The solar photovoltaic water pumping system (SPVWPS) has been becoming an increasingly important alternative in the remote, isolated, and non-electrified population. It constitutes a potential option to draw down water in the remote locations for domestic usage and livestock watering in developing countries like India. The wide spread of this technique requires accurate information and experiences in dealing with the system sizing and installation. The aim of this work is to determine an optimum photovoltaic (PV) array configuration to supply an adequate amount of energy to a DC Helical pump, under the outdoor conditions of Nagpur. Four different PV array configurations have been taken into consideration (3S X 2P, 4S X 2P, 5S X 2P and 7S). The tests have been carried out for a head of 7 bar, under sunny daylight hours, at the outdoor location of VNIT, college campus Nagpur. The best results have been obtained for two PV array configurations (4S X 2P) and (5S X 2P), which are found suitable to provide the optimum energy. The helical pump (SQF2.5-2), powered by the selected PV array configurations delivered a maximum daily average volume of water needed (24374 L/day). (C) 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.