Key Highlights

  • Silver's share of solar cell production costs rose from roughly 5 percent in 2023 to about 14 percent by September 2025, and above 20 percent by 2026 on some estimates, prompting manufacturers to accelerate thrifting.
  • Photovoltaic silver Demand fell 6 percent to 186.6 million ounces in 2025 and is forecast to drop a further 19 percent to roughly 151 million ounces in 2026.
  • LONGi Green Energy said in January 2026 it would mass-produce base-metal solar cells starting in the second quarter of 2026, and began a 21-gigawatt copper-based back-contact cell line in July 2026.
  • Shanghai Aiko Solar Energy was already producing 6.5 gigawatts of solar cells without silver, using copper for interconnection in its all-back-contact modules.

Thrifting Accelerates as Silver's Cost Share Balloons

Bloomberg reported on August 28, 2026 that solar panel manufacturers were accelerating so-called thrifting, the practice of reducing the amount of silver loaded into each panel, as record silver prices eroded Manufacturing margins. The dynamic reflects a rapid escalation in silver's weight within solar production costs: the metal accounted for roughly 5 percent of solar cell production costs in 2023, climbed to about 14 percent by September 2025, and by some industry estimates exceeded 20 percent of cell costs in 2026 as silver prices multiplied several times over. That cost pressure has pushed engineers toward new cell architectures, including zero-busbar designs and ultra-fine screen printing techniques capable of cutting silver loading per cell by 10 to 20 percent, with mainstream cells targeted to fall below 5 milligrams of silver per watt by 2027. The shift marks a Reversal from the prior several years, when solar demand for silver had more than doubled from about 82 million ounces in 2020 to roughly 197 million ounces in 2024 as global photovoltaic installations surged.

Manufacturers Move Toward Copper Substitution

Several major Chinese producers have moved beyond incremental thrifting toward outright substitution of copper for silver in specific cell designs. LONGi Green Energy Technology announced in January 2026 that it planned to mass-produce solar cells using base metals instead of silver starting in the second quarter of 2026, and by July 2026 had begun operating a 21-gigawatt back-contact cell production line built around what the company describes as an Alloy Contact Matrix technology. JinkoSolar Holding announced similar plans in December 2025 for large-scale production using base metals, while Shanghai Aiko Solar Energy was already producing 6.5 gigawatts of solar cells without silver, relying on copper for interconnection across its all-back-contact modules. Even so, mainstream TOPCon cell technology, which remains more reliant on silver paste, was expected to account for roughly 70 percent of the solar market in 2026, and back-contact cell manufacturing costs were not expected to reach Parity with TOPCon until closer to the end of the decade, meaning the transition away from silver is likely to unfold over years rather than months even as it accelerates industry-wide.

Silver Bulls Recalibrate the Demand Narrative

Follow-on coverage, including analysis from AGBI in September 2026, noted that the fading of the solar demand growth story has prompted some silver bulls to shift their attention toward gold, tempering a narrative that had cast photovoltaic demand as a primary structural pillar of the silver bull case. Even as photovoltaic demand is projected to fall by roughly 19 percent in 2026, forecasters including Metals Focus and the Silver Institute still expected the overall silver market to run a sixth consecutive annual Supply Deficit in 2026, underscoring that industrial thrifting alone has not been sufficient to resolve the broader physical imbalance between mine and recycled supply and total demand. The result is a more nuanced demand picture: solar's role as a growth engine for silver consumption is diminishing in relative terms even as total industrial demand, jewelry, and Investment demand continue to interact with a still-constrained supply base.

Where Things Stand

The solar industry's pivot away from silver, evident in LONGi's, JinkoSolar's and Aiko's moves toward copper-based cell designs through 2026, represents a genuine structural response to record silver prices rather than a cyclical blip, and photovoltaic silver demand is on track to fall for a second consecutive year in 2026. Yet the broader silver deficit has proven resilient to this shift so far, suggesting that thrifting is reshaping rather than eliminating silver's role in the energy transition. Whether copper-based back-contact technology scales quickly enough to materially dent silver demand over the next several years, or whether persistent supply constraints and rising investment demand keep the market tight regardless, remains an open question that will likely shape how the narrative between silver's industrial and monetary demand drivers continues to evolve.