Aurora Solar designs roofs and generates proposals; Solar Spine runs the sales pipeline, execution, collections and reporting for Indian EPCs.
In short
Aurora Solar is a roof-design and sales-proposal platform built by Stanford founders (2013) for US, Canadian, and Mexican residential solar installers. Its core is 3D remote roof modelling with LIDAR-assisted shading detection and NREL-validated production simulation, plus automated proposal generation with integrated financing quotes and e-signature contract closing. The product is category-leading for design accuracy: customers cite it as closing deals against homeowners' own measurements. A separate commercial product (HelioScope) covers C&I rooftop and ground-mount designs.
Aurora's positioning is 'one platform to sell, design, finance, and deliver solar and storage.' In practice it covers three things well: roof design (Design Mode), sales proposals (Sales Mode), and e-signature closing (Contract Manager). It has no install pipeline, task/checklist system, payment-collection schedule, field-operations module, or post-sale workflow of any kind. The product ends the instant the contract is signed.
For an Indian rooftop or C&I EPC, Aurora's fundamental limit is geographic and product scope: no DISCOM net-metering steps, no PM Surya Ghar subsidy tracking, no GST invoicing, no INR pricing, and the region switcher offers only North America and four European markets. An EPC would design in Aurora and rebuild the entire financial, subsidy, and compliance workflow in a separate tool—which is most of what Solar Spine's comparison rows measure.
Where Aurora Solar wins
- Remote design accuracy is Aurora's strength: LIDAR-based shading and NREL-validated performance simulation eliminate truck-rolls and site visits, and customers cite this as a deal-closer against homeowners' own measurements.
- A genuinely deep developer platform exists: Sync API, Design API, webhooks, plus an externally-audited Trust Centre with SOC 2 Type 2 and PCI DSS give enterprise buyers a credible security answer.
- A working two-sided partner network: a public, filterable partner directory and documented APIs mean other vendors (financing, hardware, utility-data) build around Aurora rather than Aurora owning every function itself.
Where Solar Spine wins
- The entire post-sale workflow is modelled: 17 project stages, 57 checklist items, payment collection with per-stage gates, and field-operations tracking (site photos, call outcomes, document verification) all exist in Solar Spine.
- Stages auto-generate checklist items with due dates when opened; checklists branch conditionally on loan, subsidy and DISCOM (BRPL, BYPL, TPDDL, PVVNL, NPCL, DHBVN, UHBVN), so the right tasks surface at the right time without manual list-building.
- Overdue work climbs one rung of the org chart every night until someone acts, so a late task does not sit quietly at the bottom of a list.
- Flat monthly pricing (₹10,000 or ₹99,999 annually plus 18% GST) for unlimited users means a 10-person team costs the same as a 1-person team. Aurora's per-user model reaches ₹11,340–18,480/user/month at ₹84/USD, so a 10-person sales and ops team would pay approximately ₹1,13,400–1,84,800/month—and would still need Solar Spine for everything after the sale.
Best for
Aurora Solar suits roof-design teams selling high-touch residential solar in North America where design accuracy and proposal aesthetics are differentiators.
Not for
Neither is two-for-one. Aurora has no post-sale alternative built in, and Solar Spine has no roof-design engine.
Pricing
Aurora Solar
Per-user monthly pricing in USD only, no INR. Both self-serve tiers support exactly one user each with no published volume discount. Basic (annual) is approximately ₹11,340/user/month; Premium (annual) is approximately ₹18,480/user/month, both converted at ₹84/USD. Enterprise is custom; it is the only tier with unlimited users. No free trial is offered on the pricing page; entry is either paid self-serve signup or a sales-assisted demo.
| Tier | ₹ / user / month | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Basic (Starter) | ₹11,340 | ₹11,340/user/month annual billing (₹13,356 monthly billing) for 1 user and 50 projects/month, reported as $135/user/month annual ($159 monthly) from secondary sources; direct confirmation on Aurora's own live pricing page was unavailable due to client-side rendering. |
| Premium (Professional) | ₹18,480 | ₹18,480/user/month annual billing (₹21,756 monthly billing) for 1 user and 50 projects/month, reported as $220/user/month annual ($259 monthly) from secondary sources and unconfirmed directly on the vendor page. Includes LIDAR-assisted modelling, bankable shade reports and battery storage modelling. |
| Enterprise | Not published | Custom quote, confirmed as 'Custom' and 'Unlimited users' directly on Aurora's own pricing page. Includes unlimited users, API access (Sync API, Design API), webhooks, advanced permissions and SSO. |
Read from https://aurorasolar.com/pricing/ on 8 September 2026
Solar Spine
Solar Spine price list, the same numbers Razorpay charges
Feature by feature
| Capability | Aurora Solar | Solar Spine |
|---|---|---|
| Solar-specific | ||
| Solar sales and install stages out of the box | No. Aurora has no sales or install pipeline at all; the product ends at Contract Manager (e-signature close). | Yes. 7 sales stages and 17 project stages seeded on day one, all editable. |
| Stage checklists that change with loan, subsidy and DISCOM | No. No checklist product feature exists. Hits for 'checklist' are a content-marketing blog post and an onboarding PDF guide, not an in-product checklist engine. | Yes. 57 checklist items; loan, subsidy and DISCOM-specific tasks appear only where they apply. |
| DISCOM net-metering steps tracked | No. Utility logic is US-only. Aurora's AHJ database covers 25,000+ US jurisdictions; NEC (US electrical code) validation is the compliance check. Aurora explicitly states this feature is 'available for US Projects only.' | Yes. Net-meter paperwork branches for BRPL, BYPL, TPDDL, PVVNL, NPCL, DHBVN and UHBVN. |
| PM Surya Ghar and subsidy tracking | No. No India subsidy scheme mentioned. The region switcher offers North America, Germany, Spain, France and UK only; there is no India page or content. | Yes. PMSG submission, DCR certificate, GBI and central subsidy redemption as dated tasks. |
| kW as a native field with kW reporting | Yes. kW/kWh system sizing and NREL-validated production simulation are core to the design engine. AutoDesigner automatically sizes panels and arrays; kWh-denominated savings charts appear throughout design and quote flows. | Yes. Every deal and project carries capacity; dashboards and targets report in kW. |
| Roof design, shading and proposal generation | Yes. This is Aurora's entire reason for existing: remote 3D roof/shade design plus interactive and PDF sales proposals with integrated financing quotes. | No. Solar Spine does not do roof design. Use a design tool and track the job here. |
| Execution | ||
| Tasks written automatically with due dates when a stage opens | No. No task-creation or due-date system exists. Help-centre search for 'task' returned only quick-start guides and a PDF admin checklist, no in-product task feature. | Yes. Nobody types the checklist; each task carries the date it was given when the stage opened. |
| Overdue work escalates up the org chart on its own | No. No escalation or org-chart feature exists. Aurora has no post-contract task system, so there is nothing to escalate. | Yes. Every night a late task climbs one rung and keeps climbing until someone acts. |
| A stage cannot be advanced with open checklist items | No. No stage-advancement gating exists because there is no stage pipeline at all past Contract Manager (e-signature close). | Yes. The advance button is unavailable until the stage's items are closed. |
| Documents verified by ops before work proceeds | No. Contract Manager handles contract e-signature only. There is no document-upload and ops-verification gate for install-stage documents. | Yes. A document is done when ops marks it correct; a rejection goes back to the person who photographed it. |
| A different first screen per role | No. Enterprise offers 'advanced user permissions' for access control, but no evidence of distinct first-screen dashboards per role. Roles like ops and telecaller do not exist as concepts. | Yes. Nine roles, nine first screens, from telecaller to director. |
| Field use on a phone: photos, tasks, call outcomes | Partly. Sales Mode is tablet-friendly for presenting proposals in homes, and a beta third-party integration (SiteCapture Site Survey App) captures site-survey photos on mobile before design. No first-party Aurora mobile app or install-task completion on mobile exists. | Yes. Every screen works on a phone; documents are photographed at the customer's house. |
| Money | ||
| Instalment schedule per project | No. 'Integrated financing' only handles third-party loan pre-approval inside the proposal, not the EPC's own collection schedule. | Yes. 10/70/20 or whatever you agreed, with due dates and outstanding balance visible to all. |
| Material cannot dispatch until payment is collected | No. No procurement or dispatch concept exists in the product at all. | Yes. Thresholds per stage, set by the workspace; the default is the one the first customer ran. |
| Daily overdue payment alerts to owner and manager | No. No payment-collection alerting feature found on any fetched page. | Yes. 7 am every day, to the person who owns the collection and their manager. |
| A bounced cheque reopens the instalment | No. India-specific instrument with no equivalent. Aurora has no internal payment-collection module. | Yes. Yes |
| GST invoices and quotes from the same record | No. No GST or tax-invoice generation feature exists. Aurora produces proposals and e-signed contracts, not company invoices, with no India tax handling. | Yes. Invoice creation is a stage in the pipeline; the subscription itself is GST-invoiced too. |
| Leads and calling | ||
| Meta lead ads land in the system within minutes | No. The Partner Directory lists no Meta or Facebook Lead Ads integration. Partner categories span financing (GoodLeap, Mosaic), hardware (Unirac) and utility-data providers only. | Yes. Ad leads arrive marked hot at the top of the calling queue inside five minutes. |
| PIN-code check on incoming leads | No. US jurisdiction handling uses the AHJ database (25,000+ US permitting authorities), not PIN-codes. No India-region concept exists. | Yes. Leads outside the PIN codes you serve are kept out of the AI caller's queue. |
| AI caller that qualifies leads and books visits | No. 'Aurora AI' is a 3D roof-modelling tool, not a voice-calling or telecalling agent. | Yes. Optional. Calls 9 am to 9 pm IST, books the visit on a named salesperson's day, hands off with notes. |
| Built-in telecalling queue with daily batches and outcomes | No. No telecalling or lead-queue feature exists. Aurora has no CRM or lead-working layer. | Yes. Queues built and ordered before the caller sits down; one outcome vocabulary for humans and the AI. |
| Lead outcomes written back to Meta | No. No lead-outcome writeback to ad platforms found. Partner Directory's technology-partner categories do not include Meta or ads-optimisation. | Yes. Qualified, converted and disqualified statuses flow back through the lead sheet into Meta's Conversions API, so the account optimises for buyers, not form-fillers. |
| WhatsApp messaging and automation | No. No WhatsApp messaging, automation or integration mentioned on any fetched page. | Partly. Click-to-chat and logged WhatsApp interactions. No automated messaging. |
| Reporting | ||
| Owner dashboard: kW against target, cash due, stuck projects | No. No owner-level business dashboard exists. Aurora has no post-sale project-tracking data model to power one. | Yes. Yes |
| Per-person monthly targets and attainment | No. No per-person target or attainment tracking feature found. | Yes. Yes |
| Ask the business a question in plain English | No. 'Aurora AI' refers exclusively to AI-assisted 3D site modelling (roof and obstruction detection), not a conversational or plain-English data-query feature. | Yes. Director and GM only. Finding, evidence, table, caveat, next step, from live data. |
| One-click export of everything | Partly. Proposals export as interactive web pages or PDF, and Enterprise adds Sync API, Design API and webhooks for programmatic data access. No one-click 'export everything' feature exists; most categories here (payments, tasks, calls) do not exist as data to export. | Yes. Excel export any time. No lock-in. |
| Data | ||
| Data hosted in India | No. Aurora's Trust Centre lists AWS (US) as its cloud-hosting subprocessor. Data is hosted in the United States, not India. | Yes. Postgres in Mumbai (ap-south-1); documents in a private store. |
| Pricing and support | ||
| Pricing model | No. Strictly per-user: both self-serve tiers are scoped to exactly 1 user each. Enterprise is the only tier with unlimited users, on a custom quote. | Yes. Flat per company: ₹10,000 a month or ₹99,999 a year plus GST. Unlimited users. |
| Prices published in INR | No. No INR pricing anywhere on the site. The region switcher has no India option; the pricing page shows USD figures only. | Yes. Yes |
| Free trial without a card | No. No free-trial terms appear on the pricing page. Entry is either paid self-serve signup or a sales-assisted demo. | Yes. 30 days, no card, no call. |
| Setup or onboarding fee | No. No company-wide setup or onboarding fee stated on the pricing page. Paid add-ons (site models from $9.99, plan sets, engineering stamps) are itemised as optional services. | Yes. None. Send the filled setup form and the workspace configures itself. |
| India-based support in IST | No. No IST support hours or India-based support team. Support is US-hours live chat (Monday–Friday, 6 AM–6 PM PT) and email only. | Yes. Email, replies within one business day, from Mumbai. |
Switching from Aurora Solar
- Export the signed proposal PDF and any design data (Sync API or Design API, available in Enterprise tier only) from Aurora.
- Attach the exported design PDF to the matching deal in Solar Spine as the design-of-record document.
- Extract lead names and contact data from Aurora (if they exist in the tool) and upload them via CSV into Solar Spine's calling queue, or import from your existing spreadsheet, WhatsApp threads or accounting records (the real source of truth for lead history, since Aurora never modelled leads).
- Since Aurora has no pipeline, payment schedule or task data to migrate, configure Solar Spine's stages, payment gates and checklist items to match your own sales process and project workflow.
- Run both tools side by side for lowest risk: keep Aurora for roof design and proposal generation, and use Solar Spine as the system of record for the sales pipeline, install execution, payments and reporting that Aurora never modelled.
Questions people ask
Can I use Aurora Solar and Solar Spine together?
Yes, and it's the recommended pattern. Aurora excels at roof design and proposal generation; Solar Spine handles the sales pipeline, task execution, payments and reporting that Aurora ends at contract close. A 10-person team could run both and pay ₹10,000/month for Solar Spine (versus ₹1,13,400–1,84,800/month for a 10-user Aurora team on annual billing).
Does Solar Spine replace Aurora's design tool?
No. Solar Spine has no roof-design or shading-analysis engine, and building one is out of scope for the product. Use Aurora (or HelioScope for C&I) for design, then track payments, tasks and site documents for the installed project in Solar Spine once the contract is signed.
What data from Aurora transfers to Solar Spine?
Proposal PDFs and design data (via Enterprise Sync API) can attach to deals as documents. Lead names and contact info can import via CSV. Lead history, stage progression, task status and payment schedules do not exist in Aurora to migrate, because Aurora never modelled them.
Is there a direct API or integration between Aurora Solar and Solar Spine?
Not today, because Aurora never modelled leads, tasks or payments for Solar Spine to sync against. Export from Aurora as a proposal PDF, or via the Sync API and Design API on Enterprise for programmatic access, then import into Solar Spine by CSV for leads or manual upload for documents. There is no live sync, so treat the export as a one-time move, not an ongoing feed between the two tools.
Which is cheaper for a 10-person sales and operations team?
Solar Spine: ₹10,000/month flat for unlimited users, so a 10-person team pays the same as a 1-person team, or ₹1,20,000/year before GST. Aurora Solar on annual billing would run approximately ₹1,13,400/month for a 10-person team on Basic tier, or ₹1,84,800/month on Premium (₹13.6–22.2 lakh/year), and Solar Spine would still be required for everything after the sale.
Where is my data hosted?
Aurora's data is hosted on AWS in the United States, confirmed in their Trust Centre. Solar Spine uses Postgres in Mumbai (ap-south-1), with row-level security fencing per workspace so one EPC's data cannot be queried across another's, and a private document store you can export at any time.
Other comparisons
Run one real project through it this month. You will know by the end of it.
30 days free, no card, no call. Then ₹10,000 a month for the whole company, however many people you put on it.