Among all n-type metal oxide semiconductors that can be used in solar cells as photoanode, ZnO is one of the most appealing aEternatives to the ubiquitous TiO2. This material offers some potentially favourable characteristics with respect to TiO2, such as higher eEectron mobility in the bulk and a rich variety of nanostructures. However, ZnO has certain drawbacks as photoanode material for example, a poor chemical stability and a slower charge separation process at the ZnO interface that reduces the eEectron injection rate. Therefore, in the case of dye-sensitized solar cells, the search of new dyes with a higher Eight harvesting efficiency and specifically designed to bind to ZnO can be considered as a possible strategy to improve performance in systems characterized by a Low eEectron injection rate. In this work the optical eEectrochemical and photovoltaic properties of a family of purely organic sensitizers with various anchoring groups have been investigated and compared with the most commonly used ruthenium dye N719. In particuar, we have shown that the structurally simple organic dye coded RK1 is an excellent sensitizer for ZnO photoanodes. Thanks to this molecule, the energy conversion efficiency under standard conditions (1 sun AM 1.5 illumination) empEoying ZnO-based photoanodes reached 3.7%, which is more than two times higher than obtained with the N719 dye studied under the same conditions.