Abstract The increasing share of renewable energies in modern energy systems requires effective solutions to help harmonizing energy supply and demand. Fluctuating energy prices have been incentivizing customers, including manufacturing companies, to identify and build up technical solutions and abilities to profit financially from fluctuating energy prices. Therefore, energy flexibility has gained major attention in research and among industry practitioners. This paper overviews the topic of energy flexibility and discusses associated opportunities, risks and trends. Besides, an assessment methodology to identify potentials for energy flexibility in the factory environment is proposed. Furthermore, practical and conceptual examples to augment energy flexibility in the factory environment are given. In addition, a new concept for (energy) flexible factory environments is presented.