About Solar Panels Report

An independent, free site that helps homeowners judge solar offers with honest math and current rules. We don't sell solar or pass anything you type to installers, and no one pays to change a result. How the site makes money.

Why it exists

Solar is sold with big savings estimates, and in 2026 many of them still lean on a tax credit that no longer exists for buyers. Meanwhile leases and PPAs, which kept their credit, are being sold hard. The questions that matter are simple, but they take arithmetic most people can't do at the kitchen table: what does this power cost me per kWh, and what will it save? This site does that arithmetic.

How the site makes money

Right now it doesn't: no ads and no paid links. If that changes, these rules hold:

• No ads on a calculator. Ads may appear on guide and state pages only. The quote checker, comparison, payback, battery, plug-in, system check and guarantee pages never load ads or any outside code.
• No one pays to change a number. Results come from the same math for everyone, and the math is published below.
• Paid links are labeled. The only one is "Get more quotes", shown beside (never inside) a result that says an offer costs more than it saves or that its price is high. It's marked as a paid link, and nothing you entered goes with it.
• We never sell or share what you type. The calculators can't send it anywhere: see privacy.

How the numbers work

• Production: system size × your state's average yearly output per kW (from NREL PVWatts), unless you enter the quote's estimate. Panels lose 0.5% of their output a year.
• What the power is worth: each kWh you'd otherwise buy saves your rate. Power sent to the grid is worth what your state's rules pay for it: the full rate with net metering, less with net billing. Power used the moment it's made (40% by default) always saves the full rate. Anything beyond your home's yearly use earns at most 25% of the rate.
• Prices over time: electricity rises 2.5% a year by default. Lease and PPA payments rise by their escalator.
• Upkeep, for a system you own: one inverter replacement around year 12 (about $2,000 in today's dollars; none with microinverters under a 25-year warranty), plus removing and reinstalling the panels for a new roof (about $250 per panel) if you say the roof will need it, plus any yearly amount you enter. These rise with inflation. A lease or PPA company pays for its own repairs, so nothing is added there.
• Today's dollars: totals are shown as you'd actually pay them, and in today's dollars, with each year's amount reduced by 2.5% a year of inflation (you can change it). The payback year uses actual dollars.
• Cost per kWh: everything you'd pay over the contract (25 years for a system you own), upkeep included, divided by everything it makes.
• Verdict: "saves" when the savings beat the payments by 10% or more; "about break-even" within −5% to +10%; "costs more" below that.
• Batteries: a battery stores daytime solar power that would otherwise go to the grid and gives it back in the evening, where it saves your full rate (or your evening rate, if you enter a time-of-use peak rate) instead of earning the export credit. About 90% of what goes in comes back out. It fills and empties on about 80% of days, but never stores more than the home has spare by day or uses after dark. It holds 2% less each year and we count it for 15 years (warranties are usually 10 years, usually to 70% of the original capacity). Where exported power earns about as much as the battery would give back, storing it saves nothing, and we say so. A typical 13.5 kWh battery costs about $15,650 installed in 2026 (EnergySage: solar battery cost in 2026), with no federal credit. Not counted: backup during outages, payments for letting the utility use your battery, and export credits that pay more at certain hours, so for many homes this is the low end.
• Not included: utility fixed charges that solar doesn't change, and the return your money could earn elsewhere.

Where the data comes from

• Electricity prices and use: U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA), final 2025 data: Annual State Historical Spreadsheets (Form EIA-861, released October 7, 2026) and Electric Power Annual (October 21, 2026) (EIA).
• Sun and production: NREL PVWatts (National Solar Radiation Database), statewide averages (PVWatts).
• Prices and paybacks: EnergySage marketplace reports. Upkeep costs: JouleIO: string inverter vs microinverter, SurgePV: microinverters vs string inverters vs optimizers; EnergySage: roof replacement with solar panels.
• Export credit rules, sales laws and plug-in laws: the sources named on each page, checked on the dates shown.

Rules change often. Every page shows when it was last checked. If you find something out of date, email hello@solarpanels.report.

Who runs it

Solar Panels Report is run by Paris Supply Group LLC, 6150 Center St, Unit 601, Clayton, CA 94517. We aren't paid by solar companies, and nothing here is financial, tax or legal advice.

SolarPanels.Report™ and the sun logo are trademarks of Paris Supply Group LLC.

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