薄膜太陽電池具材料成本低之優勢，以CdTe為主要光吸收層材料的太陽電池模組其每瓦量產成本已低達0.86美元，而CIGS太陽電池有高效率的特點也兼備可開發低成本製程的可行性。本文針對CdTe和CIGS 兩類薄膜太陽電池就其材料特性、元件結構、製程技術等介紹與評論，同時也可看出二者之差異與未來發展之趨勢。

Thin-film solar cells have the advantage of low material cost. The production cost as low as USD 0.86/W has been realized and announced recently by First Solar， a company produces CdTe solar modules. CIGS is another kind of thin film product having the potential for high cell efficiency as well as the feasibility for the development of nonvacuum roll-to-roll processes with very low cost. In this article， we give an introduction to CdTe and CIGS thinfilm solar cells for their material properties， device structures， and mass production technologies.