Concentrator photovoltaics (CPV) (also known as concentrating photovoltaics or concentration photovoltaics) is a photovoltaic technology that generates electricity from sunlight. Unlike conventional photovoltaic systems, it uses lenses or curved mirrors to focus sunlight onto small, highly efficient, multi-junction (MJ) solar cells. In addition, CPV systems often use solar trackers and sometimes a cooling system to further increase their efficiency.

Systems using high-concentration photovoltaics (HCPV) possess the highest efficiency of all existing PV technologies, achieving near 40% for production modules and 30% for systems. They enable a smaller photovoltaic array that has the potential to reduce land use, waste heat and material, and balance of system costs. The rate of annual CPV installations peaked in 2012 and has fallen to near zero since 2018 with the faster price drop in crystalline silicon photovoltaics. In 2016, cumulative CPV installations reached 350 megawatts (MW), less than 0.2% of the global installed capacity of 230,000 MW that year.

HCPV directly competes with concentrated solar power (CSP) as both technologies are suited best for areas with high direct normal irradiance, which are also known as the Sun Belt region in the United States and the Golden Banana in Southern Europe. CPV and CSP are often confused with one another, despite being intrinsically different technologies from the start: CPV uses the photovoltaic effect to directly generate electricity from sunlight, while CSP – often called concentrated solar thermal – uses the heat from the sun's radiation in order to make steam to drive a turbine, that then produces electricity using a generator. As of 2012^[update], CSP was more common than CPV.

Research into concentrator photovoltaics has taken place since the mid 1970s, initially spurred on by the energy shock from a mideast oil embargo. Sandia National Laboratories in Albuquerque, New Mexico was the site for most of the early work, with the first modern-like photovoltaic concentrating system produced there late in the decade. Their first system was a linear-trough concentrator system that used a point focus acrylic Fresnel lens focusing on water-cooled silicon cells and two axis tracking. Cell cooling with a passive heat sink and use of silicone-on-glass Fresnel lenses was demonstrated in 1979 by the Ramón Areces Project at the Institute of Solar Energy of the Technical University of Madrid. The 350 kW SOLERAS project in Saudi Arabia – the largest until many years later – was constructed by Sandia/Martin Marietta in 1981.

Research and development continued through the 1980s and 1990s without significant industry interest. Improvements in cell efficiency were soon recognized as essential to making the technology economical. However the improvements to Si-based cell technologies used by both concentrators and flat PV failed to favor the system-level economics of CPV. The introduction of III-V Multi-junction solar cells starting in the early 2000s has since provided a clear differentiator. MJ cell efficiencies have improved from 34% (3-junctions) to 46% (4-junctions) at research-scale production levels. A substantial number of multi-MW CPV projects have also been commissioned worldwide since 2010.

In 2016, cumulative CPV installations reached 350 megawatts (MW), less than 0.2% of the global installed capacity of 230,000 MW. Commercial HCPV systems reached instantaneous ("spot") efficiencies of up to 42% under standard test conditions (with concentration levels above 400) and the International Energy Agency sees potential to increase the efficiency of this technology to 50% by the mid-2020s. As of December 2014, the best lab cell efficiency for concentrator MJ-cells reached 46% (four or more junctions). Under outdoor, operating conditions, CPV module efficiencies have exceeded 33% ("one third of a sun"). System-level AC efficiencies are in the range of 25–28%. CPV installations are located in China, the United States, South Africa, Italy and Spain.

Modern CPV systems operate most efficiently in highly concentrated sunlight (i.e. concentration levels equivalent to hundreds of suns), as long as the solar cell is kept cool through the use of heat sinks. Diffuse light, which occurs in cloudy and overcast conditions, cannot be highly concentrated using conventional optical components only (i.e. macroscopic lenses and mirrors). Filtered light, which occurs in hazy or polluted conditions, has spectral variations which produce mismatches between the electrical currents generated within the series-connected junctions of spectrally "tuned" multi-junction (MJ) photovoltaic cells. These CPV features lead to rapid decreases in power output when atmospheric conditions are less than ideal.

To produce equal or greater energy per rated watt than conventional PV systems, CPV systems must be located in areas that receive plentiful direct sunlight. This is typically specified as average DNI (Direct Normal Irradiance) greater than 5.5-6m kWh/m²/day or 2000 kWh/m²/yr. Otherwise, evaluations of annualized DNI vs. GNI/GHI (Global Normal Irradiance and Global Horizontal Irradiance) irradiance data have concluded that conventional PV should still perform better over time than presently available CPV technology in most regions of the world (see for example ).