UK Solar PV Deployment Statistics

The United Kingdom had almost 14 GW of installed solar photovoltaic capacity as of April 2022, in the words of a parliamentary answer, "which is enough to power more than 3 million homes"¹. The official deployment series is maintained as accredited official statistics and published monthly, and the most recent Energy Trends release carries solar photovoltaics deployment data for the UK for the period up to the end of June 2026². On the domestic side, 1,498,949 UK homes had solar panels recorded by April 2024³, and a Commons research briefing counts 1,366,599 owner-occupier installations as of April 2026⁴.

Those two numbers, total capacity and domestic installation counts, measure different things and are often confused. Capacity counts every panel in the country, from a four-panel rooftop to a utility-scale solar farm, and it is the figure used when government talks about targets, such as the ambition to grow current capacity of around 20GW to 45-47GW of solar nationally by 2030². Installation counts measure how many separate systems exist, and the domestic subset of those is the closest available measure of how many households generate their own electricity. This page sets out both series, where the numbers come from, what has driven the swings between boom and bust years, and what the deployment data does and does not tell a household thinking about energy independence. The wider picture across all home energy technologies is on our UK home energy statistics guide.

How the monthly figures are calculated

The headline deployment series is a government statistical release, published under the title Solar PV Deployment, that appears roughly monthly and carries accredited official statistics status. That status matters: releases going back years, including those covering periods to the end of April 2021, the end of May 2016 and the end of November 2017, all carry the accreditation, which means they have been assessed against the standards expected of national statistics⁸. Each release covers the monthly deployment of all solar photovoltaic capacity in the United Kingdom, and the same series feeds the renewables section of the quarterly Energy Trends publication, whose tables show deployment of all solar photovoltaic capacity in the United Kingdom⁹. The Energy Trends release of 30 July 2026 states that its solar photovoltaics deployment figures include data for the UK for the period up to the end of June 2026².

The releases are scheduled in advance. The December 2026 solar PV deployment statistics are scheduled for release at 9:30am on 28 January 2027¹⁰. If you want to follow the series yourself, the announcement pages list each upcoming publication, and our guide to official UK energy statistics explains the release calendar and how to read the accompanying notes on revisions and accreditation.

Two definitions shape what the numbers count. First, capacity is grouped into bands by size, and the bands separate domestic rooftops from everything else: at the end of December 2017, small scale installations of 0 to 4 kW, the typical domestic rooftop size, accounted for 20% of total capacity, while large scale installations greater than 5 MW accounted for 46%¹¹. Second, a stand-alone installation is defined in the feed-in tariff guidance as one "not wired to provide electricity to a building"¹², which is why some capacity in the tables sits outside the household story entirely. A household reading the monthly release should look at the 0 to 4 kW band for the closest match to a domestic rooftop system.

Capacity: from 2.7 GWp to almost 14 GW

The growth over a decade is stark. In 2014 the government's solar strategy recorded that "currently, there is 2.7 GWp of PV capacity in the UK", deployed on over half a million buildings¹³. The year before, total capacity had grown by almost 1,000 MWp during 2013 alone, and solar PV accounted for 14 per cent of renewable electricity capacity in the UK at the end of 2013¹³.

By the end of December 2017, overall UK solar PV capacity stood at approximately 12.75 GW, or 12,748 MW¹¹. The composition of that total shows why capacity and household counts diverge: 46% (5,893 MW) came from large scale installations greater than 5 MW, with 20% (2,531 MW) coming from small scale 0 to 4 kW installations¹¹. The 2017 total represented an increase of 32% (3,057 MW) compared to December 2015¹¹. In October 2018 a ministerial statement put the figure at over 13 gigawatts, "enough to power over 3 million homes"¹⁴, and by April 2022 a parliamentary answer recorded almost 14 GW, noting that "more than 99% of the UK solar PV capacity deployed since May 2010"¹.

Two features of that growth curve matter for a householder. The first is that most of the capacity is not on homes: nearly half sits in large scale ground-mounted systems, so the national capacity figure says little about how many households generate their own power. The second is the land footprint, which is small: the UK Solar Roadmap states that solar deployment today uses 0.1% of total UK land¹⁵. The strategy that guided the early growth set out the principle that "support for solar PV should deliver genuine carbon reductions that help meet the UK's target of 15 per cent renewable energy from final consumption by 2020"¹⁶, and the 2014 strategy projected that about 10 to 12 GWp of solar PV could be deployed in the UK by the end of the decade¹³, a projection the 2017 actual of 12.75 GW exceeded¹¹.

Number of homes fitted, not power output

The domestic series tells its own story. In 2017 Ofgem's Future Insights work noted that "there are around 900,000 photovoltaic installations across the UK"¹⁷, and a government literature review from November 2016 put the figure at 898,029 installations, a provisional figure at that date¹⁸. Those counts cover all installations, but the domestic share dominates the small scale bands.

The clearest year-on-year series comes from Uswitch's green home statistics, which record domestic solar panel installations each April:

The pattern is a long plateau followed by acceleration. Domestic solar panels in the UK stood at 1,498,949 installations as of April 2024³, and solar panel installations have been increasing by more than 10% every year for the last three years⁶. A Commons research briefing records 1,366,599 owner-occupier installations⁴, a figure that counts a narrower group than the domestic totals above, so the two series differ because of what they count rather than because either is wrong.

Despite that growth, solar remains a minority technology in the housing stock. Ofgem's consumer survey evidence put solar PV prevalence in domestic properties at around 3 to 4 per cent as of 2021¹⁹, and even the later installation counts leave well over nine in ten UK homes without panels. The domestic counts also include a small number of non-home systems: Carbon Brief's breakdown of MCS installations by property type since 2009 records 10,100 on other properties in England and Wales⁵. For the certified installation series as a whole, see our page on MCS installation statistics, and for the closed scheme that drove the early boom, our feed-in tariff installation statistics.

Factors behind month to month changes

The single biggest driver of the monthly installation numbers, historically, was the feed-in tariff and its changing rates. The clearest illustration is 2012: installations reached 26,941 in March 2012, then fell to 5,522 in April 2012, according to MCS figures, as tariff cuts took effect⁵. The same mechanism worked in reverse before each reduction. Installations hit 25,614 in December 2015, but this came ahead of a further feed-in tariff reduction in February 2016⁵. Households rushed to lock in the higher rate, then the market fell away.

After the feed-in tariff closed, the monthly numbers settled at a lower level before recovering. Carbon Brief records May 2023 seeing 17,787 installations, the 12th highest month on record at that point, and June 2023 seeing 18,049, the 11th highest⁵. Those months formed part of what the analysis described as a surge in heat pumps and solar driving a record for UK homes in 2023⁵.

Underneath the policy swings sit the slower drivers the strategy documents describe: the falling cost of panels, the 2013 capacity boom of almost 1,000 MWp in a single year¹³, and the guiding principle that support should deliver genuine carbon reductions toward the 2020 renewable energy target¹⁶. The regional pattern also reflects the feed-in tariff era, because the scheme's uptake shaped where capacity was built first. For the current monthly series, the accredited releases are the reference point⁸, and our guide to reading UK energy statistics explains how to treat revisions and provisional figures.

Goals and how far off we remain

The forward-looking numbers are large compared with the installed base. A government consultation from August 2023 stated that "it is expected that solar capacity will increase from 14GW today to 70GW by the end of the decade"²⁰. The methodology behind official job estimates for the solar sector assumes up to 47 GW of installed solar PV capacity is deployed by 2030 in Great Britain⁶. Further out, the Seventh Carbon Budget analysis has solar capacity increasing to 82 GW by 2040⁷.

Against those numbers, the Climate Change Committee's 2025 progress report to Parliament is blunt: "the roll-out of solar appears significantly off track and will need to improve to deliver its contribution to decarbonisation"²¹. The gap is wide by any measure. Moving from almost 14 GW in 2022¹ to 70 GW within a decade²⁰ would mean deploying several times the entire existing fleet, and the domestic sector, at 3 to 4 per cent prevalence in 2021¹⁹, would need to grow several times over to contribute its share.

There is a precedent for projections being beaten. In 2013 the government estimated that solar capacity would reach 10 to 12 gigawatts by 2020¹⁴; the actual figure passed 12.75 GW by the end of 2017¹¹. Equally, the 2014 strategy's ambition of one million roof installations by the end of 2015¹³ was not met on the domestic side until the April 2021 count passed 1,067,693³. Projections in this sector have run in both directions.

The spread across England, Scotland and the regions

The regional pattern within the UK is uneven, and Scotland stands out. Ofgem's feed-in tariff quarterly data shows that "in Scotland solar PV makes up only 37.89% of installed capacity", whereas in all other regions it accounts for over 74 per cent²². The reason is not that Scotland has no solar; it is that Scotland's renewable capacity is weighted much more heavily towards wind and hydro, so solar forms a smaller share of a different mix.

For a household, the practical significance is that the national capacity figure conceals very different local markets. The monthly deployment releases break capacity down by size band and region, and the MCS certification data can be read down to local authority level, which is where the real variation appears: installation rates differ markedly between areas with similar sunshine, because uptake has tracked income, housing type and the historical feed-in tariff take-up as much as climate. Our page on renewable installations by local authority shows how to read that data for your own area, and which UK nation has the highest renewable uptake compares the four nations directly.

The generation side of the picture, as distinct from installed capacity, is covered in our renewable generation statistics by UK nation page. The two tell different stories: capacity measures what has been built, generation measures what it actually produces, and Scotland's lower solar share is largely a capacity-mix effect rather than a generation failure.

What installation rates reveal about energy self sufficiency

Read through the lens of energy independence, the deployment statistics carry a clear message in both directions. On one side, the growth is real and accelerating: domestic installations rose from 934,486 in April 2018 to 1,498,949 in April 2024³, more than 5% of all UK households now have MCS-certified solar PV⁵, and the record start to 2026 reported by MCS suggests the trend has continued¹⁰. A home with panels generates a meaningful share of its own electricity, which is the first step away from total dependence on a supplier.

On the other side, the same data shows how much dependence remains. Over nine in ten UK homes have no solar at all³. A panel system without storage still needs the grid for every evening, every winter week and every period of low generation, and the deployment statistics say nothing about whether the installed systems include batteries, which is what converts daytime generation into genuine self-sufficiency. The national capacity total, at almost 14 GW in 2022¹, is dominated by large scale installations that serve the grid rather than any household¹¹.

The targets also frame the independence question. If capacity reaches 70 GW by the end of the decade as the consultation expects²⁰, much of that will be utility scale, and household independence will still depend on the decisions individual families make about their own roofs. The Climate Change Committee's finding that the roll-out is significantly off track²¹ means the national contribution is currently falling short of what the decarbonisation pathway assumes. For what the data says about household energy independence across all technologies, see our dedicated market data and energy independence analysis, and for the capacity question in more depth, how much solar capacity does the UK have.