As of the end of March 2024, the UK boasts a total solar capacity of 15.8GW across 1,483,386 installations, marking a 5.6% increase (837MW) since March 2023.
There were 14,734 installations in March alone, adding 63MW of capacity, the highest figure for the year thus far but lower than early 2023 levels.
Despite this, the numbers remain significantly higher than the averages observed between 2016 and 2021.
Following a sharp decline in April 2020 due to Covid-19 lockdown measures, installations rebounded in the second half of 2020 and surpassed pre-pandemic levels.
From 2016 to 2021, the median number of monthly installations was around 3,000, increasing to nearly 15,000 over the past 12 months.
While domestic solar PV installations in the UK account for 30% of total capacity, this share dropped after the initial years of FiT, hovering at or below 25% since 2016.
However, it has recently risen due to a surge in solar PV installations, with 83% of new schemes in March 2024 being installed on residential buildings, amounting to 47MW (75% of the new capacity).
In 2023, a total of 191,524 installations were added, the second-highest number in any year, following 2011.
Nonetheless, the new capacity in 2023 ranks only the fifth highest on record, largely due to the small size of most new installations.
As of December 2023, 49% of capacity (7,708MW) came from ground-mounted or standalone solar installations, including two operational solar farms accredited on Contracts for Difference.
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