In this study, a global maximum power point tracking technique based on invasive weed optimization algorithm for PV array under partial shading conditions is proposed. This technique is not used before with this problem. The power-voltage curve of the PV array has several local maximum power points. The proposed method converges successfully to the global maximum. An overall statistical appraisal of the proposed technique compared with different meta-heuristic techniques mentioned in literature is executed under di erent scenarios of shading conditions to estimate the superiority of the proposed technique over all other techniques. The statistical metrics are including geometric mean, the root mean square error, mean absolute error, standard deviation, arithmetic mean, significance, and e ciency, in addition to a proposed one for measuring solution stability. The proposed algorithm is considered to be the most efficient and outstanding optimization technique compared to corresponding ones.