The best solar proposal software in India is the one that can print a correct PM Surya Ghar subsidy slab, the right DISCOM net metering rule, and a GST line that survives the customer’s chartered accountant. That is a narrower test than most global reviews apply. At Heaven Green Energy, a Gujarat-based solar EPC with 10,000+ installations across UGVCL, DGVCL, MGVCL, PGVCL, MSEDCL and BESCOM territory, our design desk has issued proposals on eight of the ten platforms below. This ranking is built on that work, priced in rupees, and honest about where each tool breaks. Top of the list is SurgePV at $1,299 per user per year on the 5-User Team plan, roughly ₹1.07 lakh at ₹83 to the dollar.
Direct answer. SurgePV is the best solar proposal software in India for 2026, at $1,299 per user per year on the 5-User Team plan, roughly ₹1.07 lakh at ₹83 to the dollar. It auto-calculates the PM Surya Ghar central financial assistance (₹30,000 per kW to 2 kW, ₹18,000 for the third kW, ₹78,000 cap), carries state DISCOM tariffs, flags ALMM-listed modules, and outputs a white-label proposal with the single line diagram and bill of quantities attached.
This is a country-specific ranked roundup, not a global feature grid. If you want the worldwide comparison instead, read our solar proposal software guide and the broader solar design software comparison. If you design in India but want the design-first view rather than the proposal-first view, the sibling page is solar design software India.
What Makes a Solar Proposal Software Right for India
An Indian solar proposal carries regulatory content that a US or European proposal never has to. Get any of the five items below wrong and the deal either stalls at the DISCOM or reopens at invoicing. This is why a globally popular tool can still be the wrong buy here.
The five India-specific requirements are: PM Surya Ghar central financial assistance auto-calculation with the correct slab, DISCOM net metering rules that vary by state and by system size, ALMM (Approved List of Models and Manufacturers) and DCR (Domestic Content Requirement) module flags, CEIG (Chief Electrical Inspector to Government) drawing readiness for systems above the state threshold, and GST shown as 13.8 percent effective on a composite EPC supply rather than a flat 12 percent on hardware.
A tool that handles four of five still pushes your designer into Excel for the fifth, and the Excel step is where our team has historically seen the most errors reach the customer. Read the PM Surya Ghar complete guide for the scheme mechanics your proposal has to mirror, and the ALMM list explained page for the module eligibility rules.
Bring one of your own sites to a free SurgePV demo. We will build the 3D roof from a satellite address, run the 8,760-hour shading simulation, and hand you the SLD, BOQ and branded proposal on the call.
Book a free SurgePV demo → Compare pricingThe Heaven Green Proposal Readiness Score
This is the framework we use to shortlist. Each platform is scored out of 5 on five axes, for 25 total. Anything under 17 we will not put in front of an Indian residential customer.
- Subsidy accuracy. Does the tool compute the PM Surya Ghar slab itself, or ask the designer to type a number?
- DISCOM fidelity. Does it carry the actual net metering rule and tariff for UGVCL, MSEDCL, BESCOM, TANGEDCO, JVVNL and the rest, including the size band where the state switches to gross metering?
- Compliance attachments. Can the proposal ship with the SLD, BOQ and an ALMM or DCR declaration without a second tool?
- Commercial correctness. GST, accelerated depreciation for C&I, and a payment schedule the customer’s accountant accepts.
- Speed and cost per proposal. Licence cost divided by realistic monthly proposal throughput.
Applying it: SurgePV scores 23, Arka360 20, The Solar Labs 19, Solar Ladder 18, QuickEstimate 17 (strong on 4 and 5, weak on 2 and 3 by design, since it is a CRM), OpenSolar 13, Aurora 12, Solargraf 11, Pylon 11, Enact 10.
Verdict. The gap between the India-native group and the global group is entirely in axes 1 to 3. If you only sell residential PM Surya Ghar jobs in one state, a lower-scoring tool plus a good spreadsheet can survive. The moment you sell across two DISCOMs or add C&I work, the manual layer becomes the bottleneck.
Top 10 Solar Proposal Software in India Compared
Each price below is the vendor’s own published 2026 figure in the currency that vendor bills in. Indian vendors publish in rupees; the global vendors publish and invoice in dollars, so any rupee figure beside them is a conversion at roughly ₹83 to the dollar rather than a price, and it moves with the exchange rate. Where a vendor publishes nothing, we say so instead of estimating.
| # | Platform | Published price | Key capability | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | SurgePV | $1,299/user/yr, 5-User Team (about ₹1.07 L) | Design, 8,760-hour shading, SLD, BOQ and proposal in one licence | EPCs selling residential and C&I across multiple states |
| 2 | Arka360 | ₹46,000 Lite, ₹70,000 Basic, ₹1,00,000 Premium per year, all +18% GST | India-first design plus proposal with PM Surya Ghar awareness | India-only residential and small commercial installers |
| 3 | The Solar Labs | No separate India price list published | Fast 3D residential design with proposal output | High-volume residential rooftop teams |
| 4 | Solar Ladder | Not publicly listed | Sales pipeline plus proposal built for Indian rooftop sales | Sales-led installers who want CRM and proposal together |
| 5 | QuickEstimate | ~₹36,000 ($435) | Quotation, CRM, WhatsApp follow-up | Small installers whose bottleneck is follow-up, not design |
| 6 | OpenSolar | Core platform free, add-on rates not published | Free design and proposal for basic residential | Solo installers doing 2 to 3 residential jobs a month |
| 7 | Aurora Solar | $1,620/user/yr Basic, $2,640 Premium | Mature US residential sales workflow | Indian teams exporting design work to the US market |
| 8 | Solargraf | $2,799 to $12,999/yr by project volume | Proposal-first with e-signature, Enphase-linked | Teams standardised on Enphase hardware |
| 9 | Pylon | $4.00 per Standard project, $10.00 per Pro project | Interactive web proposals with finance integrations | Markets with lender integrations Pylon supports |
| 10 | Enact | $279/mo for two users on annual billing | Proposal plus lifecycle tracking | Teams wanting post-sale tracking in the same tool |
Two structural points from that table. First, the price gap between India-native and global tools is smaller than it used to look. Arka360 Premium at ₹1,00,000 plus 18 percent GST works out near ₹1.18 lakh a seat, above SurgePV’s ₹1.07 lakh equivalent, while Arka360 Lite at ₹46,000 plus GST is genuinely cheap. Aurora Basic at $1,620 a year, roughly ₹1.34 lakh, is not the multiple of an Indian licence it once was, and OpenSolar’s core costs nothing at all. Second, none of the global tools in positions 7 to 10 will compute your PM Surya Ghar slab, and that remains the reason to buy Indian rather than the licence price.
1. SurgePV
What it does best. SurgePV is the only platform in this list where a designer can go from a satellite address to a signed, branded proposal without opening a second tool. The AI builds the 3D roof, the 8,760-hour hourly simulation produces the P50, P75 and P90 yield, and the proposal carries the single line diagram and bill of quantities as attachments. The PM Surya Ghar slab is computed from the sanctioned system size rather than typed in, and the DISCOM tariff library covers the Gujarat four, MSEDCL, BESCOM, TANGEDCO, JVVNL and the Delhi discoms.
Real pricing. $1,299 per user per year on the 5-User Team plan, $6,495 for five seats, which at ₹83 to the dollar is about ₹1.07 lakh a seat and ₹5.35 lakh for five. The Individual plan is $1,899, roughly ₹1.57 lakh. Free trial, no card. For context we would rather give than have you find: Aurora Basic at $1,620 a year is cheaper than SurgePV Individual, and OpenSolar’s core platform is free.
Who it suits. EPCs and installers issuing 20 or more proposals a month across more than one DISCOM, and anyone who also bids commercial or ground-mount work where a bankable yield report is required by the lender.
Honest limitations. SurgePV is not a CRM. It will not chase your leads, and Indian installers who lose deals to slow follow-up rather than weak proposals should fix that first. The interface ships in nine languages, none of them Indian regional languages, so a Marathi or Tamil-speaking junior designer works in English. The brand is newer than Aurora, which still matters when a large industrial buyer asks who else uses it. Onboarding support runs on English-language hours. And at about ₹1.07 lakh a seat it is not the cheapest option here, so a two-person shop doing five residential jobs a month will find Arka360 Lite better value on published prices, and should get a quote from Solar Ladder before assuming anything about where it lands.
2. Arka360
What it does best. Arka360 was built in India for Indian rooftops, and it shows in the residential design flow and the proposal templates. PM Surya Ghar awareness is present, IS code flags are basic but usable, and support runs on Indian hours, which sounds minor until your designer is stuck at 7pm IST.
Real pricing. Arka360 publishes three India plans: Lite at ₹46,000 a year, Basic at ₹70,000 and Premium at ₹1,00,000, all plus 18 percent GST, with a one-time onboarding fee of ₹10,000 on top. Premium is the only plan that includes SLD output and SketchUp export, and no India plan includes e-signature, so check which features you need before comparing the headline numbers.
Who it suits. India-only residential and small commercial installers who will never design a project outside the country.
Honest limitations. The simulation depth is not at the level IREDA and private lenders expect for larger C&I financing, so a 500 kW factory rooftop still needs a PVsyst or SurgePV report alongside it. The module and inverter database is smaller, and global code coverage is thin if you ever take export work. Watch the plan gating too: SLD output and SketchUp export are Premium-only, and no India plan carries e-signature, so a Lite or Basic seat leaves you assembling the SLD elsewhere.
3. The Solar Labs
What it does best. Speed on residential. The Solar Labs, an Indian platform used widely by rooftop teams, gets a designer from address to a 3D layout and a customer-ready proposal quickly, and the visual output tests well with homeowners. The brand sits under Arka360, though we could not source a formal rebrand announcement or a shared legal entity name, so treat the two as related brands rather than assuming they are one company.
Real pricing. No separate India price list is published for The Solar Labs. Ask for a quote, and price it against the published Arka360 India plans, which are ₹46,000 Lite, ₹70,000 Basic and ₹1,00,000 Premium a year, all plus 18 percent GST with a ₹10,000 one-time onboarding fee.
Who it suits. High-volume residential teams doing 50 or more PM Surya Ghar proposals a month where design throughput is the constraint.
Honest limitations. Commercial and ground-mount work is not its strength, and the electrical detailing needed for a CEIG submission is not produced here. If you need stamped or inspector-ready electrical drawings, you will outsource that step to a design partner such as CEIG drawing services.
4. Solar Ladder
What it does best. Solar Ladder approaches the problem from the sales side rather than the design side. It manages the rooftop sales pipeline, generates the quotation, and tracks the deal through DISCOM stages, which mirrors how an Indian residential installer actually works.
Real pricing. Not publicly listed. Solar Ladder publishes no plan table and no per-seat figure, so any number you see quoted for it in a directory is a third-party guess. Ask for a written quote.
Who it suits. Sales-led installers with a small design team, especially those running franchise or channel-partner networks where deal tracking matters more than shading precision.
Honest limitations. It is not a design engine. Shading analysis and yield modelling are light, so the proposal’s generation number is an estimate rather than a simulation. For a residential 3 kW job that is acceptable. For a 200 kW commercial rooftop with a stack and water tank shading the array, it is not.
Not sure which tier your team needs? Use our solar calculator to size a live project first, then judge each tool by whether its proposal matches those numbers. Talk to our team if you want our design desk’s raw scoring sheet.
5. QuickEstimate
What it does best. Quotation speed and follow-up. QuickEstimate is a solar CRM and quotation tool built for Indian installer sales teams, with WhatsApp follow-up, lead capture and pipeline stages that match how rooftop deals move here. Most Indian installers lose more revenue to unanswered follow-ups than to weak design.
Real pricing. Around ₹36,000 ($435) per user per year, the cheapest paid entry in this list.
Who it suits. Installers who already have design covered and need the sales layer, or teams pairing it with SurgePV for a two-tool stack. See how to write a solar proposal for the structure it produces.
Honest limitations. It does not design. No roof modelling, no shading simulation, no SLD. Treat it as the second half of a stack, not a replacement for a design tool.
6. OpenSolar
What it does best. The core design and proposal tool is free, which is a real advantage for a solo installer or a new business testing the market.
Real pricing. The core platform is free, and it stays free. OpenSolar has said API Access, charged per project on creation, and Connectors, charged as a flat monthly fee, become chargeable from 16 April 2026, but it has not published the rates and they vary by geography. Nobody can honestly tell you what an Indian team will pay for those yet, so we are not going to publish a figure. On sticker price it beats everything else on this page, SurgePV included.
Who it suits. Solo installers doing two or three straightforward residential jobs a month in a single DISCOM area.
Honest limitations. No PM Surya Ghar subsidy engine, no Indian DISCOM tariff library, no Indian support hours, and the free tier degrades quickly on commercial jobs and on states with gross metering above a size threshold. See our OpenSolar alternative comparison for the full breakdown.
7 to 10: The Global Tools and Why They Rank Lower Here
Aurora Solar, Solargraf, Pylon and Enact are all competent products. They rank in the bottom four of this list for one reason: none of them carries the Indian regulatory layer, and all of them price in dollars.
⚠️ Watch out
Dollar-priced licences move against you. A 15 percent rupee slide adds roughly ₹33,000 per seat per year on a $2,640 plan, with no change in what you get.
Aurora Solar (Basic $135 per user per month billed annually, so $1,620 a year or about ₹1.34 lakh; Premium $220 billed annually, so $2,640 a year or about ₹2.19 lakh, with LIDAR modelling and bankable shade reports on Premium and plan sets priced separately) has the deepest US residential sales workflow of any tool here, and its AutoDesigner is mature. Its AI is trained on US roof geometry, so Indian sloped RCC roofs with parapet walls and dish antennas need manual correction. Useful if you do export design work for US customers. Read our Aurora Solar alternative comparison.
Solargraf (sold by project volume, from $2,799 a year for 240 projects and two users up to $12,999 for 1,500 projects, with API access a further $4,000 a year on every tier except Enterprise) is proposal-first with good e-signature flow, and it is the natural pick if your standard inverter is Enphase. There is no PM Surya Ghar logic and no Indian DISCOM library.
Pylon (not a seat licence at all: $4.00 per Standard project and $10.00 per Pro project with no monthly minimum, plus a Solar CRM add-on from $49 per user per month and eSignature at $0.80 per project) makes attractive interactive web proposals and integrates with lenders in the markets it serves. Indian solar loan providers are not among those integrations, so the finance section becomes manual.
Enact ($279 a month covering two users on annual billing, or $299 monthly, with a cap of 10 commercial projects a month, and PVCAD a further $267 a month) covers proposal plus post-sale lifecycle tracking, which is genuinely useful, but the design engine is lighter than the top four here and the India-specific compliance work is again yours.
The honest summary: buy one of these four only if a specific feature (Enphase integration, US export work, lifecycle tracking) matters more to you than the Indian regulatory layer.
PM Surya Ghar, DISCOM and ALMM Rules Your Proposal Must Carry
📘 Regulation note
Per the PM Surya Ghar portal and MNRE, residential systems must use ALMM-listed modules and empanelled vendors, and the subsidy reaches the consumer by direct benefit transfer after meter commissioning. A proposal that shows the subsidy as a discount on the invoice, rather than a post-commissioning DBT credit, will be disputed.
Three regulatory items belong on every Indian residential proposal. The subsidy line: ₹30,000 per kW for the first 2 kW, ₹18,000 for the third kW, capped at ₹78,000 for 3 kW and above, shown as DBT to the consumer’s own bank account, not as a deduction from your quote.
The DISCOM line: name the actual DISCOM, state whether net metering or gross metering applies at the proposed size, and state the export tariff. This varies more than people expect. Gujarat’s four DISCOMs work under the GERC framework, Maharashtra’s MSEDCL runs its own net metering caps, and Karnataka’s BESCOM restricts net metering for some commercial categories. Our net metering in India guide covers the state-by-state picture, and the DISCOM process comparison covers the paperwork.
The module line: state whether the modules are ALMM-listed and whether they meet DCR where the scheme requires domestic cells. The DCR versus non-DCR panels explainer covers the price and eligibility difference. Market context for module availability and pricing is tracked by Mercom India and Bridge to India. Grid and DISCOM performance data sits with the Central Electricity Authority, and the empanelment and benchmark cost rules come from MNRE and the PM Surya Ghar scheme portal.
Should You Buy One Tool or Two?
Most Indian teams above five people end up running two licences: a design and proposal engine, plus a CRM. The single-tool dream fails because design software vendors build weak CRMs and CRM vendors build weak simulation engines.
- ✓ You issue under 15 proposals a month
- ✓ You sell in one DISCOM area only
- ✓ All jobs are residential under 10 kW
- ✓ Your owner personally handles follow-up
- ✗ You run a sales team of three or more
- ✗ You bid C&I work needing bankable yield
- ✗ You sell across multiple states
- ✗ Leads go cold before the site visit
Our own arithmetic: a five-seat SurgePV licence at $6,495, about ₹5.35 lakh, plus a three-seat CRM at roughly ₹1.1 lakh comes to about ₹6.45 lakh a year. Five Aurora Basic seats are $8,100, about ₹6.72 lakh, and five Premium seats $13,200, about ₹10.96 lakh, so the SurgePV plus CRM stack lands under Aurora on either tier while covering both halves of the job. Five Arka360 Premium seats at ₹1,00,000 plus GST come to about ₹5.9 lakh, so on licence cost alone Arka360 is the cheaper five-seat design option.
Five Mistakes Indian Installers Make Buying Proposal Software
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1
Typing the subsidy by hand. A designer who enters ₹78,000 on a 2 kW system has quoted a number the consumer will never receive. That single error has cost teams we know both the deal and the referral.
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2
Quoting net metering economics where gross metering applies. Above the state threshold the export rate drops to the pooled power purchase cost, and the payback in your proposal doubles.
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3
Hiding GST. Show 13.8 percent effective on the composite EPC supply on the proposal itself. Customers who discover it at invoicing renegotiate.
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4
Buying on demo polish instead of throughput. Ask the vendor to design your worst roof, not their showcase roof. A shaded Ahmedabad terrace with a water tank tells you more than any feature list.
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5
Ignoring who signs off. If your projects cross the state CEIG threshold, the proposal has to lead to inspector-ready drawings. Confirm the export format before you buy.
A related failure mode is vendor-side: an empanelment or ranking problem on the portal will sink a technically perfect proposal. See how to check DISCOM empanelment and why your PM Surya Ghar rank matters.
How Heaven Green Energy Helps
Heaven Green Energy runs solar EPC across Gujarat and 25+ cities, with 10,000+ installations completed. Our design desk issues proposals daily under real DISCOM constraints, which is where the scoring above comes from rather than from vendor decks. We use SurgePV internally for design and bankable yield, and we recommend it to the channel partners who ask. For inverter selection questions that feed the bill of quantities, our team references inverter sizing guidance from QBits Energy.
- Residential Solar covers 1 to 10 kW rooftop systems with the PM Surya Ghar application handled for you.
- Commercial Solar covers 10 to 100 kW with accelerated depreciation and GST modelling in the proposal.
- Industrial Solar EPC covers 100 kW and above with performance guarantees and CEIG coordination.
- Solar Calculator sizes a system and shows the subsidy in about a minute.
If you are choosing the best solar proposal software in India for your own team, start with the two India-native tools and SurgePV, run all three on the same difficult roof, and compare the proposals side by side. Then read our solar BOQ software and solar SLD software guides for the attachments your proposal needs.
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Frequently Asked Questions
What is the best solar proposal software in India in 2026?
SurgePV ranks first, at $1,299 per user per year on the 5-User Team plan, roughly ₹1.07 lakh at ₹83 to the dollar. It auto-calculates the PM Surya Ghar subsidy slab, carries state DISCOM net metering rules, flags ALMM-listed modules, and ships the single line diagram and bill of quantities with the proposal. Arka360 and The Solar Labs are the strongest India-native alternatives, and both are good picks for residential-only teams working inside a single state. Arka360 publishes India plans at ₹46,000 Lite, ₹70,000 Basic and ₹1,00,000 Premium a year, all plus 18 percent GST with a ₹10,000 one-time onboarding fee. The Solar Labs publishes no separate India price list and quotes on request.
Is there free solar proposal software for Indian installers?
OpenSolar offers a free design and proposal core, which works for a solo installer doing two or three simple residential jobs a month. The limits show up quickly. There is no PM Surya Ghar subsidy engine, no Indian DISCOM tariff library, and no Indian support hours. OpenSolar has said API Access and Connectors become chargeable from 16 April 2026 but has not published the rates, so the honest position is that the free core stays free and the paid extras are an unknown cost until it publishes them. For anything commercial, budget for a paid tool.
Which solar proposal software handles PM Surya Ghar subsidy automatically?
SurgePV computes the slab from the system size directly. Arka360 handles it partially, and The Solar Labs and Solar Ladder present it in the quotation with some manual setup. The global tools, Aurora, Solargraf, Pylon and Enact, have no PM Surya Ghar logic at all, so the designer enters the number by hand. Always show the subsidy as a post-commissioning direct benefit transfer to the consumer’s bank account, not as a discount on your invoice.
How much does solar proposal software cost in India?
Arka360 publishes India plans at ₹46,000 Lite, ₹70,000 Basic and ₹1,00,000 Premium a year, all plus 18 percent GST with a ₹10,000 one-time onboarding fee. Solar Ladder does not publish pricing at all, and QuickEstimate is near ₹36,000. SurgePV is $1,299 per user per year on the 5-User Team plan, about ₹1.07 lakh, and bundles design, simulation, SLD, BOQ and proposals in that one price. Among the global tools, OpenSolar’s core is free, Pylon charges $4.00 to $10.00 per project, Aurora is $1,620 to $2,640 per user per year, Enact is $279 a month for two users, and Solargraf runs $2,799 to $12,999 a year by project volume. Several of those undercut SurgePV on sticker price. A five-person team should budget ₹5 lakh to ₹9 lakh a year all in.
Does an Indian solar proposal need to show GST?
Yes. Solar EPC contracts in India are treated as a composite supply with a 70:30 goods and services split, giving an effective rate near 13.8 percent. Showing it on the proposal prevents the dispute that follows when the customer sees it first on the invoice. For commercial and industrial buyers, also show the input tax credit position and accelerated depreciation benefit, since both change the effective project cost materially.
Can proposal software produce CEIG-ready drawings?
Not usually. Proposal tools produce a single line diagram suitable for the customer and the DISCOM application. Chief Electrical Inspector to Government approval, which most states require above a defined voltage or capacity threshold, needs detailed electrical drawings prepared to the state inspectorate’s format. SurgePV exports DXF and DWG for a drafting team to finish. Plan for a design partner or an in-house draftsman for that step on larger projects.
Should I pick an Indian platform or a global one?
Pick Indian unless you have a specific reason not to, but buy it for the regulatory layer rather than the price. Arka360 Lite is genuinely cheap at ₹46,000 plus GST, while Arka360 Premium at ₹1,00,000 plus GST costs more per seat than SurgePV and more than Aurora Basic. What the India-native platforms actually give you is the subsidy and DISCOM logic and support in Indian hours. Choose a global tool only for a concrete need: Enphase-standardised hardware points to Solargraf, US export design work points to Aurora. Do not pay a dollar premium for features your customers never see on the proposal.
How do I test a solar proposal tool before buying?
Give every vendor the same difficult real site, ideally a shaded urban terrace with a water tank and a stairwell block. Ask them to produce a full proposal with the correct DISCOM named, the subsidy computed, GST shown, and the bill of quantities attached. Time it. Then have your most junior designer repeat the same job unassisted. Throughput on a hard roof by an average user predicts your real cost per proposal far better than a scripted demo.
Stop paying for four tools. Design it all in one.
SurgePV replaces Aurora + HelioScope + PVsyst + a separate proposal tool in a single license. AI 3D roof in under 60 seconds, bankable 8,760-hour simulation, auto-SLD, BOQ, DXF/DWG export and branded proposals.
Free trial, no credit card · $1,299 per user per year on the 5-User Team planDisclaimer: SurgePV is our own product. It is built by the Heaven Group, the same company as Heaven Green Energy, so treat this as a recommendation from its maker.