Google AI Overviews on 60 Solar Searches: Who Gets Cited (2026)

When we checked 60 common homeowner solar searches on Google (US, desktop) on 8 October 2026, 52 of them (86.7%) showed an AI Overview, and those 52 searches carried 76.6% of the combined monthly search volume. EnergySage and YouTube were the most cited sites, each appearing in 33 of the 52 AI Overviews, while only 21 AI Overviews (40.4%) cited a solar installer's own website. On average, just a third of the sites an AI Overview cited also ranked in the organic results on page one for the same search.

TL;DR

• In our October 2026 check of 60 homeowner solar searches, 52 (86.7%) showed a Google AI Overview, covering 189,390 of 247,260 monthly US searches (76.6%).
• Every search about whether solar is worth it, how to finance it and which incentives apply showed an AI Overview, while searches for choosing an installer showed one only 71.4% of the time, because "near me" searches got the local pack instead.
• EnergySage and YouTube were each cited in 63.5% of solar AI Overviews, and YouTube was cited more than twice as often as it ranked organically for the same searches (25%).
• Only 33.2% of the sites an average AI Overview cited also ranked in the organic results on page one, and 25 of the 40 citations that went to installer websites came from sites that did not rank on page one for that search.
• 21 of 52 AI Overviews (40.4%) cited at least one solar installer's own website, and the cited pages were homeowner guides such as cost pages, battery comparisons, lease and PPA explainers and installer checklists.

This post is Part 2 of the Orkkid Solar AI Study. Part 1, the city-by-city test of which installers ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity, Claude and Google AI Mode recommend, builds on our AI recommendation study. Here we stay inside Google: what homeowners see at the top of the results page when they research solar, and who gets the citation. Orkkid sells SEO and GEO services to solar companies, so we have a stake in this question, which is why every number below comes from data you can check in the method section.

1. AI Overviews showed up on 52 of 60 homeowner solar searches

We picked 60 searches that cover the whole homeowner journey, from "how do solar panels work" to "sunrun reviews", and loaded each one once from a US desktop location. Google showed an AI Overview on 52 of them, which is 86.7%. Weighted by demand, the share is a little lower: the 52 searches with an AI Overview add up to 189,390 of the 247,260 monthly US searches in the set (76.6%), because several of the biggest searches without one are local or product searches.

Here are the 10 biggest searches in the set and what Google showed for each.

The single biggest search, "solar panel installation cost" at 60,500 searches a month, opened with this AI Overview answer: "A residential solar panel system typically costs between $2.40 and $3.00 per watt before incentives, averaging around $2.66 per watt nationally." A homeowner who reads that sentence has a price anchor before they see a single installer's website.

What to do: treat the AI Overview as the first page of your sales conversation. If your cost, financing and savings pages give clear numbers, they are candidates for that box; if they hide pricing behind a form, Google can only quote someone else's numbers.

2. Worth it, financing and incentive searches always got one; "near me" searches got the map instead

Breaking the 60 searches into what the homeowner is asking shows a clear split. All 17 searches about whether solar is worth it, how to pay for it and which incentives apply showed an AI Overview. Cost searches were close behind at 7 of 8, and the one exception, "solar battery cost", showed shopping results instead.

Searches about choosing an installer were the least likely to show an AI Overview, at 10 of 14 (71.4%). The four without one were "solar companies near me" (14,800 searches), "solar installers near me" (12,100), "top solar companies" and "tesla solar review". The first three showed a Google local pack. Measured by volume, only 12,740 of the 40,510 monthly installer-choice searches (31.4%) had an AI Overview, against 88,850 of 89,850 cost searches (98.9%).

The local pack appeared on 8 of the 60 searches (13.3%), and only 3 of those 8 also showed an AI Overview. Put simply, Google answers research questions with AI and still answers "who should I hire near me" with the map.

What to do: keep two plays running. Your Google Business Profile and reviews win the high-intent "near me" searches, while your educational pages compete for the AI Overviews that shape the homeowner's thinking weeks earlier. Our guide to solar company SEO covers the local side in depth, and our Google reviews study for solar companies shows what review counts look like in practice.

3. EnergySage and YouTube were each cited in 63.5% of solar AI Overviews

The 52 AI Overviews cited 414 links from 150 different domains, an average of 6.7 different sites per AI Overview. Two sites stood far above the rest: EnergySage and YouTube each appeared in 33 of the 52 (63.5%). Reddit came third at 24 (46.2%) and SolarReviews fourth at 16 (30.8%).

YouTube also took the largest single share of all links: 69 of the 414 citations (16.7%) pointed to YouTube, including 14 Shorts, against 46 for EnergySage. The cited videos were practical explainers with titles such as "Solar Cash/Loan or Lease/PPA?", "Net Metering Explained in Under 90 Seconds" and "Which is better: String Solar Inverters or Microinverters?".

What to do: get your company listed and reviewed on EnergySage and SolarReviews, since those two platforms sit inside half or more of the answers homeowners read, and start a YouTube channel that answers one homeowner question per video.

4. YouTube was cited more than twice as often as it ranked; Reddit the other way round

Comparing the AI Overview with the organic results on the same 52 searches shows that Google's AI picks sources differently from its ranking. YouTube was cited in 63.5% of AI Overviews but held an organic page-one spot on only 25% of those searches. EnergySage showed the same pattern (63.5% cited, 26.9% ranked), and energy.gov was cited 7 times while ranking on page one zero times.

Discussion sites moved the other way. Reddit ranked organically on 69.2% of the searches but was cited in 46.2% of AI Overviews. Facebook ranked on 30.8% and was cited in 9.6%, and Quora ranked on 15.4% and was never cited at all. Google also showed a video carousel on 17 of the 52 searches with an AI Overview, which is another place a solar company's videos can appear.

What to do: of the sources Google's AI cited most, YouTube is the one a solar company controls most directly. A two-minute answer to "how long do solar panels last" or "is a solar lease a good idea", posted on YouTube with a clear title and a matching page on your site, can be cited even when your site does not rank for that search.

5. Only a third of cited sites ranked on page one for the same search

On average, only 33.2% of the domains an AI Overview cited also appeared in that search's organic results on page one. At the level of exact pages the overlap was smaller still: 89 of the 414 cited URLs (21.5%) were the same page that ranked organically. In 10 of the 51 AI Overviews that listed sources, none of the cited sites ranked on page one at all, and the first site cited ranked on page one in 29 of 51 cases.

Google's own documentation on AI features explains why: AI Overviews may use a "query fan-out" technique, running several related searches to find supporting pages, and Google says there are no additional requirements or special optimizations needed to appear in them.

What to do: stop judging your content only by its ranking. A page sitting at position 15 for "solar payback period" can still be the page Google's AI quotes, so track citations separately. Our free AI Citation Checker shows whether your pages are being cited, and our guide on how to rank in Google AI Overviews covers the page-level work.

6. 40.4% of AI Overviews cited a solar installer's own website

We checked every cited domain by hand and found 24 solar installers, from national providers such as Palmetto and Trinity Solar to local companies in Arizona, New York, California, Iowa and Kansas. Together they earned 40 of the 414 citations (9.7%), and 21 of the 52 AI Overviews (40.4%) cited at least one of them. Leaving out Palmetto, local and regional installers alone were cited in 19 AI Overviews (36.5%).

Ranking was optional here too: only 15 of those 40 installer citations came from a site that also ranked on page one for the same search. The pages that won share a pattern: each answers one specific homeowner question. Of the 40 cited installer pages, 17 had the question itself as the title and 16 put a price, a year or another number in it.

The battery comparison search is the clearest example. For "enphase vs tesla powerwall", four of the six sites cited were installers' own comparison pages, with titles such as "Enphase IQ Battery 10C vs Powerwall 3 (2026)" and "Enphase Battery vs Tesla Powerwall: Which Is Better for NY Homes?". Neither manufacturer's own site was cited. The Powerwall cost answer followed the same pattern: "A single Tesla Powerwall 3 typically costs between $13,000 and $17,500 installed," it said, with two installers' cost pages among its six sources.

What to do: write the page your sales team explains on every call. A cost page for your state with real installed price ranges, a battery comparison for the brands you install, a warranty explainer and a "how to choose an installer" checklist each matched a page that Google's AI cited in our data.

7. On brand and review searches, AI Overviews quoted review platforms

Brand review searches carry real volume: "sunrun reviews" alone had 9,900 monthly searches. For the four brand review searches with an AI Overview ("sunrun reviews", "is sunrun a good company", "sunpower reviews" and "freedom forever reviews"), none of the AI Overviews cited the company's own website. The sources included Reddit, Yelp, Trustpilot, EnergySage, ConsumerAffairs, BestCompany, the BBB, Forbes and YouTube.

The general installer searches told homeowners how to judge a company, and the advice favors installers with a verifiable track record:

• For "how to choose a solar installer", the AI Overview said to "compare quotes from at least three different companies and verify their NABCEP Certification to ensure industry-standard expertise." (NABCEP is the main US certification body for solar installers.)
• For "solar company reviews", it said "reading past client experiences on independent platforms like SolarReviews or EnergySage helps filter out misleading sales tactics or unreliable after-sales service."
• The same answer added that "a system warranty is only valid if the installation company remains in business, making established local businesses with long-term track records a safer bet than fly-by-night operations."
• For "best solar installers", it noted that "quotes from national volume providers often run about 10% higher than local installers", and three of its four citations were Google business listings.

For "best solar companies", the AI Overview named Sunrun, Blue Raven Solar and Palmetto Solar, citing This Old House and SolarReviews. The only two sources behind that brand list were a national best-of article and a review site.

What to do: your reputation on third-party platforms is what Google's AI reads when someone researches your company by name. Ask every happy customer for a review on Google, EnergySage and SolarReviews, show your NABCEP certification and years in business on your site, and pitch your company to the best-of lists that AI Overviews cite.

8. 14 AI Overviews asked the homeowner where they live

Sixteen of the 52 AI Overviews ended with a follow-up question, and 14 of them asked for a location: a ZIP code, city, state or utility. That happened on searches such as "solar panel installation cost", "is solar worth it", "solar rebates", "net metering", "solar company reviews" and "how to choose a solar installer". The answer to almost every solar question depends on where the homeowner lives, and Google's AI says so.

Location pages already earn citations. Palmetto's Topeka, KS cost page and Solar Optimum's Maricopa County cost page were both cited for "solar panel installation cost", the biggest search in our set.

What to do: build a cost and incentive page for each state or metro you serve, with local price ranges, utility names and net metering rules. When the homeowner adds their city to the search, a page that already answers for that city is ready to be quoted.

9. Tax credit searches got a 2026 answer, and current guides got cited

All five incentive searches showed an AI Overview, and the answers reflect the 2026 rules. For "solar tax credit" (4,400 monthly searches), the AI Overview opened with: "The direct federal residential solar tax credit (Section 25D) dropped to 0% for customer-owned residential systems installed on or after January 1, 2026". Homeowners are still asking, though: "Is the 30% solar tax credit going away in 2026?" appeared in the People Also Ask box on 8 of our 60 searches.

Installers can earn these citations. IntegrateSun's "Solar Incentives & Tax Credits in 2026: The Complete Guide" was cited for "federal solar tax credit 2026", next to Tesla, SolarReviews and an accounting firm. The IRS page on the Residential Clean Energy Credit is the primary source to link when you write yours.

What to do: if your incentive page still promises a 30% federal credit to homeowners who buy their system, it now contradicts what Google's AI tells the same homeowner. Rewrite it for 2026, cover state rebates, net metering and the lease or PPA route, link the official sources, and put the update date on the page.

10. Homeowners ask about downsides more than cost

Each search came with four People Also Ask questions, 240 in total. Questions about the downsides of solar appeared on 30 of the 60 searches, more than any other theme: "Why are people getting rid of their solar panels?" alone showed up on 13. "What is the 33% rule in solar panels?" appeared on 20 searches, and "Why is my electric bill so high if I have solar panels?" (in its various wordings) on 12.

Pages that address the downsides head-on were cited. SolarReviews' "Are Solar Panels Worth It? (And 7 Reasons Not to Buy Them)" was cited for both "are solar panels worth it" and "is solar worth it", and PowerOutage.us, cited in 11 AI Overviews, was cited for "are solar panels worth it" with a page titled "8 Reasons not to get solar panels".

What to do: answer the uncomfortable questions on your own site before a homeowner finds the answer elsewhere. A page on the real downsides of solar, a page explaining why a solar home can still get a high electric bill, and clear answers to the "rules of thumb" homeowners search for are exactly what the People Also Ask data shows they want. Mark up the questions with our FAQ Schema Generator once the answers are written.

What a solar company should publish to be cited

Each item below ties back to a finding above. These are patterns from one check of 60 searches, so treat them as the best evidence available today and measure your own results.

1. A cost page with real numbers for each state or metro you serve (findings 1, 6 and 8). Cost searches carried 89,850 monthly searches and 98.9% of that volume had an AI Overview. Most of the installer cost pages that got cited put a price, a place or the year in the title.
2. A YouTube video for each common homeowner question (findings 3 and 4). YouTube was cited in 63.5% of AI Overviews while ranking organically on 25% of the same searches.
3. Profiles and reviews on EnergySage, SolarReviews and Google (findings 3 and 7). EnergySage was cited in 63.5% and SolarReviews in 30.8% of AI Overviews, and no brand review answer cited the brand's own website.
4. Comparison pages for the equipment you install (finding 6). Four of six sources for "enphase vs tesla powerwall" were installers' own comparison pages.
5. A 2026 incentives page (finding 9). All five incentive searches showed an AI Overview, and the answers used the 2026 rules.
6. Honest answers to the People Also Ask questions (finding 10). Downsides appeared on 30 of 60 searches, ahead of cost.
7. A strong Google Business Profile for "near me" searches (finding 2). Those searches showed a local pack and no AI Overview, so the map still decides them.

The same thinking runs through our solar company program and our wider generative engine optimization work: publish the page that holds the answer, then earn mentions on the sites the AI already trusts. To see which sites AI assistants read when they recommend installers, see the sites AI reads about solar installers.

How we got this data

Date and setup. We checked all 60 searches once each on 8 October 2026 through the DataForSEO Google Organic Live Advanced endpoint, with location set to the United States, device desktop, and AI Overview loading switched on so that AI Overviews Google loads after the page were captured. Every request returned without errors. For each search we recorded whether an AI Overview appeared, its text, every link it cited, the organic results on page one (7 to 9 per search), whether a local pack appeared, and the People Also Ask questions.

Search volumes. Volumes are Google Ads monthly averages for the United States from the DataForSEO Google Ads Search Volume endpoint. Three searches ("cost of solar panels for 2000 sq ft house", "microinverters vs string inverter" and "solar installer red flags") returned no volume and count as zero in volume totals.

The 60 searches. We chose searches across the homeowner journey and grouped them by keyword rules into seven intents: cost and pricing (8), is it worth it (7), financing (5), incentives (5), choosing an installer (14), equipment (10) and how solar works (11). The full list is below.

Counting rules. A domain counts once per AI Overview, even if cited several times. One AI Overview ("solar roof") listed no sources, so overlap figures use the 51 AI Overviews with sources. The organic comparison counts a site as ranking when it appeared among the organic results on page one; video carousels, local packs and other features were recorded separately. People Also Ask themes were assigned by keyword matching, and one question can count toward more than one theme.

Installer websites. We checked each cited domain against its homepage and counted it as a solar installer when the company sells and installs solar systems for homeowners. That gave 24 installer sites, including the national provider Palmetto. Manufacturers (Enphase, Tesla, EcoFlow and others), equipment retailers, community solar developers, consultants and sites we could not verify were not counted.

Limits. This is one check per search from one national location and one device, so it is a snapshot. AI Overviews vary by user, location, device and time, and Google changes them often, so a homeowner in Phoenix may see a different answer, or none, for the same search. Sixty searches cover the main homeowner questions but are a sample, and the findings describe these searches only. Brand review results reflect how Google's AI summarized public reviews on that day and are not Orkkid's view of any company. We plan to re-run the same 60 searches each quarter and publish the trend. The city-level AI recommendation results are covered in the AI recommendation study.

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FAQ

How often does Google show an AI Overview for solar searches?

Google shows one on most of them. In our check of 60 homeowner solar searches on 8 October 2026 (US, desktop), 52 showed an AI Overview, which is 86.7%. Every search about whether solar is worth it, financing and incentives showed one, while installer searches showed one 71.4% of the time because "near me" searches showed the local pack instead.

Which websites do Google AI Overviews cite most for solar questions?

EnergySage and YouTube were each cited in 33 of 52 solar AI Overviews (63.5%), followed by Reddit (46.2%), SolarReviews (30.8%) and PowerOutage.us (21.2%). Across all 414 links cited, YouTube took the largest share at 16.7%.

Do I need to rank on page one to be cited in an AI Overview?

No. On average only 33.2% of the sites an AI Overview cited also ranked on page one for the same search, and 10 of 51 AI Overviews cited no page-one site at all. Of the 40 citations that went to solar installer websites, 25 came from sites that did not rank on page one for that search.

Can a local solar installer get cited in Google AI Overviews?

Yes. 21 of 52 AI Overviews (40.4%) cited at least one installer's own website, and 24 different installers were cited, including local companies with a cost page for their county or state, a battery comparison or an installer checklist. Pages that answered one specific question with real numbers did best.

Do AI Overviews appear for "solar companies near me"?

Not in our check. "Solar companies near me" (14,800 monthly searches) and "solar installers near me" (12,100) both showed a Google local pack and no AI Overview, so your Google Business Profile and reviews still decide those searches.

How can I check whether my solar company is cited by AI?

Run your most important homeowner questions through our free AI Citation Checker, and repeat the check every quarter with the same questions so you can see change. For Google specifically, search the questions yourself in a private window and note which sites the AI Overview links to.