Plenty of articles promise up to £2,000 from your bank for going solar. Read the small print and that top figure is almost always for a heat pump. For solar panels and batteries the best cashback on offer is £1,000, a few lenders will lend you the money cheaply instead, and several of the schemes still being recommended closed more than a year ago. We checked every lender's own terms in October 2026. Here is the full list.
Every lender at a glance
This table covers the offers that reward solar panels or a battery specifically, rather than a home that is already energy efficient. Amounts are what each lender's own page showed on 16 October 2026. Every one of them can be changed or withdrawn without notice, so check again in the week you apply.
| Lender | Scheme | For solar or a battery | Main condition |
|---|---|---|---|
| Halifax | Green Living Reward (cashback) | £1,000 for roof-top panels or a fixed battery, plus a free EPC | New mortgage, extra borrowing or new deal completed in the last 12 months |
| Barclays | Greener Home Reward (cashback) | £500 for panels, a battery or solar thermal | Existing Barclays residential mortgage, MCS installer, claim within 3 months |
| Lloyds | Eco Home Reward (cashback) | £500, plus a free EPC | Same rules as Halifax: a new mortgage, extra borrowing or deal in the last 12 months |
| Nationwide | Green Additional Borrowing | Borrow £5,000 to £20,000 at 0% for 2 or 5 years | Existing Nationwide mortgage, all of it spent on green improvements |
| Skipton BS | Green Additional Borrowing | Borrow £10,000 to £50,000 at a lower rate, no product fee | At least half spent on energy improvements |
| Coventry BS | Green Further Advance | Borrow up to £25,000 at a lower rate | Six months of payments made, at least half spent on improvements |
Cashback: Halifax, Barclays and Lloyds
Halifax pays the most. Its Green Living Reward gives £1,000 for roof-top solar panels or a non-portable home battery, with a free Energy Performance Certificate (EPC) offered once you've been paid. Note the wording: plug-in balcony panels and portable power stations don't count. The reward hangs off a recent mortgage event rather than simply being a customer. You need to have completed a new mortgage, additional borrowing or a switch to a new deal in the last 12 months, and you then have a year from completion to finish the work and claim with a final, paid invoice (a 60-day extension can be requested). It's for owner-occupiers only, not buy-to-let, and one reward per mortgage product.
Barclays is the simplest to qualify for. Its Greener Home Reward pays existing residential mortgage customers £500 for solar panels, battery storage or solar thermal, with no new borrowing needed. The catches: the installer must be MCS-certified, you have three months from the date on your MCS certificate to claim, you must pay by Direct Debit and be up to date, and it's one reward per customer, ever. The reward used to be bigger, so articles from before 2026 quoting up to £2,000 are out of date.
Lloyds runs the same scheme as Halifax under the name Eco Home Reward, with identical rules on timing and invoices. The difference in October 2026 is the amount. Lloyds' page now lists £2,000 for a heat pump and £500 for other improvements, with no separate £1,000 solar tier, so expect £500 for panels or a battery. Both brands belong to the same banking group, yet Halifax currently pays double for the same job.
Cheap borrowing: Nationwide, Skipton and Coventry
If the problem is finding the money rather than earning a reward, a further advance (extra borrowing added to your existing mortgage) can be the better deal. Nationwide's Green Additional Borrowing is the standout: existing members can borrow £5,000 to £20,000 with 0% interest fixed for two or five years and no product fee, up to 90% of the home's value. All of it must go on eligible improvements, and solar panels and battery storage are explicitly on the list. When the 0% period ends, anything left moves to Nationwide's standard variable rate, so plan to clear it or switch. Nationwide says the allocation is limited and can be withdrawn at any time.
Skipton Building Society lends £10,000 to £50,000 on its Green Additional Borrowing with no product fee and a better rate than standard extra borrowing, provided at least half goes on energy-efficient improvements. It also offers members a free EPC Plus report. Coventry Building Society's Green Further Advance works the same way up to £25,000, again with half the money for green work, once you've made six consecutive monthly payments.
These are secured loans against your home with normal affordability checks, and the rates change often, so we don't quote them here. Compare the total cost with your other options and speak to the lender or an independent mortgage broker first. Nothing in this guide is financial advice.
Rewards for homes that are already efficient
A second family of offers rewards the home's EPC rating rather than the work. Nationwide's Green Reward pays £500 on a purchase where the property scores 92 or more (band A) and £250 for a high B (86 to 91). Halifax and Lloyds pay £250 on purchases and remortgages from other lenders for homes rated A or B, through a broker only. HSBC adds extra cashback on its Energy Efficient Home mortgages for A and B rated homes, and NatWest, Barclays, Leeds and others offer slightly lower rates for the same bands.
Solar can help you reach these bands, typically adding somewhere around 6 to 10 points, and EPC assessors now record your actual panels and battery rather than default assumptions. But most homes sit in band D, so solar alone rarely gets a home to A or B. Treat these as a bonus at your next remortgage rather than a reason to install. Our guide to whether your mortgage lender will pay for solar explains the EPC route in more detail.
Schemes that have ended (but still get recommended)
Santander's £1,000 greener homes cashback required work to be finished by 30 September 2025 and is closed. Virgin Money's £250 Green Reward closed to registrations in June 2025, and the brand has since moved under Nationwide. Coventry Building Society's £500 green cashback ended in 2024. Barclays' larger rewards were cut in January 2026, and Lloyds' £1,000 solar tier has gone.
Many installer websites still list these, often under headlines promising up to £2,000 cashback. If a page doesn't say when it was last checked, assume it's stale and go to the lender's own site.
How to claim without losing the reward
Check before you sign anything. Register on the Halifax or Lloyds green portal, or confirm with Barclays or your building society, before work starts, because every scheme has a qualifying window and most people who miss out do so on timing. Use an MCS-certified installer. Barclays requires it, and you'll want the MCS certificate anyway to get paid for the power you export.
Keep the paperwork. Halifax and Lloyds want a final paid invoice showing your name, the property address, the installer's details, a full description of the work, the date and the total. Barclays wants the MCS certificate within its three-month window. Note your deadline the day the system goes live.
Each reward is one per mortgage product (Halifax, Lloyds) or one per customer (Barclays), so if you're planning panels now and a battery later, it can pay to fit both in one job and claim once. Lender rewards sit alongside 0% VAT and Smart Export Guarantee payments, so they all add up.