LED strip lights are taking over the world by storm. Within the last decade, it has gone from an expensive hobby to something that is very ubiquitous. So, grab some colourful LED lights and spice up the look of your interior at an affordable cost.

Just a few years ago, the world used to be lit up by the yellow glow of incandescent bulbs and sodium vapour lamps. That’s because they were cheaper and affordable for general consumers. Despite all the downsides, the low cost of these bulbs still made them the most popular type of bulbs. But that has changed in the last couple of decades. As LEDs are becoming cheaper and cheaper every year, they find new uses as interior decoration lights and for indoor lighting purposes. But before you go shopping, read this article to know more about them. Having a better understanding of LEDs will help you make better purchase decisions.

A beginner’s guide to buying LED strip lights

Not all LED strips are created equal. Even though many of them might look the same, there are minor variations in the technical specifications between different types of LED strips. So, if it is difficult to distinguish between two different types of LEDs by looking at it, how exactly do you buy the right one? Well, in order to decide the type of LED that you want, you should know about the specifications and what each of them means. This article will tell you everything you need to know about LEDs and how to buy them.

The brightness of LED strips

The standard unit of measurement of the brightness of any type of light is Lumen. Because Lumen measures the perceived brightness of a light by the human eye, it follows a logarithmic relationship with the intensity of the light. So, if the Lumen rating of an LED strip is twice that of the other, then the first light will look twice as bright to us as compared to the second one. The easiest way to understand the brightness of a light is, therefore, to look at its lumen rating. There is no easy way to find out how bright the LED strip should be. It all depends on where you use it and what you want from it.

Colour temperature of the LED

Even if the LED strip does not generate any heat, the tone of the light is always measured in temperature. And the unit for this measurement is the same as what we use to measure actual temperature. The colour of the light also changes with the temperature of the light. Warmer light has a more yellowy colour while cooler light has a bluish tint. The colour that is right in the middle of the two is pure white. We consider the sunlight as a reference point for this measurement and consider that light as pure white. The colour temperature of pure white light is 5778 Kelvin.

Colour rendering index

Have you ever found it difficult to tell the difference between a dark blue shirt and a black shirt? If yes, you can solve it by replacing the light in your room with a light that has a high colour rendering index. The colour rendering index is a scale that represents how well light can reproduce the real colours of an object similar to natural light. If the CRI of light is 100, it means that light can reproduce colours as perfect as sunlight. For decorative LED lights, the CRI index is not important. But if you are using it for ambient lighting, look for those lights with a CRI rating of eighty and above.

Power consumption

To know how much it will cost you to keep the LED lights on, you can look at the power rating of the LED strip. The power rating of a strip usually only specifies the power of a single LED on the strip. To find the total power rating, you will have to multiply the rating of the single LED with the total number of bulbs on the strip. Others specify the wattage rating per foot or per meter of the strip. Because LEDs are quite energy-efficient, the power consumption for short term use will be pretty nominal. But if you will be using the light most of the time on a daily basis, this can add up to a lot.

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