12V or 24V for Home solar system?

[Sendrix]

Which of the two is better?

[stubbynubb]

your energy consumption should determine the voltage of your power system. You should not have continuous currents greater than 100 Amp.

[Henlus]

They have their pros and cons. With 24V there is lesser loss in the cables than with the 12V system. For example, to deliver a power of 600W with a 24V system, the current drawn will be 600W/24V = 25A. For a 12V system it is 50A. Higher currents flowing through the cables will lead to higher losses.

So 24v is better than 12v, but the best is 48V. Higher voltage inverters

[Henlus]

Higher voltage inverters tend to be more efficient with less losses. Your cable size do not need to be as big and you can run longer cables between the units. Charging cycle is also reduced because less current is drawn from the batteries. However, the higher the voltage the more batteries you'll need to buy and deep cycle batteries are quite expensive.