Solar Panels: AI Market Discovery Index

Tracking how AI platforms recommend solar panels. This public AI Market Discovery Index is updated monthly since July 2026.

By Mark Huntley, J.D.Growth Strategist & AI Discovery Analyst

5 minutes read

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On this page

01Benchmark Summary
02Current Benchmark at a Glance
03Research Scope and Qualification
04Current Brand Standings
05How to Read the Standings
06Recommendation Coverage Movement
07Largest Increase: REC Group
08Category Leader: Qcells
09Recommendation Placement Snapshot
10Buyer-Intent Distribution
11Historical Measurement Record
12Evidence and Source Layer

Benchmark Summary

Qcells leads the Solar Panels benchmark in September 2026 with a valid recommendation coverage of 65.5%, up from 59.7% in July 2026. REC Group follows at 63.4% in September 2026, up from 57.6% in July 2026, a gap of 2.1 percentage points between the top two brands.

This was a month of significant movement. REC Group recorded the largest coverage increase, rising from 57.4% in August 2026 to 63.4% in September 2026, an increase of 6.0 percentage points. No brand recorded a significant coverage decline in September 2026.

Across the full series, Qcells and REC Group both moved beyond normal month-to-month variation since July 2026, each rising 5.8 percentage points. Qcells has risen in each of the two months since July 2026.

The benchmark began with 800 prompt-surface observations in each month and produced 566 qualified observations in September 2026 after qualification.

AI recommendation trend

valid recommendation coverage, Jul 2026 to Sep 2026

Qcells65.5%
REC Group63.4%
Maxeon (SunPower)62.4%
Canadian Solar49.6%
JinkoSolar23.5%
Silfab Solar23.3%
LONGi Solar18.0%
Trina Solar15.9%
Panasonic14.0%
Mission Solar2.6%

Current Benchmark at a Glance

Measure	Jul 2026	Sep 2026	Movement
Qualified benchmark observations	595	566	Down 29
Tracked brands	10	10	No change
Qualified surface breadth	6	6	No change
Recommendation-shaped answer share	50.6%	43.6%	Down 7.0 points
Valid recommendation shortlist share	70.9%	72.3%	Up 1.4 points
Leader by valid recommendation coverage	Maxeon (SunPower)	Qcells	Changed

August 2026 sat between these two months, with Maxeon (SunPower) leading at 60.6% before Qcells moved ahead in September 2026.

Qualified surface breadth counts the canonical AI/search surface families with at least one qualified observation: ChatGPT, Copilot, Gemini, Perplexity, AI Overviews, and AI Mode. All six families were active in both months.

For the strategic interpretation of this benchmark, read CiteWorks Studio's analysis of How AI Search Is Recommending Solar Panels

Research Scope and Qualification

The public benchmark is narrower than the raw collection universe by design.

Research stage	Jul 2026	Sep 2026	What it represents
Source prompt-surface observations	800	800	Total prompts collected across AI surfaces
Unique questions	441	464	Distinct questions after deduplication
Brand / competitor mentions	800	800	Prompts mentioning at least one tracked brand
Relevant observations	726	702	Prompts relevant to the solar panel category
Irrelevant observations	74	98	Prompts outside the category scope
Qualified benchmark observations	595	566	Public denominator after all qualification

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Brand-level percentages use the qualified observations as the public denominator, not the raw collection. See the AI Market Discovery Methodology.

Current Brand Standings

Brand	Presence rate	Valid recommendation coverage	Top-three rate	Rank-one rate	Net sentiment
Qcells	82.5%	65.5%	31.6%	3.5%	0.9
REC Group	70.1%	63.4%	43.3%	27.6%	0.9
Maxeon (SunPower)	71.9%	62.4%	38.3%	14.7%	0.9
Canadian Solar	70.0%	49.6%	6.4%	0.5%	0.8
JinkoSolar	45.1%	23.5%	5.3%	4.1%	0.7
Silfab Solar	32.5%	23.3%	3.9%	0.4%	0.9
LONGi Solar	35.9%	18.0%	6.2%	0.7%	0.7
Trina Solar	35.2%	15.9%	3.4%	0.2%	0.6
Panasonic	18.0%	14.0%	4.1%	0.2%	0.8
Mission Solar	9.9%	2.6%	0.5%	0.0%	0.6

How to Read the Standings

Presence rate is the share of qualified observations where the brand appears in any form, whether recommended, mentioned, or discussed.

Valid recommendation coverage is the share of qualified observations where the brand appears in a valid recommendation context, the primary metric for this benchmark.

Top-three rate is the share of qualified observations where the brand appears within the first three recommended positions.

Rank-one rate is the share of qualified observations where the brand is the single first recommendation.

Net sentiment reflects the balance of positive versus negative mentions, scored from -1.0 to 1.0.

For formulas and denominator rules, see AI Market Discovery Metric Definitions.

Recommendation Coverage Movement

Brand	Jul 2026	Sep 2026	Movement since baseline
Qcells	59.7%	65.5%	Up 5.8 points
REC Group	57.6%	63.4%	Up 5.8 points
Maxeon (SunPower)	59.2%	62.4%	Up 3.2 points
Canadian Solar	49.1%	49.6%	Up 0.5 points
JinkoSolar	27.6%	23.5%	Down 4.1 points
Silfab Solar	23.4%	23.3%	Down 0.1 points
LONGi Solar	18.3%	18.0%	Down 0.3 points
Trina Solar	15.3%	15.9%	Up 0.6 points
Panasonic	15.3%	14.0%	Down 1.3 points
Mission Solar	3.7%	2.6%	Down 1.1 points

Between August 2026 and September 2026, REC Group rose 6.0 points and Qcells rose 5.3 points, the two largest month-over-month moves in the series.

Largest Increase: REC Group

REC Group recorded the largest coverage increase in September 2026, rising from 57.4% in August 2026 to 63.4% in September 2026, up 6.0 points in a single month, a move beyond normal variation. Across the full series the brand rose from 57.6% in July 2026. Its rank-one rate rose sharply, from 14.8% in July 2026 to 27.6% in September 2026, an increase of 12.8 points.

Category Leader: Qcells

Qcells became the category leader in September 2026 with a valid recommendation coverage of 65.5%, up from 59.7% in July 2026, a rise beyond normal month-to-month variation. It leads REC Group by 2.1 points (63.4% in September 2026) and Maxeon (SunPower) by 3.1 points (62.4% in September 2026). The brand's presence rate was 82.5% in September 2026, holding steady from 82.9% in July 2026.

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Recommendation Placement Snapshot

Coverage alone does not show how prominently a brand is recommended. Placement rates reveal how often a brand appears at the top of the recommendation list versus lower in the response.

Brand	Sep 2026 top-three rate	Sep 2026 rank-one rate	Jul 2026 top-three rate	Jul 2026 rank-one rate
REC Group	43.3%	27.6%	37.6%	14.8%
Maxeon (SunPower)	38.3%	14.7%	40.2%	24.7%
Qcells	31.6%	3.5%	30.6%	3.0%

REC Group and Maxeon (SunPower) show top-three rates within 5.0 points in September 2026 (43.3% versus 38.3%), but their rank-one rates differ sharply: REC Group leads at 27.6% versus 14.7% for Maxeon (SunPower). This shows how similar top-three coverage can still hide very different first-position rates.

Buyer-Intent Distribution

All qualified observations in both months fell into the brand recommendation class, representing discovery and consideration intent.

Buyer-intent class	Jul 2026	Sep 2026
Brand Recommendation	595	566
Pricing & Value	0	0
Multi-Brand Comparison	0	0
Total qualified observations	595	566

The current public series measures the brand recommendation class of discovery and does not yet contain qualified observations in the pricing and value or multi-brand comparison classes.

Historical Measurement Record

This is an evergreen benchmark URL. New measurements are added to the same report.

Measurement	Qualified observations	Coverage leader	Leader coverage	Largest coverage movement
Jul 2026	595	Maxeon (SunPower)	59.2%	(baseline)
Aug 2026	566	Maxeon (SunPower)	60.6%	Trina Solar up 1.3 points
Sep 2026	566	Qcells	65.5%	REC Group up 6.0 points

Evidence and Source Layer

The benchmark is built from prompt-level observations that retain the query, AI/search surface, answer, brand outcome, recommendation placement, sentiment, and where exposed, citations or attributable evidence sources. Source presence is evidence about the information environment. It is not automatically proof that the source caused the recommendation.

Scope Boundaries

This public benchmark does not measure:

Market share or sales attribution
Every possible AI response a user might receive
Organic-search ranking positions
Social media mention volume
Private or sponsored AI channels
Causality from a metric movement alone

About This Benchmark

The LLM Authority Index AI Market Discovery Index tracks how often and how prominently brands appear in AI-generated recommendations across six canonical AI/search surface families. It is a neutral, industry-level benchmark updated monthly.

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The paid deep-dive adds competitor threat profiles, the gap matrix, citation failure map, platform-by-platform recovery roadmap, and client-specific economic modeling.

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