Water pumps

How to use this table

This table holds 17 water pumps normalized onto the same columns, so that units described differently by their manufacturers can be compared directly. Every row carries a confidence flag and a link to the datasheet or retailer page the figures came from, and every product has its own page with the numbers worked through for an off-grid build.

What is in here right now

The water pumps listed run from 1.2 to 33.0 GPM, with a median of 5.5 GPM. The median price works out at about $715 per unit, which is the figure worth comparing against rather than the sticker price.

Sort on any column by clicking its header. The comparison that usually settles a decision is not the biggest number but the price per unit alongside the specification that constrains your design, because that is where a cheaper product either is or is not a false economy.

What each column means

Type

The mechanism, which determines where the pump can sit relative to the water.

Voltage

Supply voltage, direct or alternating, which decides how it connects to the system.

GPM max

Maximum flow, measured at low head. Real output falls as the pump works against height and friction.

Head ft

Maximum lift including friction losses. The useful specification is the curve of flow against head rather than either endpoint.

Amps

Maximum current draw, which sizes the conductor and tests the inverter surge on startup.

Shutoff psi

Shutoff pressure. One pound per square inch corresponds to about 2.31 feet of head.

Port

Plumbing connection size.

Wty yr

Warranty length. How a claim is actually handled matters more off grid than how long the term is.

Price

List or recorded retail price at the date noted. Prices move constantly.

A workable way to shortlist

Start with the source: depth to water, static level, and yield decide the type before any specification matters. Then check flow against head at the operating point you will actually use, not at the endpoints. Then check the electrical draw against your inverter and cable run, and favor serviceability and available spares over the last few percent of efficiency.

Then read the individual product pages, which work each unit's published numbers through for an off-grid build and list the nearest alternatives in this table. The system planner sizes array, controller, battery, and inverter against each other rather than one at a time, which is how these choices actually interact.

Five ways people get this purchase wrong

1. Choosing on maximum flow, which is quoted at low head and is not what the pump delivers against real lift and friction.
2. Pumping on demand from a low-yield well instead of filling storage slowly, which stresses the well, the inverter, and the pump at once.
3. Undersizing the pressure tank, so the pump short-cycles itself to an early death.
4. Forgetting freeze protection on the plumbing at the tank and the wellhead, which fails long before the tank itself does.
5. Buying an efficient pump with proprietary parts and no local supplier. Water is the outage you cannot wait out comfortably.

Every one of those is cheaper to avoid than to fix, and most of them are decided before anything is bought. That is the argument for building the load list and the system design first and shopping second, which is what the planner and the course are for.

Where these numbers come from

Figures are transcribed from manufacturer datasheets or primary retailer specification pages, recorded with a date and a confidence flag, and linked back to the source on each product page. Where a manufacturer publishes a figure without its test conditions, it is recorded as published and treated with the skepticism it deserves rather than quietly normalized.

Prices are list or observed retail at the date noted and move constantly, so they are here for the ratio rather than for the last dollar. The price index tracks market ranges over time, the open data page publishes these tables as CSV and JSON, and the methodology page sets out how the research is done. If a figure here no longer matches its source, the corrections page is how to say so; corrections are logged publicly rather than edited away.

Missing a product you are comparing? Tell us and it goes on the list. The tables grow from what readers are actually shopping for rather than from what is easiest to transcribe.

Common questions about water pumps

Which pump type suits my well?
Depth to water decides it. A drilled well at depth needs a submersible. A shallow source or a tank suits a surface or jet pump, which is limited in how far it can lift. A cabin pressurized from storage usually wants a diaphragm pump with a pressure switch and tank.

Should the pump feed the house directly?
Usually not off grid. Filling storage slowly and drawing the house from storage lets a low-yield well recover, keeps the startup surge off the inverter, and moves the pumping into daylight when the array is producing. It is one of the highest-value decisions in an off-grid water system.

What size pressure tank do I need?
Large enough that the pump does not short-cycle, which is what destroys pumps prematurely. The right size depends on the pump's flow and the cut-in and cut-out pressures; undersizing is the most common error in owner-built systems.

Can I run a well pump from solar without a battery?
Yes, with a solar direct pump, which runs whenever the sun shines and pumps into storage that provides the buffer. It is slow by design and unusually resilient, since the water system no longer depends on the battery bank at all. It suits sites where the pump is the critical component.

What should I keep as a spare?
Whatever is specific to your installation and slow to obtain: pump seals or a complete spare pump for a critical well, the pressure switch, the fittings your system uses, and plenty of filters. Record the model, wire size, and setting depth in the systems binder so somebody else could order the right part without you.

Listings, inspection, and insurance

Safety listings are easy to skip past on a spec sheet and hard to add afterwards. Where a jurisdiction inspects an off-grid installation, unlisted equipment can fail the inspection outright. Where nobody inspects, insurers may still ask, and an appliance or a system component without a recognized listing is a reason some carriers give for declining a rural policy or a claim.

That matters more off grid than on, because rural policies are already a narrower market. Insurers commonly ask what the structure is, how it is heated, how far it is from a responding fire station, and whether the installation was permitted and inspected. Deciding to buy listed equipment and to hold the installation to code standards, even where nobody will check, is the cheapest form of that conversation going well.

Keep the paperwork with the systems binder: model and serial numbers, the datasheet as it read on the day you bought, the installation photographs before anything was closed up, and the receipts. Proving what you had is your job in a claim, and it is also what makes a sale straightforward years later. Lesson eleven covers the insurance and financing side, and the printable binder has a place for all of it.

This category inside a whole system

No component in an off-grid power or water system is chosen alone. The battery constrains the inverter, the inverter constrains the cable and the fusing, the controller constrains the array, the array is constrained by the worst month at your location, and the whole thing is constrained by the load list you started with. Choosing any one part in isolation is how people end up buying twice.

The order that works is: honest load list, then location data, then system voltage, then the components against each other, then the wiring and protection that make it safe. Lesson four covers the load list, the site report gives the location numbers for any address, the planner sizes the components as a set, and lesson six covers the part where mistakes start fires rather than merely costing money.

The other tables are next door: batteries, panels, inverters, controllers, generators, and pumps. For prices rather than specifications, the price index; for what to keep on the shelf, the spares reference; for the terms used here, the glossary.