The 7 Best Solar Kits for Kids: Reviewing Educational and Solar Toys

Getting your kids into STEM activities is hugely popular right now, and for good reason.

Teaching kids how robots and computers work, and helping them understand how to build things can not only provide a ton of fun when they’re doing it, but also set them up for future success in the job market.

You always hear from tech whizzes who tell stories about how they would take old radios apart and put them back together…well, now there are actual toys and kits that kids can use to learn about these things.

When it comes to solar kits for kids, there are a few options, although I’ll be honest…

None of them is amazing.

There are a few choices from some trusted brands that we’ll go over below, but no one has really come out in this space as THE go-to company to teach kids about solar power.

So if you can lower your expectations a little, and remember that everything on here is highly affordable, you might just find a fun kit to entertain your kids for a few hours, while teaching them about the amazing benefits of solar energy.

Best Solar Kits for Kids Quick-Find Table

Reviews of the Best Solar Panel Kits for Kids

By far the most popular solar kit for kids, this kit is made by Discovery…like the Discovery Channel company.

While the quality is clearly not over the top, it is a pretty cool set which allows kids to build up to 12 different things, each of which will end up moving some components.

There are wheeled devices, swimming devices, crawling devices…the list goes on.

This one is made for kids aged 8 and up and has 190 pieces, which makes it one of the biggest sets out there.

One cool thing about this is that it comes with instructions, obviously, but also encourages kids to make their own designs.

We love the versatility and the fact that the pieces can work together in so many ways to create a lot of cool things that will keep them coming back to the kit over and over again.

This looks to be the best selling solar kit for kids on Amazon, and surprisingly for this category, has reasonably good reviews.

Most of the other kits on this list are just “OK”, whereas this is easily the only one that deserves to be at the top of our list.

It might not be perfect, but we highly recommend getting this one before trying anything else below.

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Alright, so from here on down we get into a bunch of things that are “OK”, but not really great.

One of the reasons that I’m happy to put this near the top, though, is because our family has some experience with the Elenco brand. They make some really cool circuit sets to help kids understand circuits and electricity, and it’s well made.

This one is not quite as well made, but at least I’ve got a base level of trust with the company.

So many of these kits are cheaply made with brittle plastic pieces, but this one is pretty good comparatively.

This kit offers 4 different configurations, including a dinosaur, robot, rhino beetle, and drill vehicle.

Great for kids 8 and up, this is a toy you’ll never have to get new batteries for, since the whole thing runs off of solar power. The motor seems to be decent, so unlike some of the other kits out there, this one should actually work for awhile.

What else can I say…hard to go wrong with a solar powered T-Rex for kids, right?

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This is another brand that we have some experience with. We’ve got some Engino building toys at our house, and they are pretty cool.

One of the only problems is that they’re pretty hard to put together, even for our 7 year old. They’re even harder to take apart.

That said, they’re actually good quality, and pretty sturdy.

This is not a multiple-option build like many other kits, as it can only be turned into a plane without some creativity on the part of your child, but it’s unique because there aren’t many other plane options.

Overall, it’s going to be good quality, but the only thing we didn’t love was that it’s pretty basic, with only a handful of pieces to put together.

Engino says you can make your own artwork for the plane, which is actually pretty cool, but otherwise you’ll probably build it once and that’s it.

The solar panel and fan configuration is pretty small, so there’s not a lot of power there.

Overall one of the few decent kits out there, from a brand I personally trust.

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Alright so here we start getting into the sketchy reviews.

The build quality here is questionable.

I can’t decide if it’s a positive or a negative but…it comes with the ability to use a battery backup.

On the one hand, it means they don’t need to play with it outside or under LED lighting, and they don’t need to rely on a cheap solar panel kit to keep working. On the other hand, it doesn’t inspire confidence in the solar panel and motor’s ability to work for a long time.

Can’t decide if it’s convenient or a cop-out.

Anyway, the actual things you can build are pretty cool, including a space station that spins under the power of the solar panels and motor.

It’s not a huge risk at this price to try it out, but I’d still pick one of the above choices first.

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This is actually a common design, and it looks like a lot of companies make the exact same toy.

This one seems to be the best of the bunch, and has the most reviews, but they’re all basically the same.

Anyway, this one is kind of cool because it “does something”.

It can climb up small obstacles by itself, which can be fun for kids to play around with.

This one also comes with a battery backup, so I’m not sure what that says about the solar panel quality.

It does have 133 pieces, which is quite a large set, but there’s definitely some concern over build quality and ease-of-build.

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Not all that high tech or big, this is still an interesting product.

Mostly because they suggest you take things from around your house and make your own robot.

That basically means you can put paper/cardboard on it, add a paper cup, maybe put some pencils between the “fingers” of the robot…

OK, not all that exciting, but kids probably have more imagination when it comes to this sort of thing, so it could work out!

It is a pretty small kit and may not be the highest quality.

The robot and dinosaur build options should excite most kids, but they may not be able to use it for long before it gives out based on the feedback we go.

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This is one of the few non-toy solar kits for kids that we found.

As you can see, they’re usually solar cars, robots, or dinosaurs. This one is more educational in nature.

It might be a fun thing for kids 12 and up to play with, in order to understand how electricity generation works, and they actually get some cool pieces, including:

• 44 page manual with 10 lab exercises,
• multi-voltage solar panel with adjustable stand,
• digital multimeter,
• motor with fan blade and stand,
• LED’s,
• diode,
• resisters,
• battery holder,
• batteries, and
• test leads

If your kid is older and actually interested in learning more of the how and why behind solar, this is your best bet.

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