Each of our reviews, scores, and rankings are derived from our proprietary Ranking Criteria™. We do not have any relationships with companies that guarantee position, rank or score . . . and we never will. Like many sites, we are compensated through affiliate relationships with each company we review; however, our Ranking Criteria™, along with real consumer reviews from people like you, ensure we remain honest and unbiased. Read on to discover more about how user review moderation and expert scoring is processed or select an industry to see our full ranking criteria.

How we rank for

75%Standard Criteria

  • Equipment (25%):
    • The Solar industry offers a variety of different solar panels and inverters. Solar panels are tested and assigned a module efficiency rating that shows how efficient the solar cells are in absorbing energy from the sun. Solar inverters are also tested and given a peak maximum efficiency rating. Solar companies that offer the more efficient solar panels and inverters to customers will provide the better equipment to consumers and in turn, score higher.
  • Payment Options (20%):
    • The Solar industry offers 4 main payment options: Purchase, Loan, Lease, and Power Purchase Agreement (PPA).
  • Warranty (10%):
    • Solar ownership is often a consumer's second largest investment, behind a home mortgage. Having a comprehensive warranty provides consumers with the peace of mind they need to commit to a solar contract. Across the industry, warranties vary greatly, from 10-year limited warranties to comprehensive, no questions asked lifetime warranties. Companies with more comprehensive warranties receive a higher score.
  • Coverage (8%):
    • Best Company determines the number of states in which a company's services are available. This is one measure we use to determine a company's ability to provide consistent service to its customer base. Companies that operate in more states will receive a higher score than companies that only operate in a few.
  • Active (8%):
    • This criterion is related to a company's activity and the accuracy of its profile on our site. To get credit for this criteria, a representative of the company verifies to Best Company that the information about their company listed on our site is correct. Additionally, the company agrees to help us gather a minimum of five new reviews per month to be featured exclusively on bestcompany.com. These reviews are gathered either through our site or through our proprietary review acquisition process. Either way, each review undergoes a validation process by Best Company's integrity team to ensure reviews on our site are verified and legitimate. We feel strongly that the information we feature on bestcompany.com must be accurate. A company that fails to increase their review count by at least five reviews each month is marked as "not active" and the company's overall score is reduced accordingly.
  • Viability (4%):
    • This criterion is related to the company's ability to service customers. Over time, as we learn more about each company and the industry, we are privy to details the general public may, or may not, be privy to. This information could include the financial stability, legal standing, or business practices of said company. Each company listed on our site is initially given full credit for this criteria. However, if we deem a company's ability to service customers becomes compromised, we reserve the right to deduct points from their viability score.

Disclaimer: If Best Company finds a company is engaged in questionable or fraudulent business practices, is flagged consistently for fraudulent review solicitation, or are unable to service new consumers in a timely manner their overall score will receive a penalty until they've resolved the issue. Any such penalties will be disclosed as a warning on the company's profile page.

25%User Score

Here at Best Company, we believe a company is only as good as what its customers say about it; feedback from real customers is crucial to understanding how a company truly operates. The customer reviews score is broken down into three metrics:

  1. The average user score
  2. Total number of reviews
  3. Total number of reviews in the last 12 months

These three metrics not only help us understand what customers are saying, but they also help us determine a company’s relevance and to how many people—all of which are critical to understanding the value of a company in the eyes of the customer. Note: this is different from the “User Score” that is displayed on each company profile, which is simply the average of all user scores published for a given profile, and is independent from a company’s overall score.

User Review Moderation

In order to prevent false and misleading user reviews, Best Company employs a Review Moderation Team specifically assigned to vet all user reviews for all companies listed on the site. This team follows a very specific and strict moderation process that has been designed to gauge the validity of each and every user review submitted to our site.

The Flag System

This moderation process involves a “flag” system, where a flag is assessed for each negative attribute associated with a user review. Too many flags result in a rejection of a user review. Some of the things our moderation staff looks for and assigns potential flags to include the following:

  • Email address verification of the user
  • IP address duplication and region check
  • User review semantic verification
  • Is the user an employee of the organization?
  • Is the user associated with a competitor of the organization?
  • Foul language of any kind
  • Relevance of the content pertaining to the company and the review

As you can probably tell, we take our user review moderation process very seriously. We believe accuracy and authenticity are critical when it comes to user reviews, and are constantly finding new ways to make our user moderation process better. Please note that while we do our best to manually moderate each and every user review, mistakes can occasionally be made; however, we are dedicated to resolving any errors in our process and delivering you better data so you can make a better decision.