New solar panel sets world efficiency record

A newly developed solar module has achieved a world-record efficiency of 34.4%, marking a significant step towards producing more electricity from the same amount of sunlight and advancing clean energy technology in Germany.

“By using shingled matrix technology to interconnect the solar cells, we were able to increase the module’s efficiency to 34.4 percent,” said the research team at the Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems (ISE).

Fraunhofer ISE developed the record-breaking module in collaboration with AZUR SPACE and uses triple III-V germanium solar cells originally designed for space applications. After setting a record of 34.2% earlier in 2026, the team improved the design by adopting shingled-matrix technology, which allows solar cells to overlap without shading active areas and eliminates the need for traditional metal interconnects. The innovation increases the amount of sunlight converted into electricity and demonstrates how advances in photovoltaic design could help make future solar power systems more efficient and effective.