Best 3D Solar Design Software for Solar EPCs in India (2026 Data-Backed Guide)

Most of the faults we write about on this site start long before anything breaks. A string that's two modules too long trips on PV overvoltage every winter morning. A row of modules placed behind a water tank develops hotspots. An undersized AC cable causes grid overvoltage trips every sunny afternoon. A lightning arrester bolted to the module structure destroys an inverter in the first monsoon storm — see earthing and lightning protection mistakes.

Every one of those problems can be caught at the design stage, before a single module is lifted onto the roof. That's why the design software a solar EPC uses matters so much — and in 2026 it matters more than ever, because Indian EPCs are designing more rooftop systems, faster, than at any time in the country's history.

This guide ranks the best 3D solar design software for EPCs and installers working in India. Unlike most "best software" lists, it starts with the market data that defines what Indian EPCs actually need, explains exactly how we scored each tool, and lists every source at the end so you can check our numbers.

Our ranking at a glance

1. SolarDraft — 4.80 / 5. Best overall for Indian solar EPCs. Browser-based 3D rooftop design, a twelve-month shading heatmap, PM Surya Ghar subsidy calculations, DISCOM-ready drawings and one-click branded proposals, with support for multiple Indian languages.
2. Solar Designer — 4.65 / 5. Best for an end-to-end design-to-drawings workflow. Fast 3D modelling with sun-path simulation, a complete technical drawing pack (SLD, string routing, earthing and LA layout, structure and cable routing) and a bill of materials priced at your own rates.
3. Arka360 — 4.28 / 5. Established Indian design and proposal platform (formerly The Solar Labs) with a dedicated PM Surya Ghar residential plan.
4. Reslink — 4.25 / 5. Delhi-based, mobile-first 3D design and proposal tool with BOM automation and CRM, popular with Indian EPCs.
5. Aurora Solar — 3.60 / 5. Powerful, sales-focused platform built around the US residential market.
6. OpenSolar — 3.48 / 5. Free, general-purpose design and proposal platform with a global user base.
7. HelioScope — 3.38 / 5. Web-based layout and performance modelling, popular for commercial projects.
8. PVcase — 2.92 / 5. AutoCAD-based design for utility-scale and complex ground-mount projects.
9. PVsyst — 2.23 / 5. The engineering standard for bankable energy yield simulation — excellent at what it does, but not a design-to-proposal tool.
10. SketchUp with solar plugins — 2.10 / 5. Flexible manual 3D modelling for teams that like to build everything by hand.

We also looked at SolarLadder and SurgePV — see Also considered for why they aren't scored.

India's solar market in 2026: the data behind this ranking

Software rankings are only useful if they're built around what buyers actually need. For Indian EPCs, that need is defined by a few hard numbers.

PM Surya Ghar: the scheme that reshaped residential solar

Approved by the Union Cabinet in February 2024 with an outlay of ₹75,021 crore, PM Surya Ghar: Muft Bijli Yojana provides central financial assistance for residential rooftop solar. At the benchmark prices announced at approval, that meant a subsidy of ₹30,000 for a 1 kW system, ₹60,000 for 2 kW and ₹78,000 for systems of 3 kW or more. Households apply through the national portal (pmsuryaghar.gov.in) and choose from registered vendors.

The scheme's momentum through 2026 has been remarkable:

• Installations passed 10 lakh by March 2025, 20.86 lakh by early February 2026, 26.2 lakh by March 2026 and 39.72 lakh by 22 July 2026.
• By August 2026, MNRE said the scheme had supported rooftop solar for more than 5 million households, with 14.8 GW commissioned.
• Average daily installations rose from 5,038 in October 2025 to about 16,328 in July 2026.
• Concessional loans at 5.75% had been approved for about 2.19 million applicants, and 1.75 million installations had been completed using loan financing.
• Nearly 1.9 million participating households were receiving electricity bills with nothing to pay, and more than 1.2 million households had earned a combined ₹4.21 billion by selling surplus power during FY2025.

Where the market is concentrated

Rooftop solar is not spread evenly. At the end of March 2026, Gujarat (about 24%), Maharashtra (about 16%) and Uttar Pradesh (about 9%) led cumulative rooftop installations, and the top 10 states accounted for 80% (Mercom India). For design software, that concentration has a practical consequence: the customers EPCs present to most often speak Gujarati, Marathi and Hindi, and every state's DISCOM has its own application process and documentation expectations.

What the numbers mean for EPCs

The figures below are our own calculations from the data above. They're simple arithmetic, not forecasts, but they show why design speed and accuracy have become business-critical.

• The pace has to rise again. With roughly 5 million households covered by August 2026 and a target of 10 million by March 2027, around 5 million more households would need systems in about eight months. That's roughly 20,000 households a day — above July 2026's record pace of about 16,300 a day.
• That's a lot of designs per vendor. Spread evenly across the 24,511 vendors registered in February 2026, 5 million households would be about 200 more systems per vendor, or roughly one per working day for eight months. In practice, work is concentrated among the busiest vendors, who will do far more.
• The typical residential system is about 3 kW. 14.8 GW across roughly 5 million households works out to an average of about 3 kW per household — exactly where the subsidy reaches its ₹78,000 cap. Proposals must therefore get subsidy calculations, system sizing and sanctioned load right every single time.
• Every hour of design time matters. If a tool saves one hour of design, drawing and proposal work per project, a vendor completing 200 projects saves about 200 engineer-hours — the equivalent of more than a month of full-time work.

This is the context for our ranking. The tools that score highest are the ones that make a correct, DISCOM-ready, subsidy-aware design fast enough to keep up with this volume.

Why design quality matters: what inspections find

Speed is only half the story. A fast design that's wrong becomes a service call, a warranty dispute or a safety incident. Independent inspection programmes consistently find a high rate of defects in installed PV systems:

• A 2026 inspection report by HelioVolta, covered by pv magazine, found major issues in 87% of the projects it inspected, most of them rooftop systems.
• Rhode Island's Study of Renewable Energy Installation Quality (Round 3, prepared for the state energy office) found major or critical installation deficiencies in 31% of inspected small-scale systems — an improvement from 47% in the previous round.
• The Institute for Building Technology and Safety (IBTS) reports that wire management failures occur on 38% of the PV projects it has inspected.

These studies come from outside India and use different definitions, so their percentages aren't directly comparable — but the direction is clear. In India, Mercom India's analysts have noted that "faster approvals, access to financing, installation quality, DISCOM coordination, and grid readiness will increasingly determine how quickly the residential segment can scale."

Many of the defects inspectors find have design-stage causes that good software prevents:

Why 3D design software matters for Indian EPCs

The data above explains how much design work Indian EPCs face. These characteristics of the Indian market explain what kind of software they need:

• Speed in the first meeting. Much of the residential market — especially under PM Surya Ghar — is won or lost in a single conversation with the homeowner. Showing a 3D model of their own roof, with panels, generation, subsidy and savings, in that first meeting is a real competitive advantage.
• Crowded, complex roofs. Indian rooftops are full of water tanks, staircase rooms (mumties), parapets, solar water heaters, dish antennas and neighbouring buildings. Shading analysis isn't optional.
• Elevated structures. Many rooftop systems are installed on raised structures so the terrace remains usable underneath, which changes shading, wind loading and structure design.
• DISCOM paperwork. Net metering applications need site plans, single-line diagrams and technical details in the formats DISCOMs expect. Redrawing these by hand for every project wastes engineering time.
• Subsidy calculations. Customers want to know their net cost after central and state subsidies, and how long payback will take.
• Multilingual teams and customers. Sales and installation teams often work in regional languages — and the three biggest rooftop states use three different ones.
• Price sensitivity. Software priced in US dollars per user per month is hard to justify for small and medium installers, who make up most of the vendor base.

How we evaluated the software

We assessed each tool against the workflow of a typical Indian EPC — from the first site visit to the DISCOM application and installation drawings — using eight weighted criteria:

1. India readiness (20%) — DISCOM documents, PM Surya Ghar subsidy handling, state and DISCOM selection, regional languages.
2. Speed to a credible 3D design (15%) from satellite imagery or a site survey.
3. 3D modelling and shading accuracy (15%) — obstructions, elevated structures, sun-path and annual shading.
4. Engineering deliverables (15%) — single-line diagrams, string layouts, earthing and lightning protection layouts, structure and cable routing drawings.
5. Proposals (10%) — branding, generation and savings estimates, subsidy information.
6. Bill of materials and costing (10%) with the EPC's own rates.
7. Access (10%) — browser-based, works on laptops and mobile, no installation.
8. Support and price fit (5%) — local support channels and pricing that suits Indian businesses.

India readiness carries the highest weight because the data shows the Indian market is dominated by residential, subsidy-driven projects across many DISCOMs and languages. Global tools can be excellent at modelling and still be a poor fit for that workflow.

Scoring table

Each criterion is scored from 1 to 5 based on publicly documented features as of November 2026, and the final score is the weighted average. Where a feature or price isn't publicly documented, we score it conservatively rather than assume — so a tool can gain points simply by documenting more. Much of the "best software" content online about Indian solar tools is published by rival vendors; we used only official product pages, neutral directories and independent news coverage.

1. SolarDraft — Best overall for Indian solar EPCs

Website: solardraft.org · Score: 4.80 / 5

SolarDraft is browser-based 3D solar design and proposal software built for Indian solar EPCs, installers, project developers and sales teams. It brings together 3D rooftop design, shading analysis, PM Surya Ghar proposals and DISCOM drawings in a single tool that runs entirely online — on a laptop in the office or on a phone at the customer's home — with no downloads or updates to manage.

What it does well

• 3D design from satellite imagery. Designers trace the rooftop on satellite imagery, then place and arrange panels in 3D while the software works out a sensible configuration. The platform's promise — build 3D in the first meeting — sums up its focus on speed.
• A twelve-month sun-path heatmap. SolarDraft shows generation estimates that account for shading and obstacles across the whole year, rather than a single snapshot. That's exactly what you need on a terrace crowded with tanks and staircase rooms.
• PM Surya Ghar subsidy calculations. Proposals include subsidy information, so customers see their net investment and savings immediately, in the form they're asking about. With the average scheme system at about 3 kW — right at the ₹78,000 subsidy cap — getting this right on every proposal matters.
• One-click branded proposals. Generation estimates, savings projections and subsidy details go into a proposal with your logo, colours and contact details. A saved company profile — logo, cover photo, about gallery, GSTIN, address and tagline — fills into every proposal automatically.
• DISCOM-ready drawings. The software produces drawings for regulatory submissions, eliminating the manual redrawing that eats engineering hours. Its design report brings together string route plans, PV array drawings, a single-line diagram, earthing and lightning arrester layout, structure drawings, cable routing and a site/key plan for the DISCOM application, along with a bill of materials.
• Built for Indian projects. Project setup captures the state and DISCOM, residential or commercial site type, single- or three-phase connection, sanctioned load and design wind speed, alongside the site's solar resource.
• Six languages. The interface is available in English, Hindi, Marathi, Gujarati, Kannada and Tamil. With Gujarat, Maharashtra and Uttar Pradesh leading rooftop installations, letting teams and customers work in their own language is a genuine commercial advantage.
• Proposals on WhatsApp. Branded proposals with subsidy and payback can be sent straight to the customer on WhatsApp — how most Indian homeowners prefer to receive documents.
• Site survey, battery and project tracking. A phone-based site survey (customer, bill, GPS location, roof, shade, electrical, backup needs, photos and signature) works offline and feeds the design and proposal. Battery (BESS) sizing adds the battery to the SLD and BOM, and project tracking covers documents, DISCOM portal, installation, inspection, net meter, subsidy and handover.
• Android app in addition to the browser version.
• Field-ready. Because it runs in the browser on mobile devices, sales teams can design and present on site.
• Integrated workspace. Dashboards for 3D designs, proposals, leads (CRM), site surveys and projects keep the pipeline in one place.

A typical first-meeting workflow

1. Capture the lead and site — customer, state, DISCOM, connection type and sanctioned load.
2. Locate the roof on satellite imagery and confirm the working area.
3. Trace the roof and obstructions — tanks, staircase rooms, parapets — and set any elevated structure.
4. Place panels in 3D and check the year-round shading heatmap, moving modules away from the worst-shaded areas.
5. Choose the module and inverter and confirm the system size against sanctioned load.
6. Generate the proposal with generation, savings and PM Surya Ghar subsidy, branded with your company profile.
7. Export the drawing set and BOM for the DISCOM application and the installation team once the customer signs.

Read our full SolarDraft review for pricing details, limitations and a one-week trial plan.

Who it's for

SolarDraft is the strongest all-round choice for Indian residential and small commercial EPCs that want to close deals faster — especially those selling under PM Surya Ghar — without sacrificing the engineering deliverables needed for DISCOM approval and installation.

Pricing

SolarDraft publishes its prices, including GST, which is still unusual in this category. There is a free plan to start. Paid plans for Solar 3D Design start at ₹40,000 per year (Basic, projects up to 500 kW), with Pro at ₹60,000 (up to 1 MW, ground mount and agrivoltaics) and Premium at ₹2,00,000 (up to 10 MW, fully white-label). The Proposal and CRM modules are also sold separately (from ₹10,000 and ₹5,000 per year). At the time of writing the site offered two years for the price of one on design plans. Check SolarDraft's pricing for current plans.

Things to consider

As with any cloud tool, you'll need a reliable internet connection on site, and teams moving from desktop CAD will want a short period to adapt their drawing standards to the software's outputs. Run a trial project on one of your typical roofs to confirm the drawings match your DISCOM's expectations.

2. Solar Designer — Best for an end-to-end design-to-drawings workflow

Website: solardesigner.in · Score: 4.65 / 5

Solar Designer is a browser-based solar rooftop designer that takes an EPC from the first customer meeting all the way to a complete technical drawing set and bill of materials. It's built around building the 3D design in the first meeting, and it has a particularly complete engineering output.

What it does well

• Guided six-step project setup. Customer and project details, state and DISCOM, site type, connection type, sanctioned load and optional design wind speed are captured up front, so every later output is consistent.
• Location and solar resource. Search an address or enter coordinates, confirm the location on high-definition satellite imagery, and see the site's solar resource in kWh/m²/day.
• Panel and inverter libraries — with a request service. Choose from built-in libraries, add a custom panel by wattage and dimensions, or send the brand and model to the Solar Designer team to have it added.
• Detailed 3D roof modelling. Draw roofs and buildings, set roof type and height, edit walls, add obstructions and walkways, and place panels individually, in a line or with "fill roof".
• Elevated structure tables. Configure tilt, leg height, azimuth and the number of rows and columns per table — essential for the raised structures common on Indian terraces — with row, column and support settings.
• Sun-path and shading simulation. Step through winter, equinox and summer sun paths or today's date, with a time slider from sunrise to sunset, and view per-panel shading and an energy report.
• A complete technical drawing pack. The design report includes a string route plan, PV array drawing, single-line diagram, earthing and LA layout, structure drawing, cable routing layout and a site/key plan for the DISCOM application — downloadable individually or as one PDF.
• SLD ratings calculated from your strings. Cables, fuses, isolators, breakers, SPDs, grid connection and earthing are calculated from the design — and you can edit any rating, with the SLD and bill of materials updating to match.
• Bill of materials with your rates. Every part, priced with your own rates, exported to Excel and PDF.
• Shareable 3D view. Send customers a link to explore their system in 3D.
• Branded proposals. A saved company profile (logo, cover photo, gallery, GSTIN and contact details) fills into every proposal, with an accent colour for the design report. A built-in tool merges the proposal and design report PDFs in the browser, without uploading them anywhere.
• CRM, site survey and projects. Leads, surveys, designs, quotes and projects live in one workspace.
• Direct support. Call and WhatsApp support for design questions.

What each drawing in the pack is for

Read our full Solar Designer review for its drawing pack, limitations and questions to ask before buying.

Who it's for

Solar Designer suits EPCs who want to standardise their engineering deliverables — SLDs, earthing and LA layouts, structure drawings and cable schedules — straight from the 3D design, and price projects from an accurate bill of materials. It's a strong fit for teams handling a mix of residential and commercial rooftops with elevated structures.

Things to consider

Pricing isn't published on the homepage, so contact the team for current plans and a demo. As with any design tool, check the drawing formats against your DISCOM's requirements on a trial project before rolling it out across your team.

SolarDraft vs Solar Designer: which should you choose?

The two top-ranked tools appear to run on the same underlying platform, so their design workflow is very similar, and both produce the drawing pack and BOM that Indian EPCs need. The difference in our scores comes from what each documents publicly — languages, subsidy handling and published pricing.

3. Arka360

Score: 4.28 / 5

Arka360 (formerly The Solar Labs) is one of the best-known Indian solar design and proposal platforms, used by installers in India and abroad. It offers 3D design, shadow analysis, proposals and CRM, and it runs a dedicated residential plan aimed at PM Surya Ghar projects.

Strengths: mature product with a large user base, strong 3D design and proposals, India-specific residential plan, built-in CRM.

Considerations: pricing isn't clearly published in rupees on its main site, and third-party figures vary widely, so get a written quote for your team size. Check the DISCOM drawing set it produces against your DISCOM's requirements. A strong choice for EPCs that want an established vendor and can work with its pricing.

4. Reslink

Score: 4.25 / 5

Reslink is a New Delhi-based platform founded in 2023 by engineers from IIT Delhi. It focuses on mobile-first 3D solar design, proposal automation, bill-of-materials automation and CRM for Indian EPCs. A NITI Aayog Frontier Tech profile cites more than 5,000 companies using the platform.

Strengths: genuinely mobile-first design, strong BOM and proposal automation, rapid growth in the Indian market.

Considerations: pricing isn't published on its site, and its engineering drawing pack and shading detail are less extensively documented than the top two. Worth a trial for sales-led teams that design mainly on phones.

5. Aurora Solar

Score: 3.60 / 5

Aurora Solar is one of the best-known solar design and sales platforms globally, particularly in the US residential market. It's known for automated roof modelling, accurate shading analysis, and polished sales proposals with financing options.

Strengths: sophisticated automated modelling, mature sales workflow, strong ecosystem of integrations, excellent shading accuracy.

Considerations for India: pricing is aimed at US-market budgets, financing and incentive tools are built around US programmes, and India-specific DISCOM documentation and PM Surya Ghar subsidy formats aren't the focus. It's best suited to large teams selling in the markets it was designed for.

6. OpenSolar

Score: 3.48 / 5

OpenSolar is a free-to-use solar design and proposal platform used by installers in many countries. It offers 3D design, shading, proposals and project management, and is funded through partnerships rather than licence fees.

Strengths: no licence cost, broad feature set, global community.

Considerations for India: availability of Indian components, tariff structures, PM Surya Ghar subsidy calculations and DISCOM drawing formats may need workarounds. Check how well it handles elevated structures and the drawing set your DISCOM expects.

7. HelioScope

Score: 3.38 / 5

HelioScope is a web-based PV design and performance modelling tool popular for commercial and industrial layouts. It combines layout, shading and energy modelling with single-line diagram outputs.

Strengths: fast commercial layouts, good performance modelling, browser-based.

Considerations for India: pricing is in US dollars, and India-specific subsidy and DISCOM workflows aren't the focus. Best for C&I-focused teams that produce their own DISCOM documentation.

8. PVcase

Score: 2.92 / 5

PVcase provides AutoCAD-based design tools aimed at utility-scale ground-mount projects (and also offers roof-mount tools), with terrain-aware layouts, electrical design and detailed CAD outputs.

Strengths: handles complex terrain and large plants, deep CAD integration, strong engineering drawings.

Considerations: requires AutoCAD and CAD expertise, and is aimed at utility-scale engineering rather than fast residential sales. A good fit for EPCs whose work is mostly utility-scale; less so for PM Surya Ghar volume.

9. PVsyst

Score: 2.23 / 5

PVsyst is the industry-standard desktop software for detailed PV energy yield simulation, used widely for bankable energy reports on commercial and utility-scale projects. Its 3D near-shading scene lets engineers model obstacles and calculate shading losses in detail.

Strengths: detailed loss modelling, accepted by lenders and investors, extensive component database.

Considerations: it's an engineering simulation tool, not a sales or drawing tool. It runs on Windows, has a learning curve, and doesn't produce proposals or DISCOM drawing packs — which is why it scores low on our EPC workflow criteria despite its excellent shading score. Many EPCs use PVsyst alongside a design tool such as SolarDraft or Solar Designer: the design tool for layouts, drawings and proposals, PVsyst for bankable yield reports on larger projects.

10. SketchUp with solar plugins

Score: 2.10 / 5

Some EPCs model buildings in SketchUp and use solar plugins (such as Skelion) to place modules and run shading studies.

Strengths: total modelling freedom, familiar to architects and designers.

Considerations: manual and time-consuming, with electrical design, drawings, BOMs and proposals assembled separately. Hard to scale across a sales team handling the volumes PM Surya Ghar demands.

Also considered

• SolarLadder is better described as an operations and sales platform for Indian solar installers — CRM, project management and procurement — with lighter design features. It doesn't publish pricing. If you mainly need to run your installation business rather than produce detailed designs, it may suit you better than any tool on this list.
• SurgePV, launched in 2026, is a newer Indian design platform. There was too little independent, publicly documented information at the time of writing to score it fairly; we'll revisit it as the product matures. Note that a lot of online "best solar software" content comparing it with other tools is published by sister brands of the product itself.

Design features that matter most on Indian rooftops

Whichever tool you choose, check how it handles these India-specific situations. They're where generic tools most often fall short.

Elevated structures and wind

Raised structures let owners keep using their terraces, but they change everything: shading geometry (higher modules cast longer shadows across the roof and see over parapets), wind loading (exposed tables experience higher forces) and structural design. Good software lets you set leg height, tilt and table layout, and records the design wind speed so the structure drawing and fabrication are consistent. Our annual maintenance checklist covers checking these structures in service.

Shading from mumties, tanks and neighbours

Staircase rooms and water tanks are the most common shading sources on Indian rooftops, and their shadows move dramatically between the winter and summer sun paths. A twelve-month shading view — or stepping through winter, equinox and summer sun paths — shows which positions lose generation in which season. This is the single most effective way to prevent hotspots and disappointing generation.

String sizing for Indian temperatures

Northern India's winter mornings can drop close to freezing on the plains and below freezing in hill regions, raising module voltage; summer afternoons push cell temperatures towards 65–70 °C, lowering it. String design must keep cold-weather Voc below the inverter's maximum and hot-weather Vmp inside the MPPT range. Our PV overvoltage guide shows the calculation in full.

Sanctioned load and phase

DISCOMs typically link the permitted solar capacity to the consumer's sanctioned load and connection type. Capturing sanctioned load and single- or three-phase connection at project setup — as both SolarDraft and Solar Designer do — prevents designing a system the DISCOM won't approve.

Subsidy-aware proposals

With central assistance of ₹30,000 for 1 kW, ₹60,000 for 2 kW and ₹78,000 for 3 kW and above (at the benchmark prices announced in 2024), plus state top-ups in some states, the net cost the customer sees depends heavily on system size. A proposal that calculates this automatically — and shows the effect of moving from 2 kW to 3 kW — answers the customer's real question in the first meeting.

Drawings that match how installers work

A drawing pack is only useful if installers follow it. String route plans with colour-coded strings, cable routing with a schedule, and an earthing and LA layout give site teams a clear plan and give inspectors something to check against. They're also your evidence if a dispute arises later.

What design software is worth: a simple ROI model

Design software is usually a small cost compared with the value of the projects it supports. A simple way to evaluate it for your business:

1. Count your projects. How many systems will you design per year? (Use the per-vendor arithmetic above as a sense check.)
2. Time your current process. Measure the hours your team spends today on site layout, shading, drawings, BOM and proposal for a typical project.
3. Time the same project in the trial tool. Use a real roof, not the vendor's demo.
4. Multiply. Hours saved per project × projects per year × your loaded hourly cost of design staff.
5. Add conversion effects. If presenting a 3D design and subsidy-aware proposal in the first meeting lifts your conversion rate even slightly, the extra projects usually outweigh the software cost many times over.
6. Add avoided rework. Every DISCOM resubmission, site redesign or service call avoided because the design was right first time has a direct cost you no longer pay.

As an illustration only: if a tool saved one hour per project across 200 projects, that's 200 hours a year. At any realistic cost of an engineer's time, that comfortably exceeds an annual licence in the tens of thousands of rupees.

The design workflow that prevents repairs

Build these checks into every design — they map directly to the most common faults we see in the field:

• Shading analysis across the whole year — prevents hotspots, excessive bypass diode operation and disappointing generation.
• String sizing against record low temperatures and hot-day MPPT limits — prevents PV overvoltage and MPPT drop-out.
• Cable sizing for voltage drop and rise, not just current — prevents grid overvoltage trips.
• Inverter placement with shade and clearances — prevents overheating and derating.
• Earthing, SPD and lightning arrester layout designed, not improvised — prevents surge damage and isolation faults.
• Cable routing in protected trays and conduit — prevents rodent damage and arc faults.

Tools that produce an SLD, an earthing and LA layout, structure drawings and a cable routing schedule directly from the 3D design — as both SolarDraft and Solar Designer do — make it much easier to get all of this right on every project, not just the big ones.

Related guides: how to design a rooftop system under PM Surya Ghar, the DISCOM net metering drawings checklist and our free string sizing calculator.

How to choose: an 8-step trial

1. List your deliverables. What does your DISCOM need? What do your installers need on site? What do customers expect in a proposal?
2. Pick a real test roof. Choose a recent, complicated project — tanks, parapets, an elevated structure.
3. Time it. Measure how long each tool takes from address to proposal and drawing set.
4. Check the outputs. Compare SLDs, earthing layouts and BOMs with what your engineers produce today.
5. Test on mobile. Can your sales team use it at the customer's home?
6. Check libraries. Are the modules and inverters you buy available, and how quickly are missing ones added?
7. Ask about support. Is help available in your language and working hours, by phone or WhatsApp?
8. Compare total cost. Annual cost for your whole team, not just a single licence.

Rolling out design software across your team

Buying a tool is the easy part. Getting consistent results across sales, design and installation teams takes a little planning:

• Set up your company profile first. Logo, GSTIN, contact details and default cover images make every proposal consistent from day one.
• Build your component library. Add the modules, inverters, cables and structures you actually buy, with your rates, so BOMs are accurate without manual edits. Request any missing models from the vendor early.
• Agree drawing standards with your DISCOM contacts. Submit the first few drawing sets with a note asking for feedback, and adjust templates before volume ramps up.
• Create a design QA checklist. Before any design goes to a customer: shading reviewed across seasons, string voltages checked against inverter limits, cable sizes checked for voltage drop, earthing and LA layout included, sanctioned load respected.
• Train sales and engineering together. Sales should know what the tool can show in the first meeting; engineers should know what sales promised.
• Close the loop with the field. When installers find a mismatch between drawing and roof, feed it back into your templates. When a system develops a fault, check whether the design could have caught it.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the best 3D solar design software in India?

For Indian solar EPCs, we rank SolarDraft first with a weighted score of 4.80 out of 5, for its combination of fast browser-based 3D design, year-round shading analysis, PM Surya Ghar subsidy-aware proposals, DISCOM-ready drawings, six-language support and published rupee pricing with a free plan. Solar Designer (4.65), which appears to run on the same platform, is second, followed by Arka360 (4.28) and Reslink (4.25).

How big is India's rooftop solar market in 2026?

MNRE data showed 32.59 GW of grid-connected rooftop solar at the end of August 2026, out of more than 168 GW of total installed solar capacity. JMK Research estimated that about 9.8 GW of rooftop solar was added in January–September 2026 alone.

How many homes have rooftop solar under PM Surya Ghar?

By August 2026, MNRE said PM Surya Ghar: Muft Bijli Yojana had supported rooftop solar for more than 5 million households, with 14.8 GW commissioned. The scheme's target is 10 million (1 crore) households by March 2027.

What subsidy does PM Surya Ghar provide?

At the benchmark prices announced when the scheme was approved in 2024, central financial assistance was ₹30,000 for a 1 kW system, ₹60,000 for 2 kW and ₹78,000 for systems of 3 kW or more. Check pmsuryaghar.gov.in for current terms, as some states add their own subsidy.

What is the average size of a PM Surya Ghar rooftop system?

Dividing the 14.8 GW commissioned by the roughly 5 million households covered (August 2026) gives an average of about 3 kW per household — the size at which the central subsidy reaches its maximum.

Is there free solar design software?

Yes. OpenSolar is free to use, SolarDraft has a free plan with usage limits, and some inverter manufacturers offer free design tools for their own equipment. Whatever you choose, test it on a real project before committing.

Do I need PVsyst if I use 3D design software?

For residential and most small commercial rooftops, a good 3D design tool with shading and energy estimates is usually enough. For larger projects that need bankable energy yield reports for lenders or investors, PVsyst is still the common standard and is often used alongside a design and proposal tool.

Can solar design software create DISCOM documents?

Some can. SolarDraft and Solar Designer both produce drawings such as single-line diagrams and site/key plans intended for DISCOM applications. Always confirm the formats your specific DISCOM requires.

Can I design solar systems on a mobile phone?

Browser-based tools such as SolarDraft and Solar Designer run on mobile devices, which lets sales teams create and present 3D designs during the customer visit.

How does design software reduce solar repair and maintenance costs?

By catching problems before installation: shading that causes hotspots, strings that exceed inverter voltage limits in winter, undersized cables that cause voltage trips, and poorly planned earthing and cable routes. Inspection studies regularly find defects in a large share of installed systems, and every fault avoided at the design stage is a service visit you never have to make.

Are SolarDraft and Solar Designer the same software?

They appear to run on the same underlying platform: the applications share the same interface and version numbering, and SolarDraft offers a fully white-label plan. They're sold under different names, domains, support and pricing, so we review them separately — but expect very similar design tools.

Is Arka360 better than SolarDraft?

Arka360 is a more established product with a larger user base. In our India-weighted scoring SolarDraft ranks higher because it publishes rupee pricing with a free plan, documents a full DISCOM drawing set and supports six languages. If vendor maturity matters most to you, trial both.

How did you score the software?

We scored each tool from 1 to 5 on eight criteria weighted for Indian rooftop EPC work — India readiness (20%), speed (15%), shading (15%), engineering drawings (15%), proposals (10%), BOM (10%), access (10%) and support and price fit (5%) — using publicly documented features as of November 2026, scoring undocumented features conservatively. The full scoring table is above.

Sources

1. SolarQuarter, "India's Solar Capacity Crosses 168 GW As 2026 Installations Near 34.45 GW By August 2026", 11 September 2026 (citing MNRE data) — solarquarter.com
2. JMK Research, "India Added 35.2 GW of Solar and 4.69 GW of Wind Capacity in the First Nine Months of 2026" — jmkresearch.com
3. Mercom India, "India's Rooftop Solar Installations Surge by 125% YoY in Q1 2026" — mercomindia.com
4. Mercom India, "PM Surya Ghar Powers 5 Million Homes, Total Capacity Hits 15 GW", 4 August 2026 (citing MNRE) — mercomindia.com
5. PM India, "Cabinet approves PM-Surya Ghar: Muft Bijli Yojana", February 2024 — pmindia.gov.in
6. KNN India, "Nearly 23 lakh rooftop solar systems installed under PM Surya Ghar scheme: Centre", February 2026 — knnindia.co.in
7. SolarQuarter, "PM Surya Ghar Yojana updates 2026: 26 lakh rooftop solar installations across India", 25 March 2026 (citing MNRE) — solarquarter.com
8. Angel One, "Government reports over 20.85 lakh rooftop solar installations under PM Surya Ghar scheme", February 2026 — angelone.in
9. Renewable Watch, "PM Surya Ghar Muft Bijli Yojana surpasses 1 million installations", 17 March 2025 — renewablewatch.in
10. pv magazine India, "High defect rates drag down solar performance and yield, finds report", 13 October 2026 — pv-magazine-india.com
11. Rhode Island Office of Energy Resources, "Study of Renewable Energy Installation Quality in the State of Rhode Island — Round 3" — energy.ri.gov
12. IBTS, "Inspecting for Success: Common Deficiencies in Solar PV Installations" — ibts.org
13. Capterra, SolarDraft product listing — capterra.co.uk
14. PM Surya Ghar national portal — pmsuryaghar.gov.in
15. SolarDraft, "Pricing" and "Features" pages, reviewed November 2026 — solardraft.org
16. Solar Designer application and product pages, reviewed November 2026 — solardesigner.in
17. Arka360, PM Surya Ghar residential plan page — arka360.com
18. NITI Aayog Frontier Tech, "Faster Solar Adoption: The Platform Helping 5000+ Companies Set Up Solar Energy Systems" (Reslink) — frontiertech.niti.gov.in
19. YourStory, "Reslink's made-in-India innovation aims to break Chinese grip on the solar energy market", November 2025 — yourstory.com
20. G2, Solar Ladder pricing overview — g2.com