Abstract The construction of conventinal solar air collectors and the fact that they will operate with a significant pressure difference between the heated air stream and ambient, suggests that significant quantities of air may leak into or out of them. A search of the literature reveals no consideration of the effects these air leaks may have on the validity of collector efficiency measurements, on the efficiency itself, or indeed what the meaning of efficiency is under such operating conditions. This paper discusses the meaning of collector efficiency when leaks into the collector occur, analyses the effects on efficiency measurements, and solves the collector efficiency for the simple case of a constant leakage rate along the collector. Assuming that air leaking in from ambient can replace deliberate fresh air supply to the load as in building heating, then significant measurement errors are made if air leaks in to the collector are not accounted for. Further, the collector efficiency is increased over the no leak case, so that complex construction methods to make the collector air tight are probably not warranted.