It takes much less power to light up small LEDs than any other type of lighting solution.

LED lighting started off from being large and unfeasible for use in homes to accessible and in a wide variety of solutions and applications.

LED lights have numerous benefits over other lights - the most major benefit is their energy efficiency. It takes much less power to light up small LEDs than any other type of lamp. Some LED manufacturers claim a lifespan of over 10 years.

But they still have some drawbacks. LED lamps are not always compatible with dimmers, so you cannot dim them when you need to. With time, the circuit of an LED light may give in and deteriorate the brightness of the light. Also, LEDs are known to emit blue light. As per some health researchers, blue light tends to disrupt the user's sleep.

What should I look for when buying LED lights?

You can get LEDs in a very diverse range of shapes and sizes, but not all are fit for everyone. When looking for an LED lamp that fits your needs you should try to check the following things;

Compatibility

This refers to the size, shape and voltage of the bulb. It should be the same as the ones already fitted in your home. Check especially for bayonet or an Edison-type screw base.

Safety rating

The bulb must have passed minimum safety requirements to have earned a safety rating.

Lifetime and guarantee

A quality LED should last from 15,000 to 30,000 hours. If you're buying a product claiming to be in that range, it should have a warranty of about 2-3 years.

Bulb efficiency

Compare the efficiencies in lumens per Watt before buying led bulbs.

Colour temperature

There are a variety of colours that you can get LEDs in, and you should see whether a warmer or cooler colour suits your home and buy accordingly.

How can you tell how bright an LED light is?

It was common practice to rank the brightness of a bulb based on its wattage. Even though it worked fine with incandescent lamps, it is still an imprecise way of measuring the brightness of a bulb. The case becomes a little different when it comes to LED bulbs. Compared to incandescent lamps, LEDs are much more power-efficient. They only need a small part of the wattage of an incandescent lamp to give the same amount of light A better way to know the brightness of a bulb is to see the lumens it provides. Lumens (SI unit lm) measure the visible light a lamp or any other light source can emit. Compared to wattage, it is a much more efficient way to determine how bright a bulb would be, precisely a measure of light. The wattage, on the other hand, only describes the power input a bulb needs to operate.