An on-grid solar system stays wired to the utility, sends surplus power back for a credit, and shuts off the moment the grid goes down. An off-grid solar system never connects to the utility, so it must generate and store every watt it will ever use, typically pushing a home installation to $50,000-$100,000 or more. A hybrid system splits the difference: grid-tied for the lower upfront cost and net-metering credit, plus a battery sized to carry key circuits through an outage, usually $30,000-$45,000. Which fits a given property comes down to two questions: is there already a utility connection, and what does losing power actually cost you.
What “on-grid,” “off-grid” and “hybrid” mean
On-grid (also called grid-tied) is the standard setup for almost every residential system sold in the US: panels feed a grid-tie inverter that syncs its output to the utility’s voltage and frequency, and production beyond what the house is using flows out through the meter. No battery is fitted or required. Off-grid means exactly what it says: no utility meter, ever, so every appliance draws from a battery bank that panels, and often a generator, keep charged. Hybrid is grid-tied plus a battery and a transfer switch or smart panel; it earns net-metering credit in normal operation, then switches some or all of the house to battery power once the utility drops. See our solar panel guide for how the panels themselves differ across all three. A portable power station marketed as “off-grid ready” is usually describing this hybrid-style backup, not a true off-grid install. Small plug-in systems that sit in a window and feed one circuit, covered in our plug-in solar guide, are also on-grid. As of October 2026, about ten states, Utah and California among them, have passed laws that let certified kits under a size cap, usually 1,200 watts, skip the full interconnection process a rooftop array goes through; California’s and New Jersey’s laws take effect in 2027. Elsewhere the utility may still require an interconnection application before you connect one, so check your state’s law and your utility’s rules first.
What happens to each system when the power goes out
A plain on-grid system goes dark in an outage by design, not by failure. UL 1741, applied with the IEEE 1547 interconnection standard, requires grid-tied inverters to detect a loss of utility power and disconnect within 2 seconds, a behavior called anti-islanding, so a lineworker never meets a “dead” wire that is secretly still live. A rooftop array producing plenty of power on a sunny afternoon still leaves the house dark the moment the grid trips, unless a battery and transfer equipment are added. An off-grid system never notices a utility outage, since it was never connected to one; its only failure mode is draining its battery faster than the panels and generator can refill it in bad weather. A hybrid system’s transfer switch or smart panel isolates a set of circuits and moves them to the battery automatically, then back once the utility returns; how seamless that is depends on the specific inverter, so check its own spec sheet rather than assume it is instant.
Cost comparison: on-grid, hybrid and off-grid
Prices checked September 2026. A typical grid-tied home system runs $2.58-$2.75 per watt on a 7-8kW array, around $18,000-$22,000 before incentives; the federal residential solar tax credit expired for systems installed in 2026 and later. Hybrid prices the same array plus a 10-13kWh battery and hybrid inverter package, typically $12,000-$20,000 installed, for a combined $30,000-$42,000. Off-grid sizes for the worst case, not the average – an oversized 10-20kW array plus a 40-60kWh battery bank for 3-5 sunless days at $800-$1,200 per installed kWh – which is why the all-in total lands at $50,000-$100,000-plus.
| System | What it includes | Typical installed cost | Power in an outage |
|---|---|---|---|
| On-grid | Panels + grid-tie inverter, no battery | $18,000-$22,000 | None – shuts off by design |
| Hybrid | Same array + battery + hybrid inverter/transfer switch | $30,000-$42,000 | Selected circuits, sized to the battery |
| Off-grid | Oversized array + 40-60kWh battery + charge controller, usually plus a generator | $50,000-$100,000+ | Whole house, limited by battery and sun |
Net metering and why it moves the on-grid math
Net metering is the credit a utility pays for solar sent back through the meter, and it changes what a battery is worth. Under NEM 3.0, California’s current rules, that credit averages around $0.05 per kWh exported, down from roughly $0.30 previously – about a 75 percent cut for anyone who interconnected after April 2023. New York, New Jersey, Maryland, Massachusetts, Vermont and Oregon still credit exports close to retail; roughly a third of states have reduced or replaced full retail net metering as of 2026. Where the export credit is thin, a battery that lets you use your own solar in the evening rather than sell it at $0.05/kWh and buy it back at $0.25-$0.35/kWh often pays for itself faster than the same battery bought purely as outage insurance. Where exports still track retail, plain on-grid with no battery usually has the shortest payback.
Inverter types and battery sizing
An off-grid inverter never has to sync to anything, unlike the two grid-connected types above, but it is usually paired with a separate MPPT charge controller managing how panel output charges the battery, plus a generator input for days solar cannot keep up. Battery sizing starts with the same arithmetic in any of the three: usable kWh needed equals critical daily load in kWh times days of autonomy wanted, divided by usable depth of discharge. LiFePO4, which nearly every current home battery uses, tolerates close to 100 percent depth of discharge, unlike the 50 percent commonly budgeted for older lead-acid banks, so a 16kWh LiFePO4 pack delivers close to its full 16kWh rather than half. A whole-home hybrid battery backup option, 16 kWh Haven Home Backup, packages 16,000 Wh of LiFePO4 storage for $10,999, enough for most circuits for a full sunless day. EcoFlow DELTA Pro Ultra Whole-Home Backup Power (UL 9540 Certificated) is a smaller alternative at 6,000 Wh and $3,799, often paired with EcoFlow Smart Home Panel 3 (32 Circuits) ($3,099) so it backs up chosen breakers instead of the whole panel. Run this math against your own load with our solar battery calculator.
Worked example: an off-grid cabin versus a grid-tied home
A part-time cabin with LED lighting, a compressor fridge, a water pump and device charging typically draws 4-6kWh a day; call it 5,000Wh. At 4 peak sun hours, that load needs 5,000Wh / 4h = 1,250W of live panel output; real-world losses from wiring, heat and angle run 20-25 percent, pushing the nameplate array to roughly 1,600W – four 400W panels like Renogy’s 200/400W N-Type Portable Solar Panel Blanket ($240) wired in parallel. A weekend cabin can usually get by on 1-2 days of autonomy rather than the 3-5 days a full-time off-grid home needs, since nobody draws power between visits; at 5,000Wh a day, 2 days is 10,000Wh (10kWh) of usable storage. A packaged option like Renogy’s 48V Standard Backup System – 50Ah Self-Heating LiFePO4 Battery & 3500W Solar Inverter Charger ($1,937), bundling a lithium battery with its own charge controller and inverter, covers a single overnight fridge-and-lighting cycle on its own; most real cabin builds close the rest of the gap with a small generator rather than paying for two full sunless days of battery. Size that generator for the fridge’s compressor surge, which can briefly pull 5-7 times its running current (about 1,000-1,500W for a full-size fridge) at startup, and never run it indoors or in a garage – its exhaust carbon monoxide is invisible and can reach a lethal concentration in minutes.
A grid-tied home, by contrast, sizes to average draw, not worst-case autonomy. The US Energy Information Administration puts average household consumption at about 10,400kWh a year (863kWh a month in 2024), or roughly 28,400Wh a day. At 4.5 peak sun hours and a 20 percent loss allowance, that is 28,400Wh / 4.5h / 0.8 = about 7,889W of panels – an 8kW array, in line with the $18,000-$22,000 figure above; see our solar system sizing guide for the full method with your own utility bill. No battery is required for the grid-tied version; adding one for backup, as above, is a separate decision with its own price tag.
| Metric | Off-grid cabin | Grid-tied home |
|---|---|---|
| Daily load | ~5,000Wh | ~28,400Wh |
| Panel array | ~1,600W | ~8,000W |
| Battery | 10kWh, plus a generator for extended cloud cover | None required; 10-13kWh for hybrid backup |
| Inverter | Off-grid stand-alone + MPPT charge controller | Grid-tie (or hybrid, if adding backup) |
| Rough parts cost | $12,000-$18,000 | $18,000-$22,000 installed |
Which one actually fits your situation
If the property already has a meter and outages are rare or short, plain on-grid with no battery has the shortest payback, especially where exports still credit near the retail rate. If outages matter – a well pump, a home office, medical equipment, a low export credit like California’s $0.05/kWh – hybrid keeps the net-metering upside and adds backup for the circuits that need it, without paying to store days of whole-house power. Off-grid wins the cost argument only where there is no utility connection and running one would cost more than the system itself: overhead line extensions run $10-$50 a foot, so a half-mile (2,640 feet) of new line alone can cost roughly $26,000-$130,000, sometimes more in rocky or wooded terrain. For land that already has a meter, off-grid is rarely the cheaper choice; for land that does not, it can be the only realistic one. Either way, have a licensed electrician handle any work inside the main panel, including a transfer switch or interconnection breaker – never a DIY step.
Frequently asked questions
Can a grid-tied solar system keep the lights on during a blackout?
Not without a battery. UL 1741’s anti-islanding rule forces a plain grid-tie inverter to disconnect within 2 seconds of losing utility power, shutting the system down even on a sunny day. Only a hybrid system, with a battery and transfer switch, can power any circuits once the grid drops.
Is off-grid solar cheaper than staying connected to the utility?
Usually not, if a connection already exists. A full off-grid home system typically costs $50,000-$100,000-plus against $18,000-$22,000 for an on-grid array of similar output, mainly because of the 40-60kWh battery bank off-grid needs. It wins only where extending a utility line would itself cost more than the solar system, which $10-$50-a-foot line-extension pricing can easily reach on rural land.
Do I need a permit for an off-grid solar system?
In most US jurisdictions, yes. Off-grid systems still involve batteries, inverters and wiring covered by the National Electrical Code, so most counties require an electrical permit and inspection regardless of any utility interconnection.
What size battery does a hybrid solar system need?
It depends on which circuits you want backed up and for how long, not on the size of the array. Multiply those circuits’ combined wattage by the hours you want covered for watt-hours needed, then divide by the battery’s usable depth of discharge; our solar battery calculator runs that math with your own numbers.
Does net metering still exist in 2026?
Yes, but the value varies by state. New York, New Jersey, Maryland, Massachusetts, Vermont and Oregon still credit exports close to the retail rate, while California, Hawaii, Nevada and Arizona have moved to lower net-billing rates. Check your own utility’s current tariff before assuming either extreme applies to you.