What is the difference between a product warranty and a performance warranty?

The product warranty covers the physical module - delamination, a failed junction box, corroded busbars, a cracked backsheet - and on most tier-one panels now runs 25 years. The performance warranty is a separate promise about output: the panel will still produce at least a stated percentage of nameplate wattage in a given year, typically 86 to 92 percent at year 25. A panel can be perfectly intact and still fail the performance warranty, and it can fail physically while producing fine. You need both documents.

How long should a workmanship warranty be on Long Island?

Ten years is the number to hold a quote to. This is the installer's own promise covering roof penetrations, flashing, conduit runs, racking torque and anything they drilled through - and it is the only one of the three warranties that dies if the company closes. NYSERDA requires NY-Sun participating contractors to carry a written workmanship warranty, but the program floor is shorter than ten years, so the floor is not the thing to rely on. Ask how long the company has held its New York electrical license.

What voids a solar warranty?

Four things cause most denials. Pressure washing or scraping the glass, which damages the anti-reflective coating. Any unpermitted electrical change to the array after commissioning. A roofer who removes and reinstalls panels without the installer present. And an installation that departed from the manufacturer's written mounting instructions, which NEC 110.3(B) makes a code violation and every module maker makes a warranty exclusion. Keep the Town of Huntington electrical inspection sign-off with your closing documents.

Do solar warranties transfer when you sell the house?

Module and inverter warranties follow the equipment, so they transfer with the house automatically in most cases - no paperwork, though some manufacturers want a notification. The installer's workmanship warranty usually requires a written assignment, and plenty of sellers discover at the closing table that it was never filed. If the system is leased or on a power purchase agreement, the buyer has to formally assume the contract, and that assumption is a mortgage-underwriting item, not a formality.

Equipment

Solar Panel Warranties Explained for Long Island Homeowners

Huntington Solar Co Published October 2, 2026

Three separate documents cover a residential solar array on Long Island, and homeowners routinely treat them as one: a panel product warranty, a panel performance warranty, and the installer’s workmanship warranty. Two of them are backed by manufacturers that will outlive your mortgage, and one of them is backed by whoever knocked on your door in Huntington last spring.

The Three Documents, and What Each Actually Promises

The product warranty covers the module as hardware. Delamination, a failed junction box, corroded busbars, a cracked backsheet, water ingress at the frame - these are product claims. Most tier-one residential modules sold in Suffolk County now carry 25 years here, up from the 10- and 12-year terms that were standard a decade ago.

The performance warranty is a separate, parallel promise about electrical output. It allows a first-year degradation step of about 2 percent, then a linear annual decline capped somewhere between 0.25 and 0.55 percent per year depending on the cell technology. The arithmetic matters more than the headline: a module with a 0.5 percent annual cap lands near 86 percent of nameplate at year 25, while the better TOPCon and heterojunction modules guarantee 90 to 92 percent. On an 8.7 kW array that spread is roughly 500 watts of guaranteed capacity at the end of the term.

A panel can be physically intact and still fail its performance warranty. It can also fail physically while producing exactly to spec. The two documents cover different failures, and a quote that mentions only “25-year warranty” has told you almost nothing.

The workmanship warranty covers everything the installer did to your house rather than to the panels: roof penetrations, flashing, racking torque, conduit runs, the subpanel work, the labor to pull a failed module off the roof and put the replacement back. Ten years is the number to hold a quote to.

Does a Home Warranty Cover Solar Panels? Almost Never

This is the single most common misunderstanding, and it is worth being blunt about. A home warranty - the annual service contract sold at closing - covers appliances and mechanical systems that wear out. Nearly every major plan excludes rooftop photovoltaic equipment by name, and the ones that mention solar usually cover only a conventional solar water heater.

What does apply is your homeowners policy. Permanently attached roof-mounted panels are generally treated as part of the dwelling under Coverage A, which means hail, wind and falling-limb damage are insurance claims, not warranty claims. Two practical steps for a north-shore house: tell your carrier the array exists and raise the dwelling limit by the replacement cost of the system, and read your wind or hurricane deductible, which on a Centerport or Northport policy is often a percentage of the dwelling limit rather than a flat dollar figure. A nor’easter that strips twelve modules is not a manufacturer defect, and no one at the panel company will take the call.

Brand by Brand: Read the Spec Sheet, Not the Sales Sheet

Equipment selection changes the warranty you own, and the module market has turned over enough since 2024 that reputation is a poor guide.

Qcells warrants its Q.PEAK and Q.TRON residential modules for 25 years product and 25 years performance, with the TOPCon cells holding the higher end-of-term output figure. Panels are built in Dalton, Georgia, which shortens a replacement cycle.
REC ships a 20-year product warranty as standard but extends it to 25 years including labor under REC ProTrust when the array is installed by a REC Certified Solar Professional. That certification is the difference between a 20-year parts warranty and a 25-year parts-and-labor warranty on the same panel - worth asking about by name.
Maxeon warrants its 6 and 7 series modules for 40 years, product and performance. Note that the US company formerly trading as SunPower filed for bankruptcy in 2024 and its warranty obligations were not transferred intact; if a quote includes SunPower-branded hardware, ask in writing which legal entity administers the warranty today.
Panasonic announced in 2024 that it was exiting panel manufacturing. Installed EverVolt modules keep their 25-year AllGuard coverage as a contractual obligation, but service now runs through a partner network. Anyone quoting Panasonic panels from remaining stock should put the claims process in writing.

Inverters are the shortest clock in the system. Enphase IQ8 microinverters carry 25 years in the US. SolarEdge inverters ship with 12 years, extendable to 20 or 25 for a fee - and the extension has to be purchased near commissioning, not in year eleven. On the storage side, a Tesla Powerwall 3 carries 10 years, and an Enphase IQ Battery 5P carries 15 years or roughly 6,000 cycles with a 60 percent capacity floor. If Battery storage is part of the plan, that 10-versus-15-year difference is a real cost input, not a detail.

The Workmanship Warranty Is the One That Fails

Here is the catch that the door-to-door pitch leaves out. If your installer goes out of business, your module and inverter warranties are unaffected - those obligations sit with the manufacturer. Your workmanship warranty simply evaporates, because the company that signed it no longer exists. You are left owning a 25-year parts warranty with nobody to pay for the labor to use it.

That asymmetry is why installer durability is a technical specification. Ask how long the company has held its New York electrical license, whether the crew is in-house or subcontracted, and who answers a leak call in year seven. NYSERDA requires NY-Sun participating contractors to carry a written workmanship warranty, but the program minimum is shorter than the ten years a serious installer offers, so meeting the floor is not evidence of much. Our Residential solar installation pages set out how the three layers stack on a Huntington, Greenlawn or Dix Hills roof.

What Voids Coverage on a Long Island Roof

Most denied claims trace to four causes, and three of them are avoidable.

Cleaning damage. Pressure washing, metal scrapers and roof rakes scratch the anti-reflective coating. Ground-level rinsing with a hose is the accepted method.
Unpermitted modification. Any electrical change after commissioning - an added circuit, a swapped inverter, a DIY battery tie-in - needs a permit and an inspection. NEC 690.12 rapid shutdown compliance and NEC 705 interconnection rules are what the inspector is checking, and PSEG Long Island’s interconnection agreement assumes the as-approved configuration.
A roofer working alone. When shingles get replaced, panels must come off and go back on per the mounting instructions. Removal and reinstallation of an 8 to 10 kW array typically runs $1,500 to $4,000 and is not a warranty item - which is the real argument for sequencing the two jobs. See when to replace your roof before going solar.
Installation that departed from the manual. NEC 110.3(B) requires equipment to be installed per its listing and labeling, and every module maker writes the same requirement into its warranty exclusions. Rail spans, clamp zones and torque values are not suggestions.

Keep the permit file. The Town of Huntington Building Division sign-off and the final electrical inspection are the documents a manufacturer asks for when a claim gets interesting, and the documents a buyer’s attorney asks for at closing.

What to Confirm Before You Sign

Ask for all three warranty documents as PDFs before the deposit, not after. Confirm the performance figure at year 25 as a percentage rather than a phrase, confirm the inverter term and whether an extension must be bought up front, and confirm the workmanship term in years with the warranting entity named. Then check whether the incentive math still holds: New York’s residential credit under Tax Law 606(g-1) is 25 percent capped at $5,000 and PSEG-LI net metering still credits exported power, while the 30 percent federal residential credit ended for expenditures after December 31, 2025. The Full incentives breakdown carries the current numbers.

A quote that hands over three clearly written documents is telling you something about the company that no review page can.

Frequently asked

Does a home warranty cover solar panels?: Almost never. A home warranty is a service contract on appliances and systems that wear out - the furnace, the water heater, the dishwasher - and nearly every major plan excludes rooftop photovoltaic equipment by name. Read the exclusions page before you assume otherwise. The coverage that actually applies to a roof-mounted array is your homeowners insurance policy, which generally treats permanently attached panels as part of the dwelling under Coverage A, plus the three manufacturer and installer warranties that come with the system itself.
What is the difference between a product warranty and a performance warranty?: The product warranty covers the physical module - delamination, a failed junction box, corroded busbars, a cracked backsheet - and on most tier-one panels now runs 25 years. The performance warranty is a separate promise about output: the panel will still produce at least a stated percentage of nameplate wattage in a given year, typically 86 to 92 percent at year 25. A panel can be perfectly intact and still fail the performance warranty, and it can fail physically while producing fine. You need both documents.
How long should a workmanship warranty be on Long Island?: Ten years is the number to hold a quote to. This is the installer's own promise covering roof penetrations, flashing, conduit runs, racking torque and anything they drilled through - and it is the only one of the three warranties that dies if the company closes. NYSERDA requires NY-Sun participating contractors to carry a written workmanship warranty, but the program floor is shorter than ten years, so the floor is not the thing to rely on. Ask how long the company has held its New York electrical license.
What voids a solar warranty?: Four things cause most denials. Pressure washing or scraping the glass, which damages the anti-reflective coating. Any unpermitted electrical change to the array after commissioning. A roofer who removes and reinstalls panels without the installer present. And an installation that departed from the manufacturer's written mounting instructions, which NEC 110.3(B) makes a code violation and every module maker makes a warranty exclusion. Keep the Town of Huntington electrical inspection sign-off with your closing documents.
Do solar warranties transfer when you sell the house?: Module and inverter warranties follow the equipment, so they transfer with the house automatically in most cases - no paperwork, though some manufacturers want a notification. The installer's workmanship warranty usually requires a written assignment, and plenty of sellers discover at the closing table that it was never filed. If the system is leased or on a power purchase agreement, the buyer has to formally assume the contract, and that assumption is a mortgage-underwriting item, not a formality.