizen, then find it a home
The API is generous but not infinite, and courtesy keeps you out of trouble. Cache on your server, poll at a sane interval, and back off when you get an error rather than retrying in a tight loop. If ten browsers open your dashboard, they should all read from your cache — not fire ten fresh calls at Victron.
Which brings up the part beginners skip: this needs somewhere to live. Your access token must never sit in browser JavaScript where anyone could read it, so you put a small server or proxy in the middle. It holds the token, talks to the VRM API, caches the results, and serves clean data to your front-end — browser, wall-mounted TV, or website embed.
That’s not theory for us. Our own off-grid support van runs exactly this pattern: a server-side proxy holds a read-only token and feeds two live dashboards from the official VRM API, so the credentials never touch the public page. It’s a modest bit of infrastructure, but it’s the difference between a demo that works on your laptop and one that runs unattended for years.
/05 — THE PART EVERYONE UNDERESTIMATES
Building it is a weekend. Keeping it running is forever.
Here’s the honest bit the tutorials leave out. The first version, on your own screen, is genuinely satisfying — and it’s the easy 20%. Then reality arrives:
- Tokens get revoked, rotated or expire — and when one dies, the dashboard goes blank with no warning unless you built one.
- The API evolves. Fields get added, shapes shift, deprecations land. Code that worked last year quietly starts returning nulls.
- Hosting needs upkeep — patches, certificate renewals, the server rebooting at 3am and not bringing your service back up.
- Someone has to notice when it silently stops. A dashboard nobody trusts is worse than no dashboard at all.
None of this is hard in isolation. It’s that it never ends, and it always lands on the one person who understood the code — usually while they’re meant to be doing their actual job. That ongoing ownership, not the initial build, is the real cost of a custom dashboard — and it’s exactly the part we take off your plate.
/06 — SEE IT RUNNING LIVE
Watch it work on our own off-grid van
We don’t ask you to take this on trust from a slide deck. Our own off-grid support van — the 365 Crafter — is live on this site right now. It’s a real vehicle with a Cerbo GX running Venus OS, MPPT solar and a lithium battery bank, and its data streams through the official VRM API onto our public page.
On our custom VRM dashboards page you can watch the same van rendered in two completely different dashboard styles — proof that once you’re building on the API, the layout and branding are yours, not VRM’s fixed template. There’s also a fleet-style demo where several vehicles appear on one screen; only the van is real live data, and it’s clearly labelled as such, so you’re never misled about what you’re looking at.
It’s the worked example the search results don’t give you: not a code snippet buried in a forum thread, but a running dashboard you can open, poke at, and judge for yourself.
/07 — WHAT IT COSTS
Pricing is quote-based — here’s what moves it
We don’t publish a price, because no two of these jobs are the same and a made-up number would be dishonest. Every dashboard is quoted from what you actually need. The things that move the figure:
- How much data — a handful of KPIs versus a rich multi-panel layout with history.
- Live or polled — MQTT real-time is more work than periodic polling.
- How many sites — one van, or a whole fleet on one screen.
- Branding & devices — your colours and logo, a website embed, or a wall-mounted TV/kiosk.
- Hosting & ongoing support — the upkeep above, handled by us so it just keeps working.
Tell us the shape of what you want and we’ll give you a straight quote. We build, host and support it as a done-for-you service, worldwide — delivered remotely, with response times measured against UK office hours (Mon–Fri, 9–5 UK time).
One thing we’ll always be straight about: we’re an independent service and are listed in Victron Energy’s Recommended Software Integrator Program — though not a Victron dealer, distributor or reseller. Victron and VRM are their trademarks; our work simply builds on their official, public API.
// RELATED
Related: live custom VRM dashboards, customise your VRM dashboard, white-label Victron monitoring, embed VRM on your website, Victron Grafana dashboards, and off-grid Victron energy. The same official API also supports downloading GPS tracks — part of what powers the route history behind Victron GPS tracking and boat GPS tracking.
FAMILY-RUN SINCE 1995 · ★ 4.9 ON GOOGLE · 200+ COMPUTERS UNDER OUR CARE · NO FIX, NO FEE · SAME-DAY REMOTE SUPPORT
// GOOD QUESTIONS
Frequently asked
Is there an official worked example of a VRM API dashboard?
Not really. Victron’s API documentation is excellent as a reference, and there are community scripts on GitHub, but there’s no polished, end-to-end example showing a finished custom dashboard. That gap is exactly why we built one you can see live — our own van on the custom dashboards page — so you can judge the result, not just read the endpoints.
Can the VRM API give me real-time data?
No — and it’s important to know that up front. The API returns logged data at your system’s logging interval, 15 minutes by default. For a genuinely live dashboard you subscribe to MQTT — either from the GX device on the local network, or remotely through Victron’s VRM MQTT broker — which is the same stream VRM’s own real-time data uses. We’ll advise which path fits your goal; often a blend — live tiles over MQTT, history over the API — is the right answer.
What do you need from me to build it?
Two things, mainly. A Victron GX device (a Cerbo, Venus GX or similar) logging to VRM — the API only carries data that reaches VRM through a GX. And appropriate VRM access: either a read-only personal access token or an invite to the installation, so we can pull your data without ever needing your password. From there we handle the build, the hosting and the upkeep.
Can I put the finished dashboard on my own website?
Yes — a common request, and very different from VRM’s own share links, which are read-only and update only at the logging interval. Because we build on the API and host it ourselves, we can embed a live, branded panel straight into your site. See embedding Victron VRM on your website for how that works.
Do I have to keep a server running myself?
Something has to hold your access token and talk to the VRM API on the dashboard’s behalf — the token can never live in a browser, where anyone could read it. That means a small server or proxy. If we build it for you, that hosting is part of the service and we keep it patched and monitored, so ‘keeping a server running’ never becomes your problem.
Are you affiliated with or certified by Victron?
No. We’re an independent service and are listed in Victron Energy’s Recommended Software Integrator Program — though not a Victron dealer, distributor or reseller — Victron and VRM are their trademarks. Everything we build uses their official, public VRM API exactly as it’s intended to be used. We think highly of VRM; a custom dashboard adds views on top of it, it doesn’t replace it.
Can you just build and run the whole thing for us?
Yes — that’s the point of this service. You tell us what you want to see and where; we design it, build it on the VRM API, host it, and keep it running — worldwide, delivered remotely. You skip the tokens, the polling logic, the hosting and the 3am reboots. Start with our live dashboards, then get a quote.
Why not just use VRM’s Advanced tab?
For many people the Advanced tab is enough — it’s genuinely good, and if it does the job you should use it. But the main VRM dashboard layout is fixed, custom widgets are limited to around six parameters, and there’s no branded, one-screen multi-site view. When you hit those edges, a custom dashboard on the API is the honest next step — not before.
If you build it for us, can it be deployed to our own site rather than yours?
Yes — and for API-minded teams that is often the better route. We deploy to a subdomain of your site (say dash.yourcompany.co.uk): your own VRM token sits in a single server-side file that the relay reads, so it never appears in the page code, and the SFTP login you give us reaches only that subdomain’s folder — nothing else. The whole stack lives on your hosting at your domain, so long-term ownership stays with you; it’s the same architecture our own live demo runs on.
Skip the build. Keep the dashboard.
We design, build, host and maintain your custom Victron VRM dashboard on the official API — proven live on our own off-grid van. Quote-based, worldwide, done for you.
01202 775566 · help@365techies.co.uk · MON–FRI 9AM–5PM