The 5 Best LED Bulbs to Easily Integrate into Your Home

LED (light-emitting diodes) lights are a smart solution for lighting our homes, and the best LED bulbs help us save energy (and therefore money) in the long term. 

LED lights consume far less energy than traditional light sources (such as incandescent or compact fluorescent light bulbs), but they are able to emit the same brightness. This is because of their excellent thermal efficiency, removing heat through heat sinks to prolong the life expectancy of the bulb.

Their versatility means you can easily integrate LED bulbs into your lighting design, whether you use them to create an intimate party atmosphere and as night lights for your children. Some LED bulbs also offer smart home integration.

These are five of best LED bulbs available whatever your requirements.

Best LED Bulbs

The TP-Link Kasa Smart Bulb is the best dimmable LED bulb around. You can select a dimming range from 1% to 100% to set the right brightness for your mood.

It connects to your home’s Wi-Fi through the free Kasa app, and from there you can easily manage your lights - such as setting fixed times to turn your bulbs on or off - with your smartphone or tablet. It also connects with Alexa, Google Assistant or Microsoft Cortana via voice assistant.

Furthermore, the quality of the white bulbs are superb. You can also buy TP Link's colour changeable bulb equally high-quality alternative. 

This is a super efficient LED bulb from Amazon, which uses 14.5 watts of energy and costs just £2.22 per year to operate (depending on usage).

It provides vivid white colour and requires no waiting time to warm up to full brightness (up to an impressive 1521 lumens). You won’t have to worry about replacing these bulbs any time soon either. With a lifespan of 15,000 hours, the bulbs will last over 13 years (based on three hours of use per day). 

Buying in bulk is a great way of setting the bulbs up around the house and not worrying about replacing them for a long time.

Looking for a lighting product to transform your smart home? Phillips’ smart LED bulbs can be used to overhaul your entire lighting system to make it internet connected, offering good integration with HomeKit, Google Assistant other home assistants.

You can play with 16 million colours to create the perfect atmosphere in any room, and the Philips Hue app is packed with features such as routine setting, sunrise/sunset automation, scenes, geofencing and a vacation mode (so you can schedule lights to turn on and off while you're away from home).

While the bulbs work out of the box via the Philips Hue Bluetooth app, it's worth paying extra for the Philips Hue Bridge which lets you sync your light with your music, movies and games. You'll also need the bridge in order to connect to Alexa. 

This amber LED bulb from Genixgreen helps to create a relaxing atmosphere and works brilliantly as a night light. It’s perfect for toddlers, relaxing in bed, or setting mood lights. 

This 50-pack is a bargain worth snapping up for use in multiple rooms, and the bulbs are extremely economical to run, featuring a long life span that provides over 25,000 hours of brightness and low power consumption.

The bulbs also come with short-circuit protection and over temperature protection to give you peace of mind when your children are asleep in the next room. 

For a cheap LED bulb you can use in living rooms, hallways and kitchens, you won’t find much better than Integral’s Classic Globe GLS (General Lamp Shade) LED bulb. 

It is quite simply a powerful white light, with a brightness of 1060 lumens which is thermally efficient and includes multiple everlight LEDs. It's also very budget-friendly.

How to Choose the Best LED Bulb

Before you begin to shop for an LED bulb, it’s important to consider which rooms you want to install them in, and to review the specifications of bulbs to make sure they’re suitable for your home. 

Brightness

The brightness of LED bulbs is measured in lumens, or Lm. The higher the number of lumens, the brighter the bulb. This measurement exists because LED energy-efficient bulbs use considerably fewer watts than traditional light sources, so the lumens measurement helps to solely review brightness.

As a rough guide, around 350-450 lumens would be suitable for a bed-sized table lamp, whereas for a larger-size living room you’d be looking for between 2,000 and 3,000 lumens. 

Dimmable

LED bulbs can be dimmable, but not all of them are. And in some cases you won't be able to use a standard dimmer for an LED bulb. 

Dimmable LED bulbs often tend to come with smart home automation where you can control the brightness via an app or smart speaker, but make sure to research whether a bulb may require a dimmer switch before you buy it. 

Fittings

LEDs are available to fit most fittings, but you’ll need to shop around if the bulb you want does not come in your required fitting. 

Costs

LED lights can cost more in the short-term, but they’re a far more cost-effective investment in the long-term. Not only will they help to reduce your energy costs, but using LED lights cuts carbon emissions through using less energy than you would with incandescent or compact fluorescent light bulbs (CFL) bulbs.