As a nation, wind produces far more energy than solar, but if you’re looking to power your home, then panels on your roof are almost always the best choice.
If you’re weighing up solar panels against a wind turbine, you’ve probably noticed something odd. Wind supplied a record 30% of UK electricity in 2025 and solar just 6.9%, yet nearly every home renewables quote is for panels. The reason is size, site and planning law.
For a typical UK home, solar wins on cost, planning and payback. A 4kW system costs about a fifth of a 6kW pole-mounted turbine, rarely needs planning permission, and makes each unit of electricity for under half the price. This guide covers 2026 costs, output, the planning rules and the few properties where wind does make sense, plus two things most comparisons skip: the lifetime cost per kWh, and why the rules cap a garden turbine at a rotor about 2.2m wide.
- Solar is the better choice for most UK homes. A 4kW system costs £6,000-£7,500 installed. A 6kW pole-mounted turbine costs £31,000-£35,000.
- Solar electricity costs less than half as much per unit. Our lifetime estimate is 9.5p per kWh for rooftop solar and 22p for a well-sited turbine, against 26.32p from the grid (October to December 2026 price cap).
- A turbine needs a measured average wind speed of at least 5 m/s. The Energy Saving Trust recommends recording wind on site for at least three months first.
- Permitted development only covers very small turbines. In England a garden turbine without planning permission is capped at 11.1m tall with a 3.8m² swept area. Wales and Northern Ireland always require an application.
- Wind’s real advantage is winter output. That makes it a partner for solar on large rural sites, not a replacement.
Solar panels vs wind turbines at a glance
Solar beats wind on every line that decides whether you get your money back. The comparison uses a 4kW rooftop solar system and a 6kW pole-mounted turbine, the size the Energy Saving Trust uses for its wind figures.
| Factor | Solar panels (4kW) | Wind turbine (6kW pole) |
|---|---|---|
| Installed cost | £6,000-£7,500 | £31,000-£35,000 |
| Yearly output | 3,000-3,800kWh | Up to about 9,000kWh on a good site |
| Lifetime cost per kWh | About 9.5p | 22p (good site) to 40p (weaker site) |
| Lifespan | 25-30+ years | Around 20 years with servicing |
| Running costs | One inverter swap, £500-£1,000 | £100-£200 a year, plus a £1,000-£2,000 inverter swap |
| Planning permission | Not needed on most roofs | Needed at this size |
| Where it works | Most south, east or west-facing roofs | Open, exposed rural land |
| Strongest months | April to September | Autumn and winter |
| 0% VAT | Until 31 March 2027 | Until 31 March 2027 |
Wind only comes out ahead on winter generation. That can matter on a farm with a big winter load, but it can’t offset a price five times higher on an ordinary home.
What solar panels and wind turbines cost to install and run in 2026
A typical 4kW solar system costs £6,000-£7,500 installed, while a 6kW pole-mounted turbine costs £31,000-£35,000. The wind figures come from the Energy Saving Trust, which put it at around £35,000 in May 2026, and Changeworks in Scotland, which quotes around £31,000.
Solar: MCS installation data for 2026 puts the average at roughly £1,550-£1,700 per kW, covering around ten panels, an inverter, scaffolding, wiring and your MCS certificate. After that, plan for one inverter replacement at 10-15 years. Our solar panel cost guide breaks prices down by house size and region.
Wind: the turbine is only part of the bill. You also pay for the mast and a concrete foundation. Then a long cable run, because the turbine has to stand well clear of buildings and boundaries. Then the inverter, grid connection and planning application, plus any noise or ecology reports the council asks for. Ask for quotes itemised line by line, because groundworks and cabling are where totals drift. Servicing runs at £100-£200 a year, according to the Energy Saving Trust, and every repair means working at height.
Roof-mounted turbines are much cheaper, with 1kW units commonly quoted at £2,000-£4,000. Changeworks advises against fitting them to homes because of the strain on the building, and they produce very little, as the field trial results below show.
Both are zero-rated for VAT until 31 March 2027, when the rate is due to return to 5%. Solar can be surveyed and fitted within weeks. A turbine usually needs three months of wind measurement, a planning decision (councils have eight weeks for most small applications) and grid connection approval. A wind project started this autumn could miss the 0% window.
There are currently no specific grant schemes for home wind turbines, the Energy Saving Trust says. Solar is covered by more help, listed in our solar grants guide.
How much electricity and money each one makes
A well-sited 6kW turbine can generate around 9,000kWh a year, more than double a 4kW solar system, but your site decides whether you get near that. Solar output is easy to predict from roof direction and postcode. Wind isn’t, because the energy in moving air rises with the cube of its speed. Cut the average wind speed by a fifth and you lose about half the output.
Worked example: 4kW solar on a Midlands semi
Take a household using 2,700kWh a year with a south-facing 4kW system. It generates about 3,400kWh. Without a battery, around 40% is used as it’s produced: 1,360kWh. At the 26.32p price cap, that saves £358. The other 2,040kWh is exported at 12p: £245. Total, about £600 a year, which pays back a £6,800 system in around 11 years. Being home in the day or adding a battery shifts more output into the 26p column.
Worked example: 6kW turbine on an exposed farmhouse plot
Give the same household a turbine hitting 9,000kWh. Wind blows day and night, but a home using 2,700kWh can only absorb so much. Say 1,600kWh is used on site: £421 saved. The other 7,400kWh is exported at 12p: £888. That’s about £1,300 a year, or £1,150 after servicing. On a £35,000 installation, payback is around 30 years, on a machine expected to last about 20. At a 15p export rate it’s still 25 years.
Wind only starts to pay when a heat pump, electric car, workshop or farm soaks up thousands of kWh at the full import price, or when the turbine replaces a diesel generator on an off-grid property.
How many solar panels equal a wind turbine?
About 25. Matching 9,000kWh takes roughly 10.5kW of solar at a UK average of 850kWh per kW, or 24-25 panels at 430W, covering about 50m². On land with room for a turbine, a ground-mounted array that size would cost roughly £14,000-£18,000 by our estimate. That’s about half the turbine’s price for the same yearly output. Under current rules in England a stand-alone array over 9m² needs planning permission, so neither avoids the council at that scale.
What each unit of electricity costs over the system’s life
Rooftop solar produces electricity for about 9.5p per kWh. A 6kW turbine costs around 22p on a good site and nearly 40p on a weaker one, which is more than grid electricity. This puts a £7,000 system and a £35,000 system on the same scale.
The solar figure: £6,800 upfront plus £800 for an inverter swap makes £7,600. At 3,400kWh a year, trimmed for panel ageing, that’s about 80,000kWh over 25 years. Divide and you get 9.5p.
The wind figure: £35,000 upfront, £3,000 of servicing over 20 years and £1,500 for an inverter makes £39,500. At 9,000kWh a year for 20 years, that’s 180,000kWh, or 21.9p. Now drop output to 5,000kWh. Because of the cube rule, that only takes average wind speeds about 18% lower. The cost jumps to 39.5p. A small difference in wind speed takes a turbine from expensive to dearer than the grid. Finance costs and export income are left out, and neither changes the order.
Planning permission: the rules only allow a very small turbine
Most home solar needs no planning permission, but a turbine big enough to make a difference almost always does. Roof panels are permitted development in England if they project no more than 200mm, with exceptions for listed buildings and wall-mounted panels facing a road in a conservation area.
For a stand-alone garden turbine in England, the Planning Portal sets these limits:
- Height: blade tip no more than 11.1m, with the lowest point of the blades at least 5m off the ground.
- Boundaries: at least the turbine’s full height plus 10% from every boundary.
- Swept area: no more than 3.8m².
- One turbine only, meeting the MCS planning standard, including a noise calculation at neighbouring homes.
The swept area limit decides everything. 3.8m² is the circle traced by a rotor about 2.2m across. The 6kW turbine in the Energy Saving Trust’s field trial had a 5.5m rotor sweeping about 24m², more than six times the limit. So a turbine you can put up without permission is roughly 1-1.5kW. The boundary rule then means a full-height turbine must stand 12.2m from every boundary, so you need a plot more than 24m across in each direction.
If your home already has an air source heat pump, a turbine loses its permitted development rights and needs a full planning application.
Wales and Northern Ireland require planning permission for any wind turbine, and Scotland’s exceptions are best checked with your local planning officer. In March 2026 the government consulted on letting farms, businesses and schools in England put up a single turbine of up to 30m without a full application, while proposing no change for homes. It closed on 10 June 2026, so check GOV.UK for the outcome. If your property includes a working farm, that route may matter more than the household rules.
Anything exporting more than 3.68kW per phase, counting solar and wind together, also needs network operator approval. See our guide to G98 vs G99.
Why roof-mounted turbines rarely work
They sit in slow, turbulent air. In a year-long field trial published in 2009, the Energy Saving Trust monitored 57 small turbines, 38 of them on buildings. Every building-mounted site averaged under 4 m/s, and some used more electricity than they made because the inverter kept drawing power. The best building-mounted result, a 1.5kW unit in Scotland, produced about 975kWh in a year, less than three solar panels. If your roof isn’t ideal for panels, it’s still a better bet than a turbine; see our guide to north-facing roofs.
When a wind turbine is worth considering
A turbine can make sense on an open rural plot with measured average wind speeds of 5 m/s or more and either a high electricity demand or no grid connection. Work through these checks in order. A no at any stage means solar is the better use of your money.
Trees, buildings and hills break up the wind. The turbine needs clean airflow from the prevailing south-westerly and should stand well above anything nearby.
Wind maps are estimates, and the 2009 trial found prediction tools overestimated urban and suburban speeds. Record with an anemometer at hub height for at least three months. Under 5 m/s, stop.
Exports earn 12-15p per kWh. Power you use saves 26p or more. A heat pump, EV, farm load or off-grid home changes the maths more than a bigger turbine does.
Without an MCS certificate you can’t claim Smart Export Guarantee payments. Search the MCS directory for small wind before paying for a survey.
Certified small wind is a thin market. When MCS certified Ryse Energy’s G-11 in January 2025, it was the first wind product certified in more than four years and the only one then on the scheme, with 11 installers certified for small wind. Confirm the product and installer are both listed before you sign.
Solar and wind together
A hybrid only makes sense on a site that already passes the wind checks, but there the two cover each other’s weak season. A south-facing solar system makes only around 12% of its yearly output between November and February, while UK winds tend to be stronger through autumn and winter, when a heat pump works hardest.
Fit the solar first, since it’s cheaper per kWh, then size the turbine against the winter gap rather than your annual total. A battery evens out day and night, but it can’t carry summer sunshine into December. Our solar and heat pump calculator helps with the solar side.
Solar vs wind scored for a typical UK home
Solar scores 4.1 out of 5 and a home wind turbine 2.1, across the six factors that decide whether each is worth buying for an ordinary house.
On a windy farm with a big winter load, wind’s scores for cost per kWh and winter output carry more weight. On a town or village house the gap is wider than shown, because a turbine that fits the planning rules is far smaller than our 6kW benchmark.
No suitable roof or land? Two smaller options
Plug-in solar became legal in Great Britain on 27 August 2026. A registered, compliant kit can feed up to 800W into an ordinary socket from panels on a balcony, wall or garden frame. Battery kits aren’t covered and renters need permission. Savings run to tens of pounds a year, on a kit costing a few hundred.
Co-owning a wind farm means buying a share of a large turbine in return for savings on your bill. Check who runs the scheme and what happens if they fail: Ripple Energy, the best-known platform, collapsed in 2025 and its wind farms passed to another operator, 1st Energy. Our guide to community energy projects covers what to look for.
Is wind or solar more efficient?
Efficiency figures don’t settle it. Modern panels convert around 20-23% of the sunlight hitting them, and no turbine can capture more than 59% of the wind’s energy, with small ones managing much less. For a home, kWh per pound is what counts, and solar wins at almost every UK address.
Can I put a wind turbine on my house?
In England a building-mounted turbine can only be permitted development on a detached house or block of flats, no more than 3m above the roof or 15m tall overall, with a swept area under 3.8m². Changeworks advises against them because of structural strain, and trial results show very low output.
Are vertical axis wind turbines better for homes?
They take up less space and catch wind from any direction, but the Energy Saving Trust notes they tend to be less efficient than propeller-style turbines. They don’t solve the problem of slow, turbulent air around houses.
Can I get Smart Export Guarantee payments for a wind turbine?
Yes. The SEG covers wind, but you need an MCS certificate or equivalent and a smart meter that records exports.
Solar for almost every home, wind for a few exposed rural sites
Solar costs about a fifth as much as a 6kW turbine, rarely needs planning permission and produces electricity for around 9.5p per kWh. A turbine on a good site costs more than twice that per unit, and on a slightly calmer site it costs more than the grid.
Wind belongs where the land is open, the wind has been measured at 5 m/s or more, and there’s a big load to use the output, ideally alongside solar. If that isn’t your property, get three quotes from MCS-certified solar installers and run them through our solar quote checker before you sign.
METHODOLOGY: Figures checked September 2026. Grid price is Ofgem’s October to December 2026 Direct Debit cap of 26.32p per kWh, with no VAT on electricity until 31 March 2027. Exports at 12p per kWh. Solar output assumes 850kWh per kW a year and about 0.5% yearly panel ageing. Wind costs and output are from the Energy Saving Trust (May 2026) and Changeworks (June 2026). Lifetime costs exclude finance and export income.
DISCLAIMER: Prices and savings are indicative and vary by property, site, tariff and installer. Planning rules differ across the UK, so check with your local planning authority. This is not financial advice.
