Pylon vs. Solar Monkey
A Quick Summary
Of everything a Dutch installer might put next to Pylon, Solar Monkey is the closest. Both run in the browser, both design a roof and price it, both handle batteries, and both are built for quoting rather than for engineering reports. It is also the only one of the Dutch options that publishes what it costs, which makes this the easiest comparison to check.
Solar Monkey came out of Delft, built its simulation with TU Delft, and does two things Pylon does not. It monitors the systems you install, and it stands behind the yield in your quotation with a Guarantee Fund and quarterly performance reports. If you sell on a promised yield, that is a genuinely good reason to choose it, and no feature table should pretend otherwise.
Where they part company is the model. Solar Monkey starts at €85 a month plus €12 for each project. Pylon is €4 per project and no monthly fee at all. Ten projects in a month costs €205 on one and €40 on the other, and a month where you quote nothing costs €85 against nothing. Pylon also includes the things Solar Monkey leaves to other software: the CRM, the e-signature, and reading the customer’s own consumption data instead of a profile.
| Solar Monkey | ||
| Pricing |
€4 per project
No monthly fees
|
From €85 per month
plus €12 per project
|
| Ten projects in a month | €40 | €205 |
| A month with no quotes | €0 | €85 |
| Customer management | Built in |
Bring your own
Pipedrive, Zoho or Salesforce
|
| After the install | Not covered | Monitoring and a yield guarantee |
| GetApp "Ease of use" rating | 4.5 / 5 | – / 5 |
Pylon's Ideal Customer Checklist
- Your quote volume moves month to month, and a subscription you pay through a quiet winter is money you would rather keep.
- You want the CRM and the e-signature in the same tool as the design, not stitched to it.
- You size batteries against the customer’s real consumption data rather than a standard profile.
- Your business ends at handover, and monitoring is somebody else’s job.
What can you not do in Solar Monkey?
Less than with most tools on this site. Solar Monkey designs, shades, simulates and quotes, and it does all of it in a browser. This comparison is about what surrounds that, and what it costs.
You cannot manage your customers in it: Solar Monkey connects to Pipedrive, Zoho or Salesforce instead, so the pipeline lives in a second subscription. There is no e-signature, so the quote goes out and the signature comes back somewhere else. And there is no import of the customer’s own consumption data, so a battery is sized against an assumed profile rather than against what the meter actually recorded.
| Solar Monkey | ||
| No monthly fee Solar Monkey starts at €85 per month | ||
| Customer and pipeline management built in Solar Monkey integrates Pipedrive, Zoho or Salesforce | ||
| E-signatures | ||
| Interval consumption data Design against the customer's own usage, not a profile | ||
| High-resolution imagery included | ||
| Performance monitoring of installed systems | ||
| Yield guarantee behind the quoted figure Solar Monkey backs it with a Guarantee Fund |
When should you choose Solar Monkey, and when Pylon?
Pylon
- You prefer zero commitment with Pylon’s Pay-As-You-Go pricing, paying only when you use it.
- You want one tool from the first call to the signed quote, without a separate CRM behind it.
- You sell batteries on evidence from the meter, not on an assumed household profile.
- You quote fewer than twenty jobs a month, where a per-project price is plainly cheaper.
Solar Monkey
- You sell on a guaranteed yield and want a fund standing behind the figure in your quotation.
- You monitor the systems you install and want that in the same place as the design.
- You already run Salesforce, Pipedrive or Zoho and want the design tool to feed it.
- Your volume is high and predictable, where a flat monthly fee is the cheaper shape.
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Our customers say it best
Pylon is amazing to work with. Their software make it simple for our staff to produce high quality solar proposals in minutes.
I couldn’t recommend this design software enough. It’s very easy to use, constantly updating in all aspects.