The effect of solvents in liquid electrolyte on the photovoltaic performance of dye-sensitized solar cells was investigated. The solvents with large donor number enhanced the open-circuit voltage but reduced the short-circuit current density. By mixing 30 vol.% NMP with 70 vol.% GBL, the open-circuit voltage increased from 0.55 to 0.632 V and the fill factor increased from 0.607 to 0.613 while the short-circuit current density decreased little. The further addition of 0.4 M pyridine into the above mixed solvent caused a huge increase of overall conversion efficiency from 5.73 to 6.70% under irradiation of 100 mW cm(-2). (C) 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.