Quick answer · updated 5 September 2026

How much solar do I need to run a watermaker?

Somewhere between 92 W and 493 W of panel to make 100 litres a day — a spread of more than 5× that comes down to which system you buy, not how much sun you get.

Leanest system92 WSchenker Zen 30
Thirstiest493 WRainman Modular AC 70L
The assumption1,600 Wha 400 W panel, clear day

That is array dedicated to the watermaker, on top of whatever the fridge, the autopilot and the electronics already take — so the upper end of that range means well over a panel of genuinely spare generation, not a panel you already have. It is also a clear-day figure: a week of overcast is the case that actually sizes a cruising system, which is why tank capacity is the cheap buffer.

The honest version of this question is not "how much solar" but "how much spare solar" — and the answer is on your own boat, not in a table. The calculator asks for your surplus rather than your array.

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Where these numbers come from. Every figure on this page is computed at build time from the comparison table — rated output and rated draw as the manufacturer publishes them, with watt-hours per litre derived as one divided by the other. Nothing is typed in by hand, so nothing here can drift from the table. Where a figure is an assumption rather than a specification it is labelled as one. Methodology · the table.