Solar Savings Calculator (2026)
Estimate your payback period and lifetime savings now that the federal residential solar tax credit has ended for post-2025 installations. Change any input to match your home — nothing is stored on a server and we never ask for your phone, email, or address.
Verdict
Weak
Estimated simple payback: 19.0 years
Based on 15.0¢/kWh electricity, 1,300 kWh/kW·yr production, and a 65% export credit.
Estimated system size
8.8 kW
11,505 kWh/year
Estimated system cost
$26,549
No federal credit in 2026
First-year savings
$1,395
Bill offset in year one
25-year net savings
$18,658
Breaks even year 18
Sensitivity range
25-year net savings if electricity prices rise slower (2%/yr) vs faster (5%/yr):
How to read this
Assumptions
These are the default inputs behind the estimate. Change them in the calculator to match your home.
- Federal residential tax credit set to 0% for 2026 (advanced mode can simulate old scenarios).
- System auto-sized to offset ~90% of your annual usage unless you set a size.
- Roof sun multipliers: poor 0.75, average 0.90, good 1.00, excellent 1.08.
- Self-consumption 45% without a battery, 70% with a battery.
- Panels degrade 0.5%/year; a mid-life inverter replacement and $150/yr maintenance are included in the 25-year projection.
Sources
State electricity prices and production come from the generated data set; each state page lists its exact sources and last-updated date.
- IRS — Residential Clean Energy CreditFederal residential credit not available for property placed in service after Dec 31, 2025.
- U.S. EIA — Electricity dataResidential electricity prices by state.
- NREL PVWatts v8Solar production modeling.
How to estimate solar savings in 2026
For years, the 30% federal tax credit did a lot of the heavy lifting in solar math. With that credit gone for systems placed in service after December 31, 2025, whether solar pays off comes down to four local numbers: your electricity rate, how much a system produces where you live, what you pay per watt to install it, and how your utility credits the energy you export. This calculator turns those inputs into a payback period, a first-year saving, and a 25-year net-savings figure so you can see the whole picture rather than a single headline number.
Start with your real monthly electric bill and the rate from that bill — it's prefilled from your state's data, but your actual rate is what matters. The calculator estimates your annual usage, sizes a system to cover roughly 90% of it, and prices the install at a cost per watt you can adjust to match real quotes (the typical U.S. residential range is $2.40–$3.80 per watt). It then values the energy you generate: power you use as it's produced offsets electricity at your full retail rate, while power you export is credited at your utility's export rate, which is often lower than retail.
The 25-year projection is where the long-term case is won or lost. It grows your savings as utility rates rise (3.5% per year by default), trims them as panels slowly degrade (0.5% per year), and subtracts ongoing maintenance plus a mid-life inverter replacement. The result is a break-even year and a plain-English verdict. Because rate increases are the single biggest unknown, we also show a sensitivity range for a slower (2%) and faster (5%) rate-growth world.
A few tips: if your roof is shaded or faces away from south, drop the roof-sun quality; if your utility pays below retail for exports, selecting a lower export credit — or adding a battery to use more of your own power — will reflect that. And if you want to compare owning versus a lease or PPA, head to the buy vs lease calculator. Every figure here is an estimate, not a quote or tax advice — for state-specific context, open your state solar guide.