The best solar proposal software in UK use is not the prettiest PDF generator. It is the one that produces a document an MCS auditor, a DNO engineer and a sceptical homeowner will all accept without a follow-up phone call. That is a narrower requirement than the global proposal market assumes. A UK residential quote has to carry the MCS certification number, a SAP 10 calibrated performance estimate, the Smart Export Guarantee (SEG) tariff assumption the savings are built on, the zero-rated VAT position on domestic installations, and an honest connection timeline once the system crosses 3.68 kW per phase. Most proposal tools sold into the UK were built for the American or Australian market and handle two of those five. Across the ten platforms benched below, the one that handles all five without a paid add-on is SurgePV at roughly £1,030 per user per year on the 5-User Team plan.
Direct answer. The best solar proposal software in the UK for 2026 is SurgePV, at about £1,030 per user per year on the 5-User Team plan. It bundles MCS-aware proposal templates with the SAP 10 performance estimate, a supplier-level SEG export tariff library, zero-rated VAT handling for domestic jobs, G98/G99 connection flags and 8,760-hour shading behind every quote. Easy PV is the cheapest UK-native paid alternative at £35 per user per month, and OpenSolar’s core platform is free.
This ranking is written for MCS-certified installers, contractor sales teams and small EPC firms in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland who send more than five quotes a month. Every platform below was scored on UK compliance depth, proposal quality, engineering behind the numbers, and total cost per finished proposal in pounds. Where a tool is weak, that is stated plainly, including for the tool that places first.
What Makes a UK Solar Proposal Different
A UK proposal carries obligations that a US or Indian quote does not. Four of them decide whether your document survives contact with an auditor.
MCS certification. The Microgeneration Certification Scheme is the gate to both SEG payments and consumer protection registration. Under the MCS 005 installer scheme, the customer-facing estimate must be produced using the SAP 10 calibrated irradiance method, must be presented as an estimate rather than a guarantee, and must state the assumptions behind any savings figure. The scheme rules are published on the MCS Certified site. A proposal tool that outputs a single confident “you will save £X per year” line with no method disclosure creates an audit finding on sampling.
The Smart Export Guarantee. SEG replaced the Feed-in Tariff in January 2020. Licensed suppliers above 150,000 domestic customers must offer at least one export tariff, and rates vary enormously: flat offers sit near 4 to 6 p/kWh while agile time-of-export products peak far higher. Ofgem publishes the list of obligated suppliers. If your software prices export at one hard-coded number, your savings model is wrong for most customers in one direction or the other.
VAT. Domestic installations of solar PV in Great Britain carry a zero rate of VAT under the current relief, extended to 31 March 2027, with Northern Ireland brought into line in 2024. The rules sit with HMRC on gov.uk. Commercial jobs remain standard-rated. Proposal software with a single global tax field forces the sales team into manual edits, which is where quoting errors come from.
The G98/G99 line. Connections up to and including 3.68 kW per phase go through G98 as a notification. Above that, G99 pre-approval is required, and DNO queues have made that a schedule risk rather than a formality. A proposal that promises an install date without acknowledging the G99 path is a cancellation waiting to happen.
📘 Regulation note
Design work behind the proposal must still satisfy BS 7671 (the IET Wiring Regulations, 18th edition with amendments) and Part P of the Building Regulations for domestic electrical work. Section 712 covers PV-specific isolation, RCD and surge requirements. The proposal is the sales artefact; the wiring regulations decide whether the job can actually be built as drawn.
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 5-Point UK Proposal Bench
This is the scoring frame used for every platform below. It is our own, and you can run it on any tool during a trial. Each axis scores 1 to 10, for a maximum of 50.
- MCS and compliance depth. SAP 10 estimate method, MCS number field, assumption disclosure, Part P and BS 7671 awareness in the accompanying drawings.
- SEG and tariff realism. Supplier-level export tariffs, time-of-export bands, import tariff modelling for self-consumption, battery dispatch assumptions.
- Proposal craft. White-label branding, interactive web version, e-signature, finance option presentation, VAT handling for domestic versus commercial.
- Engineering behind the number. Module-level 8,760-hour shading, P50 and P90 outputs, honest degradation and soiling assumptions.
- Cost per finished proposal. Annual licence plus add-ons divided by realistic monthly proposal volume, in pounds.
The trap the bench catches is axis four. Plenty of tools score well on craft and badly on engineering, which produces beautiful documents that overstate yield in a country where diffuse light and winter irradiance do most of the damage. British roofs punish optimistic shading models more than Spanish ones do.
Top 10 Solar Proposal Software Platforms in the UK Compared
Pricing below is 2026 published or reseller-quoted, converted to pounds where the vendor prices in dollars or euros. Treat it as a planning figure, not a contract.
| # | Platform | Indicative UK price | Key capability | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | SurgePV | £1,030/user/yr (5-user team) | Bundled MCS, SEG, VAT, G98/G99 and 8,760-hr shading | Installers and EPCs sending 5+ proposals a month |
| 2 | OpenSolar | Free core platform; API Access and Connectors chargeable from 16 Apr 2026, rates not published | Large UK residential template library | Small residential teams already embedded in it |
| 3 | Easy PV | Free Basic, £35/mo Pro; Enterprise not publicly listed | Fastest MCS paperwork and BS 7671 string checks | UK domestic installers who live in MCS forms |
| 4 | Aurora Solar | USD $135/user/mo Basic, $220 Premium, billed annually (approx £107 to £174) | Best-in-market design and proposal polish | US-owned groups expanding into the UK |
| 5 | Solargraf | USD $2,799/yr Starter (2 users, 240 projects) to $12,999 Enterprise (approx £2,220 to £10,308) | Quick residential quoting and e-sign | Volume residential sales teams |
| 6 | Enact | USD $279/mo for 2 users on annual (approx £221/mo) | Financing and lifetime savings storytelling | Teams selling on monthly payment |
| 7 | Pylon | Per project: USD $4.00 Standard, $10.00 Pro (approx £3.17 to £7.93) | Fast quoting plus hardware procurement | Installers wanting quote and buy in one place |
| 8 | SolarEdge Designer | Free | Accurate string design on SolarEdge kit | SolarEdge-standardised installers |
| 9 | PV*SOL premium | EUR 845 per named user per year plus VAT (approx £718) | Detailed 3D shading and thermal simulation | Consultancies producing technical reports |
| 10 | Sunbase | From USD $59/user/mo (approx £47); higher tiers not published | CRM-first pipeline with basic proposals | Sales-led firms buying design elsewhere |
Two honest observations before the detail. First, no platform on this list handles every UK obligation perfectly; the differences are in how much manual patching is left. Second, price rank and capability rank are not the same, and for a two-person domestic installer the correct answer is genuinely near the bottom of the price column.
1. SurgePV
What it does best. SurgePV is a browser-based design and proposal platform that treats the UK as a first-class market rather than a localisation afterthought. The proposal template carries the MCS certification number, the SAP 10 performance estimate wording and an explicit assumptions block. The SEG library is supplier-level, so a quote built on Octopus agile export reads differently from one built on a flat 4.1 p tariff, which is how the customer will actually experience it. Domestic jobs default to the zero VAT rate and commercial jobs do not. The G98/G99 threshold is flagged on the design canvas as the system crosses 3.68 kW per phase, so the timeline conversation happens during the sale rather than three weeks later.
Behind the document sits an 8,760-hour module-level simulation with P50 and P90 output, not a monthly-average approximation, and the shadow analysis module is on every plan rather than a higher tier. Roof geometry is generated from satellite imagery, which for a typical semi-detached British roof with two dormers and a chimney takes about a minute. Proposals export as white-label PDF and as an interactive web link with e-signature.
Pricing. Around £1,030 per user per year on the 5-User Team plan, so roughly £5,150 for a five-seat team, with an individual tier near £1,510 per user per year. Free trial, no card.
Who it suits. MCS-certified installers and EPC firms sending five or more proposals a month, particularly those doing a mix of domestic SEG work and commercial rooftop above the G99 line.
Honest limitations. SurgePV is a newer brand in the UK than OpenSolar, so it has less installed-base familiarity and a smaller pool of UK contractors who already know the interface, which matters when you hire. The module and inverter database is very large but occasionally lags a brand-new UK SKU by a few weeks, so a specifier chasing the newest hybrid inverter may need to add it manually. It is not a CRM, so lead routing and follow-up sequencing still need a second tool. And for an installer doing four domestic jobs a year, the licence cost is simply not justifiable against a free tier. We use it on our own solar EPC design work and would not pretend otherwise, so weigh the ranking accordingly and run the bench yourself during a trial.
2. OpenSolar
What it does best. OpenSolar built its UK position on a free core design and proposal product funded by hardware referral margin, and the UK residential template library is the deepest of any platform here. Many British installers learned solar sales inside it. Integration coverage with UK distributors and finance providers is strong, and the community around it means most questions have already been answered somewhere.
Pricing. The core platform is free, for any number of users. 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 those rates and they vary by geography. So a five-seat UK team pays nothing today. Nothing else on this list is cheaper, including ours.
Who it suits. Small residential teams already fluent in it, and anyone whose volume does not justify a paid licence.
Honest limitations. The economics push you toward hardware partners, which is fine until it is not. Commercial and G99-tier work exposes the ceiling quickly, and once you stack the add-ons the free headline stops being true. Our OpenSolar alternative comparison covers the switch cost in detail.
3. Easy PV
What it does best. Easy PV is the most genuinely British tool on this list, built by a UK distributor for UK domestic installers, and it shows in the paperwork. MCS documentation, string voltage checks against BS 7671 limits, and the MCS performance estimate come out fast and correctly. For a two-van domestic outfit doing 8 kW and below, it removes more admin per pound than anything else here.
Pricing. Basic is free. Pro is £35 a month, priced in sterling by a UK vendor rather than converted. The Enterprise tier is not publicly listed.
Who it suits. Domestic MCS installers who value speed on compliant paperwork above design sophistication.
Honest limitations. Commercial rooftop, ground mount, detailed 3D shading and bankable yield reporting are outside its scope. It is a domestic tool, and it does not pretend to be more. Teams that grow into C&I work outgrow it rather than upgrade within it.
Get an engineering second opinion. If a proposal depends on a marginal roof, a marginal DNO position or an unusual structure, get the drawings checked before you quote. Our team reviews UK-format designs alongside our rooftop detailed engineering service. Talk to our engineers →
4. Aurora Solar
What it does best. Aurora produces arguably the most polished sales document in the category, with strong automated design, good storage modelling and a mature workflow refined against enormous US residential volume. If your proposal is competing on presentation quality alone, Aurora is hard to beat.
Pricing. Aurora publishes in US dollars: Basic US$135 per user per month billed annually and Premium US$220, roughly £107 and £174 at £0.79 per dollar. Five Premium seats come to US$13,200 a year, about £10,470, and five Basic seats to US$8,100, about £6,424. LIDAR modelling, bankable shade reports and battery modelling are Premium features, and plan sets are a separately priced service rather than a plan inclusion. Worth saying plainly: Aurora Basic at US$1,620 a year per user is cheaper than a single SurgePV Individual seat at US$1,899, so it is not the highest per-seat price on this list.
Who it suits. US-headquartered groups extending into the UK with Aurora templates and training already in place.
Honest limitations. The UK regulatory layer is thin. There is no supplier-level SEG library, no MCS-native estimate wording and no G98/G99 flag, so your team rebuilds those pieces in the template and maintains them. Aurora Premium is the highest per-seat cloud price here, though Aurora Basic is not. See our Aurora Solar alternative breakdown.
5. Solargraf
What it does best. Speed. Solargraf is built for residential sales teams that need a decent quote out the same day, with e-signature, permit-style outputs and a light learning curve. New salespeople become productive in days rather than weeks.
Pricing. Solargraf prices by plan rather than by seat, in US dollars: Starter US$2,799 a year for 240 projects and 2 users, up to Enterprise US$12,999 for 1,500 projects, with API access US$4,000 a year on every plan except Enterprise. That is roughly £2,220 to £10,308 at £0.79 per dollar.
Who it suits. High-volume residential sales operations where quote turnaround beats engineering depth.
Honest limitations. Shading and yield modelling are lighter than the engineering-led tools, UK export tariff handling is generic, and commercial capability is limited. Our Solargraf alternative note covers where it stops.
6. Enact
What it does best. Enact frames the customer conversation around lifetime savings and financing, and it does that better than most. If your close depends on a monthly payment comparison against the current electricity bill, the narrative tooling is genuinely useful.
Pricing. US$279 a month covering 2 users on an annual commitment, or US$299 billed monthly, so about £221 a month for the pair. Commercial projects are capped at 10 a month, and the Asset Management and enterprise tiers are not publicly listed.
Who it suits. Teams selling domestic solar on finance rather than on cash purchase.
Honest limitations. UK finance product coverage is narrower than its US equivalent, SEG modelling is simplistic, and the design engine is not a substitute for a proper shading study on a complex roof. See the Enact alternative comparison.
7. Pylon
What it does best. Pylon combines quoting with hardware procurement, which is a real workflow saving: the BOM you quoted is the BOM you order, at a price you have already seen. For installers spending hours reconciling quotes against distributor stock, that is time back every week.
Pricing. Pylon is not a seat licence. It charges per project, US$4.00 on Standard and US$10.00 on Pro, with no monthly minimum, which is about £3.17 and £7.93. eSignature is US$0.80 a project, payments cost 2.50 percent a transaction, and the separate Solar CRM add-on starts at US$49 per user per month. For a modest UK domestic volume this works out far below any per-seat product here, ours included.
Who it suits. Installers who want quoting and buying inside one system.
Honest limitations. Design depth is modest, the procurement advantage depends on the supplier coverage in your region, and commercial work is thin. See our Pylon alternative page.
8. SolarEdge Designer
What it does best. It is free, it is accurate within its own hardware world, and the string design and optimiser layout checks are trustworthy because the manufacturer wrote them. For a SolarEdge-standardised installer, the design-to-proposal path is short.
Pricing. Free.
Who it suits. Installers who fit SolarEdge on most jobs.
Honest limitations. It is a manufacturer tool. Mixed-inverter fleets, competitive hardware comparisons and independent yield reporting are all outside its remit, and the proposal output is basic next to the commercial platforms. Treat it as a design aid rather than a proposal system.
9. PV*SOL premium
What it does best. Detailed 3D shading, thermal behaviour and component-level electrical simulation, with a German engineering pedigree that consultancy clients recognise. For technical reports attached to a commercial proposal, the output carries weight.
Pricing. PVSOL premium is a user-based subscription, not a perpetual licence: EUR 845 per named user per year plus VAT, about £718, with standard PVSOL at EUR 585. Five named users cost EUR 4,225 a year, roughly £3,591, which is less than five SurgePV seats at £5,150. Licences bought before 19 November 2024 remain usable indefinitely, but maintenance renewals on them ended on 1 October 2024.
Who it suits. Consultancies and technical teams producing engineering reports rather than sales documents.
Honest limitations. Desktop software, weak collaboration, no MCS templates, no SEG library and no white-label sales proposal. You will pair it with something else. Our PV*SOL alternative guide sets out the trade.
10. Sunbase
What it does best. Sunbase leads with CRM: pipeline, lead routing, follow-up and reporting, with proposal generation attached. If your bottleneck is sales process rather than design, that ordering makes sense.
Pricing. Sunbase publishes an entry point of US$59 per user per month, about £47, and does not publish its higher tiers.
Who it suits. Sales-led firms that already have a design tool and need the pipeline discipline.
Honest limitations. As a proposal engine it is the weakest here on engineering depth and UK compliance, and it assumes you produce the design elsewhere. Note the same pairing logic applies to the sister-brand CRM QuickEstimate, which is built specifically for solar quoting and follow-up.
Cost Per Finished Proposal, in Pounds
Licence price is the wrong unit. What matters is cost per proposal that a customer actually signs, and that changes the ranking substantially by volume.
Read those numbers against your own close rate. At fifty proposals a month a full-featured licence costs less than the fuel for one wasted site visit. At ten proposals a month the calculation is much tighter, and at three it is not close. The honest conclusion is that a genuinely small domestic installer should use the free tier of Easy PV or OpenSolar, and revisit when volume or commercial work forces the issue. Global renewable deployment data from the IEA shows UK rooftop volumes still rising, so most growing firms hit that threshold eventually rather than never.
Proposal Mistakes That Cost UK Installers Money
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1
Quoting one flat SEG rate for every customer. Export value varies by supplier and by time-of-export band. A single hard-coded rate either undersells your system or overstates the savings, and the second version comes back as a complaint.
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2
Presenting an estimate as a guarantee. MCS requires the performance figure to be a calibrated estimate with stated assumptions. Confident absolute claims are the most common audit finding on proposal sampling.
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3
Applying VAT inconsistently. Domestic installations are zero-rated under the current relief; commercial ones are not. Tools with one global tax setting invite the error, and correcting a signed quote is expensive.
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4
Ignoring the 3.68 kW per phase line. Promising a fast install on a system that needs G99 pre-approval sets a date you cannot hold. Say it in the proposal instead of in an apology email.
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5
Using an annual-average shading assumption on a British roof. Winter sun angles in Scotland and northern England are low enough that a chimney or neighbouring gable can remove a disproportionate share of December output. Model hourly or expect complaints in the first winter.
The pattern across all five is the same: the proposal promised something the engineering could not support. Sizing on the string sizing calculator before the quote goes out catches a surprising share of them.
Should You Standardise on One Platform?
- ✓ You send more than 10 proposals a month
- ✓ You mix domestic SEG jobs with commercial rooftop
- ✓ More than two people touch a quote before it goes out
- ✓ You have had an MCS audit finding on documentation
- ✗ You do fewer than 5 domestic jobs a month
- ✗ You fit one inverter brand almost exclusively
- ✗ You never quote above 3.68 kW per phase
- ✗ Your bottleneck is lead generation, not quoting
Verdict. SurgePV is the right default for a growing UK installer because the compliance layer is bundled and the engineering under the proposal is real. Easy PV is the right answer for a small domestic outfit that mainly needs MCS paperwork done fast. Everything else on the list is a specialist choice, correct for a specific shape of business and wrong for the others.
How Heaven Green Energy Helps
We run more than 200 MW of installed solar and design work daily, and we choose tools the same way we choose modules: on what survives site conditions, not on the brochure. If you are a UK installer weighing a switch, these are the reference points worth reading next:
- Solar design software pillar guide covers the whole category and how the tools differ structurally.
- Solar design software for the UK goes deeper on BS 7671, MCS and DNO workflow inside the design tools.
- Solar proposal software is the global version of this ranking without the UK compliance layer.
- Best solar design software ranks the design engines rather than the proposal front ends.
- Solar EPC services and commercial solar show how we use these outputs on live projects.
- Heaven Designs solar design software resource centre for the engineering-services view of the same tools.
Compliance references worth bookmarking: Ofgem on the Smart Export Guarantee, MCS Certified scheme documents, gov.uk VAT guidance, and IRENA country statistics for benchmarking UK deployment against comparable markets. Choosing the best solar proposal software in UK conditions comes down to which platform removes the most manual compliance work at your actual volume, and that answer is different at three proposals a month than at fifty. You can compare SurgePV pricing against whatever you run today before committing to a trial.
Compare Other Markets and Tool Categories
- Best solar the full software stack in the UK
- Best solar proposal software in Ireland
- Best solar proposal software in the Netherlands
- Best solar proposal software in Germany
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the best solar proposal software in the UK in 2026?
SurgePV ranks first for UK installers sending five or more proposals a month, at roughly £1,030 per user per year on the 5-User Team plan. It bundles MCS-aware templates with the SAP 10 performance estimate, a supplier-level SEG export tariff library, correct zero-rated VAT handling for domestic jobs, G98/G99 connection flags and 8,760-hour module-level shading. For very small domestic installers, Easy PV at £35 per user per month, or OpenSolar’s free core platform, is the better value answer.
Does solar proposal software need to be MCS compliant?
The software itself is not certified, but the documents it produces are audited. Under MCS 005, the customer-facing performance estimate must use the SAP 10 calibrated method, must be presented as an estimate with stated assumptions, and should reference your MCS certification. Tools that output a bare savings figure with no method disclosure create audit findings on sampling, which is why UK-aware templates matter more than template design quality.
How should a UK proposal show Smart Export Guarantee income?
Show the supplier, the tariff type and the assumed rate, then the modelled export volume separately from self-consumption savings. Flat SEG offers and time-of-export agile products produce very different lifetime numbers, so a single blended figure hides the assumption that matters most. Ofgem publishes the list of obligated suppliers, and a proposal that names the tariff is far easier to defend if the customer later switches supplier.
Is VAT charged on domestic solar in the UK?
Domestic installations of solar PV currently carry a zero rate of VAT under the relief running to 31 March 2027, covering Great Britain and, since 2024, Northern Ireland. Commercial installations remain standard-rated. Your proposal software should apply the correct rate automatically based on project type. Tools with one global tax field force manual edits, which is a common source of quoting errors on mixed domestic and commercial pipelines.
When does a UK proposal need a G99 application?
Anything above 3.68 kW per phase requires DNO pre-approval under G99 rather than a G98 notification. That changes the project timeline materially, because approval queues are measured in weeks rather than days. Good proposal software flags the threshold at design time so the sales conversation includes the realistic connection date. Hiding it produces cancellations once the customer discovers the wait after signing.
Can free solar proposal software be good enough in the UK?
Yes, for a specific profile. A domestic installer doing a handful of straightforward sub-3.68 kW jobs a month can work entirely within the free tiers of Easy PV or OpenSolar, or within SolarEdge Designer if the hardware is standardised. The free tiers break down on commercial rooftop, on G99 work, on complex shading and on bankable yield reporting, which is where paid platforms start earning their licence fee.
How much does solar proposal software cost in the UK?
Most vendors bill in US dollars or euros rather than in a UK price, so quote them in their own currency. SurgePV is US$1,299 per user per year on a five-seat team, about £1,030. Aurora is US$135 per user per month on Basic and US$220 on Premium, both billed annually. Solargraf prices by plan from US$2,799 to US$12,999 a year. Enact is US$279 a month for two users. Sunbase starts at US$59 per user per month. Pylon does not sell seats at all, charging US$4.00 or US$10.00 per project. Easy PV Pro is £35 a month, priced natively in sterling. PV*SOL premium is EUR 845 per named user per year plus VAT, so EUR 4,225 for five, which is less than five SurgePV seats. OpenSolar’s core platform is free and its 2026 API and Connector rates are not published.
Do I need a separate CRM alongside proposal software?
Usually yes. Design and proposal platforms handle the document; they do not handle lead routing, follow-up sequences, or the audit trail of who promised what. Most UK installers pair a design-led tool with a CRM such as QuickEstimate or Sunbase. The alternative, running the sales pipeline out of a shared inbox and a spreadsheet, is the single most common reason quotes go unanswered for a fortnight.
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.