Abstract Thermo-economy is a useful and powerful tool that combines thermodynamics and economics. It can evaluate how irreversibility and costs of any process affect the exergoeconomic cost of the product. In this work, a number of comparisons for solar thermal-powered different recovery units for reverse osmosis desalination system are performed using thermo-economic analysis. Three different configurations are used for this comparison (Basic, Pelton Wheel Turbine, and the Pressure Exchanger) with Sharm El-Shiekh RO desalination plant for a total productivity about 145.8 m 3 /h (40.5 kg/s). As a result of this analysis, the unit product cost of Pelton Wheel Turbine (PWT) and Pressure Exchanger (PEX) configurations are 24% and 24.2% respectively less than that of the basic configuration. Thermo-economic analysis shows that the minimum investment and operating & maintenance costs are obtained by PEX configuration. Also, it achieves minimum exergy destruction against the two other configurations (Pelton Wheel and Basic systems). Therefore, the final conclusion of this work is that the PEX configuration is more economical than either stand alone or PWT configurations.