Understanding Watts vs. Lumens for Home Lighting

The equivalent power value on LED bulbs which are written by manufacturers can be deceptive for consumers. The deceptive information on the LED bulb boxes may cause the consumers to make wrong choice. This situation leads unfair competition environment.

Generally there are three values on the LED bulbs. One of them is power, the other is lumen and the last one is equivalent power.

Power indicates that the total power that the bulb draws from the electrical grid while the bulb is on. That means the power of your LED bulb affects the amount of your electricity bills.

Lumen indicates the total light output of the LED bulb while it is operating at full brightness. So more lumen you have means the more light you have.

Equivalent power point out the incandescent bulb power which is correspond the lumen value of the LED bulb in order to make easy the consumers choice.

For instance, assume that the LED bulb that operates at 7.5W is 750 lumens. Power; 7.5W, Lumen; 750 but we mentioned about the third value which is equivalent power. So what is the equivalent power of this LED bulb?

Actually the values are not constant and are not open for comments because an old technology taken as reference in here. The table below shows the lumens of the incandescent lamps. Here, the range of lumen value of the LED bulb may indicate the equivalent power.

If we go back to our example, our 750 lumen LED bulb can be considered as 60W equivalent. If a number is written above this value, it becomes a deceptive statement for consumers.

As you can see in sample pictures, manufacturer or importer stated that 880 lumen LED bulb is 80W equivalent. According to the table above it is obvious that the LED bulb is actually 60W equivalent.

Another manufacturer stated that 1055 lumen LED bulb is 75W equivalent. As you can see the table above, it is correct definition. However, in previous example, it was written as 880 lumen is 80W equivalent. We can say that the consumer is misleading who are considering the equivalent power.

There is no such mechanism to control or monitor this situation. In this case the market needs honest manufacturers and importers. Also the consumers should have become conscious of LED bulb selection. Most importantly, consumers should pay attention to lumen value which is indicating true light output instead of equivalent power.