This paper aims to study the cooling effect of phase change materials integrated with solar photovoltaic panels (PV-PCM), and further explore the cooling characteristics of the PV-PCM system under different solar irradiance inputs. A test bench of the PV-PCM was built and studied under solar irradiances of 600W/m², 800W/m², and 1000W/m². Throughout the experimental testing, the indoor temperature was kept constant at 20.7°C with no wind effect. The results showed that the temperature at the center of the PV-PCM system upper surface under 600W/m², 800W/m² and 1000W/m² irradiance conditions, was 19.61°C, 22.39°C, and 26.77°C lower than that of the PV system, respectively, employing the same phase change material adhesion and illumination time. For the PV panels used in this experiment with a maximum power capacity of 12W, the maximum output power of the PV-PCM increased by 0.55W, 0.86W, and 1.28W, respectively. In addition, the respective increases in the maximum power generation efficiency compared to the PV system case were 1.11%, 1.30%, and 1.55%, under 600W/m², 800W/m² and 1000W/m² respectively. It was also shown that it takes 480 minutes and 80 minutes, respectively, to cool the PV panels from their maximum temperature to room temperature for the PV and the PV-PCM systems, respectively. Overall, the PV-PCM can effectively reduce the temperature of the PV panels and improve their power generation efficiency, while the cooling effect and power generation efficiency increase with the increase in solar irradiation.