According to the International Energy Agency’s (IEA) Global Energy Review 2025, global solar PV capacity additions exceeded 600GW in 2025, accounting for over a quarter of total global energy demand growth and becoming the single largest contributor to new energy supply for the first time.

The IEA report noted that the strong growth was driven by record deployment in China, significant gains in India and the European Union, and sustained cost competitiveness across major markets. Solar PV expansion rose by around 12% year-on-year, pushing global cumulative installed capacity to approximately 2.8TW and solidifying solar as the world’s largest installed power generation technology by capacity.

More than 30 countries added over 1GW of solar PV in 2025, nearly double the number in 2020, reflecting the accelerating global spread of solar deployment. This record build-out occurred as global energy demand rose by 1.3% in 2025, while electricity consumption grew at more than twice that rate.

Renewables and nuclear together met nearly 60% of global energy demand growth in 2025, with solar PV outpacing all other individual technologies. Natural gas was the second-largest contributor at 17%, far behind solar in incremental growth.

IEA Executive Director Fatih Bairol commented, “Electricity consumption is growing much faster than overall energy demand – and one energy source is growing much faster than any other. Solar PV accounted for over a quarter of all of the world’s energy demand growth – more than any other source, for the first time – followed right after by natural gas.”

China remained the dominant force in global solar expansion, commissioning nearly 370GW of solar PV in 2025, more than half of the global total. This represented a 13% increase from 2024, driven by developers accelerating projects ahead of mid-year regulatory changes – specifically the shift from fixed tariffs to competitive auctions.