1 week Ago By The Independent
If you’re interested in generating your own cheap solar power and you’re ready to choose a company to fit your solar panels and connect them to your home, this is the guide for you. There are about 4,000 solar installers in the UK, making the choice a dizzying one. But most only operate in certain areas, thinning the field for many homeowners.
We compared price , warranty and customer satisfaction to choose the best solar panel fitters. Our top pick is Glow Green, because of its 14 years in the market and competitive pricing. But if access to certain panels, or a longer guarantee are your top priorities, then we may have a better fitter for you on our expert list.
Whatever your budget, there are a range of companies in the UK supplying solar panels and services to suit all homes and needs. Our choices are certified by either MCS, the Flexible Energy Oversight Registration Body (Flexi-Orb), or both. Finding a fitter with one of these certifications is important, as it ensures that they have the know-how to fit the panels and other electrical equipment – some of it high voltage – safely.
The law does not require fitters to have these certifications, but they do give customers some comfort that fitters know what they are doing. Best solar panel companies at a glance Best overall: Glow Green Glow Green has been around as a company for the joint-longest in our list and offers a fixed cost guarantee, which will appeal to many buyers looking to keep to a budget. It’s also one of the cheapest options on the market.
As well as being affordable, Glow Green has access to high-power 500w panels from Chinese firm Perlight, whereas most competitor panels push out 400-450 watts. These are a good option if your roof space is limited, as you will get maximum output for the area that you have. Panels are one of the cheaper parts of a solar installation – most money goes on scaffolding and labour costs.
Perlight panels also offer a 30-year guarantee, the longest we have seen in the UK, which may provide some comfort for those who don’t want to have to rent scaffolding again for a while. Perlight panels boast high pressure resistance, meaning they should be able to weather the bumps, bangs and weather that 30 years on a roof will throw at them. Glow Green will also fit DMEGC Infinity panels, which came top of our best solar panels roundup .
DMEGC is considered a Tier-1 manufacturer, an industry term for the biggest and longest-running solar panel makers, which have solid financial strength. The status is not a be-all and end-all for solar panel buyers but does indicate that a company has a good chance of honouring its guarantees and that its manufacturing processes are solid, which is useful bearing in mind how long the panels need to last. The DMEGC Infinity solar panel provides a good compromise between power output, long warranty and decent power longevity, offering more than 87 per cent of its box-fresh output after 30 years.
Glow Green can fit heat pumps, EV chargers , boilers and air conditioning units. The company is also a Tesla Premium certified installer and a Duracell platinum partner for battery fittings. This means picking them affords some choice when it comes to panels, batteries and other gear.
Choosing to get a heat pump, perhaps using the government’s grant scheme to save money, whilst getting solar panels and other green goods at the same time could be a way to negotiate a better deal. We went along to watch a Glow Green installation, so we can attest to the quality of the company’s work. Pros: Cons: Top customer satisfaction score: Solar4Good Solar4Good is a family-run business set up in 2021, but drawing on its founders' 15 years of solar industry experience.
Like most on the list, the company is MCS certified. MCS sets standards for low carbon products like solar panels, heat pumps and battery storage, and the companies which fit them. Solar4Good has HIES Membership, NAPIT Registration & Trustmark Endorsement.
It also has the joint-highest online customer review score. The company’s website is easy to use and has a comprehensive section answering many questions for potential customers. Reviewers say the firm’s aftercare is particularly good.
The firm also has plenty of offices dotted around the country, including Birmingham, Manchester, Exeter, Glasgow and Leicester, as well as its headquarters in Harrow. As with other fitters we have reviewed, the firm also fits EV chargers and battery storage which can help you make even more of your investment in solar panels. Solar batteries are great for homes that use a lot of electric power such as through electric car charging , a heat pump or lots of activity during the day.
You can use them as a sort of time machine, to store sunlight power and use it at night. Just be careful if you are a light user of power, since they are still quite expensive and you may be better off selling your unused electricity to the grid during the day and simply buying it back later. If you run a business and want solar panels – a great option if you have your own premises such as a factory or warehouse – then Solar4Good can quote for these installations, too.
Pros Cons Best for high-end panels: Heatable Heatable distinguishes itself by having exclusive access to high quality REA Fusion2 panels. These offer a longer useable life than other panels, although they come at a cost premium to match. The company is a Tesla Premium Partner for batteries and holds Which? approval for both solar and heating equipment.
Its quotes are fixed, with any additional costs such as unforeseen structural issues or existing electrical faults being picked up in the survey they perform before beginning work. Heatable has one of the best online review scores. Customers say they can tackle older properties and that they would recommend the company to their friends.
Heatable’s website offers an online design process, so you can use satellite imagery to estimate how many solar panels you can get on your roof, and thus how much solar power can be supplied. We found this quite easy to use and it gave a very good indication of what a solar array would look like. REA panels, which are one of our top solar panel picks , use micro inverters fitted to each panel.
Inverters turn the direct current that the panels provide into alternating current which your home ring main uses. Many setups use one centralised inverter and they usually require a certain amount of power to get going, meaning that some setups can’t make use of low light conditions to generate power. REA says that its micro inverters, fitted to every panel, are more efficient in generating power on darker days.
It also means that an inverter failure does not affect the rest of the array. The inverters will also benefit from the guarantee the panels get: 25 years. The panels are double sided so sunlight can be absorbed on both sides.
You may ask: When it will be fitted to the roof, why bother? Well, some light will pass through the panel, reflect off your roof and enter through the back. Panels with this feature can generate up to 20 per cent more energy. Engineered in Australia, the manufacturers say these cells are built to last and they top our chart for efficiency and degradation.
They also have a minimalist all-black design, which is useful if you want to keep your solar installation low-profile. REA says its cells also have separate zones which mean that less power is lost should part of the array end up in the shade from trees, clouds or other buildings. And they make use of lower AC voltage for safety reasons.
REA panels are quite expensive, though. Pros: Cons: Best for solar subscriptions: Sunsave Sunsave differs from the other installers on this list in that it offers a long-term 20-year loan on your solar system, meaning there is no up-front cost. The company says that some users could save a third off their electricity bill from day one.
The setup comes with a battery, so you will get the most use out of the power you generate, so long as everything is set up to maximise solar use. The interest rate is very low, at 3.3 per cent per year, making it comparable to a mortgage rate.
Sunsave offers free replacements for parts such as batteries and inverters, which may come to the end of their working lives before solar panels do. The company says: “Under the Sunsave Guarantee, whether in warranty or not, we’ll replace any equipment that isn’t working to a suitable level of performance – so the customer has peace of mind their system will be working to at least the projected levels for at least 20 years.” This is a good option if you want solar, use plenty of power and have loads of roof space, but would prefer to borrow to fund the purchase.
The length of the loan means you’ll probably also need to be planning on staying in your home for a long time, although Sunsave says the loan can be transferred to a new owner. You’ll also want to make the most of any power you sell back to the grid, snagging the best deals for exporting. Adding interest payments to the mix theoretically lengthens the time it takes to break even on the equipment.
With other suppliers, when paying upfront it can take anywhere from five to 13 years or even more to break even, depending on the size of your array, your energy usage – both the volume and when in the day – and future electricity prices over the next few decades. But with so many variables to factor in, you may decide a fixed period of 20 years is a fair deal if you save a little money during that period and get free electricity after that. Pros Cons Best for long warranty: Project Solar UK Project Solar has also been around since 2011, making it the joint longest-running solar installation firm.
The company has served more than 45,000 customers since launching. The firm is based in Burton-on-Trent but covers Wales and England, except for London. Project Solar’s big selling point is that it offers a lengthy 10-year warranty for its work.
Generally, most problems will crop up in a year or two after the weather has had a proper chance to put your panels through their paces. But the extra coverage on what is a multi-decade investment could prove attractive to some buyers. The firm uses Evolution Evo panels, which output a healthy 480-490 watts apiece, and can be installed within a day, 90 per cent of the time Project Solar is accredited by Flexi-Orb and it offers a full survey before quoting to avoid cost increases as work gets underway.
As with others, ground-mount installations are offered, which are cheaper but will eat up land, making it less useful for other things. Reviewers liked the speed of the work and the punctuality and professionalism of the installers. One thing to note is that 10 per cent of the online reviews are one star, although 80 per cent are five star.
Other fitters have fewer unhappy reviews. Pros Cons How we chose the best solar panel installers We compared price, warranty and customer satisfaction to choose the best solar panel fitters. We also chose fitters that have broad national coverage.
There are about 4,000 companies or traders who fit solar panels in the UK, so there is plenty of choice and you may find a trusted operator in your area that did not make the list. Which solar panel system should I pick? Only pick reputable companies that have accreditation with schemes like MCS or Flexi-Orb. It’s also worth looking out for other scheme memberships like the government-backed TrustMark, the Energy Performance Validation Scheme (EPVS), the National Inspection Council for Electrical Installation Contracting (NICEIC) or the Home Insulation and Energy Systems Contractors Scheme (HIES).
Companies that have good reviews and a long track record are also good choices – being national is not necessarily an indicator of quality. Can any electrician fit a solar panel system? No. Solar panel systems are highly specialist and, because they work with high voltages, can be dangerous if incorrectly installed.
You’ll need a qualified and certified electrician to install and connect your new panels to your home and the national grid. For the same reason, you won’t be able to fit them yourself either..
