LUX | LED Lighting: Watts vs Lumens
You're probably used to looking at the wattage on the packaging of your incandescent to determine how bright you need the bulb to be. But with LEDs, you'll need to think in lumens (not watts!) when it comes to the amount of light.
LED, lights, watts, lumens, watts vs lumens, LUX, energy, brightness
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22 Jun Watts vs Lumens

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Your incandescent light has just burned out and now you need a replacement light, but which route should you take? You’ve heard LEDs can help save energy and money, but you’ve also seen how “blue” and dim they can appear. But thanks to advances in technology, LEDs (light emitting diodes) can now have the same warm glow as an incandescent; you just have to know what to look for when purchasing. That’s where our “Be Enlightened” series shines. Over the next several weeks we will be posting various tips, information, and guides to help you understand what you need to know when switching out incandescents and replacing them with LEDs. Topics will include covering the basics (like watts vs lumens down below), what exactly you should be looking for, and why it makes a difference - not just on your wallet but on the environment as well.

So first, let’s get two things straight.

What’s a Watt? A watt (w) is used to measure how much energy a bulb draws (not how bright it is).

You’re probably used to looking at the wattage on the packaging of your incandescent to determine how bright you need the bulb to be. But with LEDs, you’ll need to think in lumens (not watts) when it comes to the amount of light.

So then, what’s a lumen? A lumen (lm) is used to measure how much light a bulb emits.

Because LEDs use considerably less energy to emit light, wattage is no longer the indication of brightness. For example, your typical incandescent uses 60W to shine a brightness of 810 lumens. An LED uses only 6-9W to emit the same amount of light (see our A19 Filament as an example). Not to mention the LED will last 25,000-50,000 hours! The energy savings and long lifespan saves precious resources and saves you money.

Here at LUX, we try to keep things straightforward and provide the equivalent wattage of an incandescent to our LEDs. Even though there is no true or exact conversion rate for lumens to watts, we’ve put together a quick reference table below.

Watts_vs_Lumens3

So remember, when it comes to LEDs, think in lumens, not watts!