India's module capacity reaches 261.7 GW while cells lag at 36.6 GW
Serguey Asael Shinder2 min readIndia added 50.6 GW of solar module manufacturing capacity and 9.7 GW of cell capacity in the first half of 2026, according to Mercom India's report on the state of solar manufacturing, as reported by pv magazine on 25 September. That takes cumulative capacity to 261.7 GW for modules and 36.6 GW for cells as of June. Under the government's Approved List of Models and Manufacturers, 225.5 GW of module capacity is on List-I and about 35.5 GW of cell capacity on List-II.
The gap between the two numbers is the story. Mercom's chief executive, Raj Prabhu, calls domestic cell shortages the biggest near-term problem for the Indian market: module lines have multiplied, cell supply has not kept pace, prices for compliant modules have risen and project activity has slowed sharply. He adds that installed cell capacity overstates what is actually available, because new lines take months to reach stable production, and that the List-II requirement has increased dependence on domestic cells before enough capacity was running.
The technology mix has consolidated around TOPCon, which accounts for 80% of ALMM-listed module capacity, with mono PERC/TOPCon lines at 11%, mono PERC at 4%, heterojunction at 3% and thin film at 2%. Gujarat holds about 45% of module capacity, followed by Rajasthan with 26.1 GW and Tamil Nadu with 23.4 GW. Imports of cells and modules rose 18% year on year in the first half, with cells making up 81% of them, and the United States took 92% of India's solar exports.
What it means
India has built a module industry roughly seven times the size of its cell industry, and a policy that requires domestic cells has turned that imbalance into a bottleneck for its own installations. The rising import figure fits the same picture: much of what is imported is the cell, not the finished module.
For developers, the practical signal is price and schedule risk on projects that must use List-II cells, at least until new cell lines are running at nameplate. For the wider market, the export concentration matters too. With nine in every ten exported modules going to the US, Indian manufacturers are exposed to American trade policy, including the Section 232 tariff on polysilicon products due to take effect in December, which applies to cells and modules as well as raw polysilicon.