Q cells recc maxion which are the best solar panels to install on your home in 2024 I’m going to be answering that question and introducing you to the top solar panel manufacturer brands in today’s top five best solar panels in 2024. I should start out by saying these are for people that want to have professionally installed solar panels backed by a reputable company and backed by a top-tier tier one manufacturer.
Now, if you’re doing a do-it-yourself solar project, you don’t necessarily need to use any one of these brands. In fact, there are probably some cheaper options available to you if you’re willing to take on the warranty and the service risk on your own. But as far as for this video, this is for homeowners that want to get a full-service professional install with a 25-year or longer warranty.
Jinko Eagle G2 410 Watt Panel: Affordable Option
With that, let’s get into the lineup. All right, coming in at number five on the list is the jeno eagle G2 410 watt panel. You know, the nice thing about the jeno panel is it’s cheap. I mean, that’s really the best I can say about it in terms of solar panel cell technology or efficiency or warranty. There’s nothing really that stands out here, but if what you’re looking for is just a good, cheap, low price per watt panel that’s readily available in high quantities, jeno’s got you covered with that. Now, at one point, they were manufacturing this panel or one of its variants in Florida. I’m not sure if that’s the case this year,
but I know at one point this was a made-in-USA, made-in-Florida solar panel. Of course, jeno is one of the world’s largest solar module manufacturers, both on the residential side and on the commercial side. So, if what you’re looking for is a good solid cheap solar panel that’s backed by a solid company, you can’t really go wrong with the jenko eagle. However, as you can see aesthetically, it’s really nothing to write home about.
The silver frame has kind of gone out of fashion for residential solar panels. So, if you’re planning on installing this on your home, consider what a silver frame panel might look like on your roof. Now, on a ground mount system, that probably doesn’t matter. So again, that could be an excellent option for ground-mounted solar panels. But for roof mount, I don’t really like the aesthetic.
In terms of efficiency performance, it’s nothing to write home about, but again, if you’re doing a ground mount system and you have plenty of space, module efficiency really isn’t that important. As long as you have space to mount the necessary solar panels, the necessary quantity of solar panels, then going with a low price per watt panel like the Jingo Eagle may be a good route for you.
Maxion 7 445 Watt Solar Panel: High Efficiency and Warranty
- All right, coming in at number four is the maxion 7 445 watt solar panel.
- Now, with maxion, what they’re known for is super high efficient solar cells or having the most efficient solar cells, and that’s definitely true here at 24.1% module efficiency.
- When we talk about module efficiency, all we’re talking about is what percentage of the sunlight that hits the surface of the solar panel, what percentage of that is successfully captured and converted into usable electricity.
- The rest of the sunlight, a lot of it gets reflected away, some of it passes straight through the module, some of it is lost in the conversion process, lost as heat.
- When we look at module efficiency, anything over 22% right now I would say is considered a high efficiency module.
- Maxion has excellent performance here at 24.1%.
- Now, the other thing maxion is known for is having one of the best, if not the best, warranty in the industry.
- In fact, if you met with a maxion or with a sunow dealer, chances are the warranty just took up a big part of that sales presentation where they were telling you about how the lifetime performance of the system and having coverage out to 40 years is better than most of the industry right now.
- Although those of you who’ve been following this for a while know that maxion and its former parent company sunpow did go through some sort of a bankruptcy or restructuring a couple of years ago.
- So, I think with the way things are right now in solar, the warranty is only as good as the company giving you the warranty, giving you the guarantee.
- So, 40-year warranty sounds great. Will this company be here in 40 years? We don’t know right now.
- The industry is going through a little bit of a shakeup.
- But the way it exists right now, the way it exists on paper, sunow has one of the best warranties in the industry.
Low Degradation Rate of Maxion Panels
Now, the other thing that sets sunp power apart is its low degradation rate at only a quarter of a percent per year. When we talk about degradation rate, what we’re talking about is solar panels as they age over time, they lose a small percentage of their performance. Now, a typical solar panel is going to lose half a percent of its performance per year. A premium panel like the maxion 7 only loses a quarter of a percent per year. So, in other words, it degrades at only half the rate of a standard panel, which means more total energy produced over the lifetime of the system. Now, a couple of things I don’t like about the maxion 7.
The first you probably see jumps out here, it’s the white back sheet. So, when you have these panels mounted on your roof, unlike a true all-black panel, which is just going to look like one sheet of black glass, having the white back sheet means you’re going to have a little bit of a checkerboard type of effect on your rooftop. Now, I know a lot of you folks out there don’t really care about that or you’re not going to get offended by a small aesthetic detail like that. But those of you who are more aesthetically inclined might choose to go with a true all-black module.
But the thing that I really don’t like about the maxion panel and why I wouldn’t personally choose it is just you pay a very high price premium. Yes, it’s very high efficiency. Yes, it’s got an excellent warranty. But at the end of the day, if I wanted to invest more into my solar system, I wouldn’t spend that extra cash on buying the most efficient solar panels. For somebody like myself,
I would actually look at which inverter system or maybe adding an extra battery or some additional battery storage with my solar as opposed to throwing an extra few thousand dollars into the solar panels. But that’s just me. By the way, if you’re out there and you had solar panels installed on your home within the last year, leave a comment down below. We’d like to hear from you and let us know which brand of solar panel you chose and what your experience has been so far.
Silfab Elite 410 Watt Panel: Value and Aesthetics
All right, coming in at number three is the silfab elite 410 watt all-black solar panel. Now, when we talk about the silab elite, I think this is where you’re going to find some of the best value but with excellent aesthetics and very good efficiency as well. As you can see, the silab elite is more of an all-black design and a lot of the intercell contacts are done on the backside, which allows it to again have more of that true all-black aesthetic.
In terms of performance, it’s sort of right there in that competitive range. So, if we look at the spec sheet here, we can see that the silfab elite 410 offers module efficiency of 21.4%. I wouldn’t really call that a high-efficiency module. I would say that’s in sort of the middle of the range right now. I’m going to say anything over 22% I will call that a high-efficiency solar module, but still overall decent performance and good value.
The other thing where silfab sets itself apart is on the warranty. You do get a 30-year linear performance warranty. When we talk about linear performance, that’s because there’s a certain rate of degradation. The solar panel is going to lose a certain percentage of its performance over time as the solar cells age. In the case of the silfab elite, you’re still guaranteed to have 91% of initial rated power in year 25. This is a slower degradation rate than a standard panel. The silfab panel comes in at a very competitive price point. It is also a made-in-USA product.
Sunboy: Enhancing Customer Experience for Solar Installers
| Silfab Elite 410 | Sunboy Sponsor Information |
|---|---|
| That’s the silfab elite 410. | Just a quick word from our sponsor sunboy. |
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Cells KRON G2 430 Watt Panel: Market Leader in the USA
All right, coming in at number two on the list is the cell’s KRON G2 430-watt solar panel. I believe this is going to be the solar panel that captures the most market share in the United States. This is a made-in-USA product and I actually had a chance to tour the facility where this particular solar panel
