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LED Grow Lights are becoming ubiquitous in the market when looking at options for growing plants without natural light or without enough natural light. If you go back even a couple years people never considered LED for growing plants either in their home or in a commercial grow environment.
LEDs started with a humble beginning in handheld games, indicator lights, holiday lighting, as well as many other common uses. While LEDs we useful for lighting the way for the human eye, the original LEDs were not nearly powerful enough to grow plants. With the creation of high power LEDs in specific colors, LEDs have now become a viable source of light for growing plants.
The first LED grow lights were under powered and not capable of flowering Cannabis on their own. They were often used as supplemental lighting since they could increase the quality of the spectrum with targeted colors of LEDs. This allowed the power for good yields to be provided by the traditional HPS lighting with the quality enhanced by the improved spectrum of the LEDs. With newer technology, recent LED grow lights can provide the power and improved spectrum on their own!
Other indoor growing lighting such as high intensity discharge (HID) lights require external ballasts and fans hooked up through ducting to keep them cool. LED grow lights are completely self-contained in that their fans, power supplies, and LED bulbs are all in one simple to install package.
It is a good idea understand the most fundamental question when looking to buy an LED grow light; what is an LED? LEDs create light through a phenomenon called electroluminescence, where electricity passing through a silicon semiconductor junction results in the creation of photons. Unlike every other grow lighting technology, LEDs do not require heat and/or mercury to create light for use in an LED grow light or other applications such as headlights for your car.
Electroluminescence was first discovered in 1907, but the first LED wasn’t created until 1927, although no practical use was found for it. It wasn’t until 1962 that the first visible light LEDs were created, glowing red. In the 70’s other colors of LEDs were discovered, but blue LEDs were not bright enough for practical use until 2002. The 2014 Nobel Prize in physics was awarded for the invention of a practical, high-intensity blue LED, as it opened the door to many applications of LEDs, including replacing incandescent and fluorescent lighting indoors for humans, as well as plant grow lights.
The electroluminescence phenomenon used in LEDs can create different colors using different semiconductor materials and slight impurities (called “doping agents”). For LED grow lights, the important colors are created with:
There are many different names for the same thing: a blue (or very rarely UV) LED diode covered with a yellow phosphor will create what the human eye perceives to be white light. The invention of practical high-intensity blue LEDs earned a Nobel Prize in 2014 because coating them with a yellow phosphor allowed LEDs to replace all other lighting technologies for humans while significantly increasing lifespan and efficiency.
White LEDs work by covering a high-intensity blue LED and placing a phosphor “cap” on top, usually yellow. When a high-energy blue photon generated by a blue LED strikes one of the phosphor molecules, some of its energy is converted into heat and the rest is re-emitted as a different, lower-energy (redder) color of light. Some blue photons sneak through the phosphor layer, but most are converted to a yellow or red color. This allows highly-efficient blue LEDs to recreate most of the colors that our eyes can see at a significant energy savings compared to incandescent, fluorescent / induction, high pressure sodium and metal halide lights.
The phosphor coating converts 20-40% of the light energy produced by the blue LED to heat to make it look white or “broad spectrum” to our eyes. Even so, “white” LEDs are far more efficient than almost any other lighting technology for humans.
However, the colors of light human eyes preferentially see in the green/yellow range of the spectrum are almost opposite what plants preferentially absorb for photosynthesis in the red and blue areas of the spectrum. Combining red and blue LEDs will always create light more efficiently for plant absorption than a phosphor-coated blue LED ever can.
The so-called “broad spectrum” and “full-spectrum” or “white” phosphor-coated blue LEDs are designed to be ideal for human eyes rather than plants; although they include the colors plants require to grow, they can never be as efficient as the right combination of single-color (mostly red and blue) LEDs for growing plants. White LEDs produce more yellow light than plants can efficiently use, and if they are based on a blue LED they lack UV light which increases plant quality.
There are trade-offs between the so-called “full spectrum” phosphor-coated blue LEDs and utilizing multiple different colors or “bands” in LED grow lights.
“White” or “broad-spectrum” LEDs can provide for plants’ minimal needs for growth, and if they are based on UV LEDs (which almost none are) they can even provide all the colors of light plants need to grow ideally. However, they do not produce all of these colors in the ideal ratio for plants. Most “full spectrum” LEDs produce predominantly yellow light, which is absorbed by plants but is not directly usable. The yellow light heats up leaves more than is necessary for ideal plant growth in indoor gardens, requiring additional cooling to keep the plants from overheating.
By utilizing multiple different kinds of specific-color (“bands” of) LEDs, LED grow lights can perfect their spectrum and provide plants with the colors of light required for photosynthesis / growth as well as just enough of the other colors to grow perfect plants.
In general, more bands of LEDs will make a more-efficient LED grow light, but there are always exceptions. Including unnecessary colors purely to increase the number of bands may make for better marketing for an LED light, but it won’t grow plants better.
Plants will grow with only red and blue light, but they will not achieve their full potential without at least some other colors of light.
While plants don’t use each color equally, they do prefer broad-spectrum light. From the lowest-wavelength (highest-energy) to the highest-wavelength (lowest-energy) these colors are:
Ultraviolet (UV) light causes many plants to develop thicker cell walls, pigments, vitamins and other substances in a process called photomorphogenesis. In plants that naturally develop red pigmentation in their leaves such as red-leaf lettuce, UV light is responsible for the pigment production; without it the plants will remain green. In Cannabis, UV light is responsible for increased THC, CBD and terpene production.
Blue light is used directly in photosynthesis, and is partially responsible in triggering plants to grow compactly rather than “stretching”.
Green light is mostly reflected by leaves, which is why plants look green to us. However, some green light is used by plants for hormonal signaling and without it plants don’t grow normally.
Yellow light is absorbed by plant leaves but not directly used; yellow photons “bounce” inside leaves and lose energy in the form of heat until they become red photons the plant can absorb. Yellow light is helpful in heading leaves up to their ideal metabolic temperature, unless you compensate by raising the growing area temperature.
Orange light is used for some photosynthesis, photomorphogenesis and hormonal signaling.
Red light is the most readily-absorbed by plants and the most efficient for photosynthesis. However, without far-red / near infrared and blue light, plants given mostly red light will grow long, weak stems.
Far red / near infrared (IR) light is utilized by plants for hormonal signaling controlling flowering, stem elongation, and as a photosynthetic enhancer through a phenomenon known as the Emerson Effect.
Only with a balance of light across the spectrum from UV to IR will plants achieve their full potential. Green and yellow light are required, but in amounts significantly less than the photosynthetically-ideal red and blue light.
Like every lighting technology, LEDs degrade over time and put out less light- they just do it a lot slower than other types of lights, as long as the LEDs are properly cooled. Excess heat causes LEDs to lose brightness and fail faster than if they are properly cooled.
For LED light bulbs used in houses, the small total wattage of the LEDs means that a simple, small “heat sink” can be used to get rid of the excess heat. When you put enough LEDs together to make a high-power grow light, more elaborate cooling is required to keep the LEDs running at peak efficiency for as long as possible. LED grow lights with inadequate cooling designs will dim quickly, even though the LEDs they are made from may be rated for a very long life, because this rating requires them to be properly cooled.
LED grow lights designed with large heat sinks and fans to actively cool these heat sinks will keep LEDs cool and ensure a long life. Some designs don’t use fans but instead spread the LEDs out, which can work as long as the heat sinks are properly designed and sized, but it also places limits on the brightness of LEDs that can be used.
The benefits of using LED grow lights in your indoor grow are numerous and will be covered in detail below where we compare LED grow lights to the other older traditional lighting options. For now we can focus on the benefits of LEDs on their own.
Traditional HID lighting required large cumbersome reflectors along with fans and ducting to run properly. LED grow lights will allow you to simplify your indoor garden. The smaller size to watt ratio of LED grow lights can save a lot of valuable space in your grow, freeing up more space for plants and proper ventilation. The additional space you gain from not having as much cooling and equipment needs allows you to have a better space to work in where you can take better care of your plants thanks to better visibility and access.
The management of the environment in your grow is key to success. High temperatures will cause heat stress at the very least and can cause the entire loss of a crop. To keep your environment at the proper temperature you need to use air conditioning with thermostatic controls. Traditional HID lighting adds huge amounts of heat to the environment since they run over 500 degrees. LED grow lights are only warm to the touch and do not put as much heat into the grow environment. This adds safety to your garden and saves money as well.
LED grow lights are much more efficient at producing the light that makes plants grow than traditional HID lighting or other technologies. HID lighting can produce a lot of light but it takes a lot of energy to create this light. Using the more efficient LED lighting will save you in power bills over the long run.
Replacing bulbs every 6 or 9 months is a thing of the past with LED grow lights. High quality LEDs can last 4 to 5 years without any maintenance or bulb changes. This saves money and time in your grow.
Many LED grow light companies overstate the wattage their lights actually run at, instead using the theoretical limit of the LEDs in the light. If this much energy were run through the light it would likely cause permanent damage to the light and shorten the lifetime of the LEDs. Some other manufacturers will misleadingly name their LED grow lights with the wattage they claim it will replace, such as a 1000 watt HPS.
When buying LED grow lights you should always make sure the company is claiming the actual wattage the grow light will use in your garden. You are essentially paying mostly for wattage when you buy LED grow lights so if you are misled in the wattage you are not getting what you are paying for.
Every garden has a light cycle. Depending on what stage your plants are in (flowering or vegetative) you will need to set up your lighting to turn on and off at the proper intervals. You need to understand how this works if you are going to succeed and get a solid harvest out of your garden.
In nature, outdoors, plants follow the seasons and while water and temperatures can play into this, the length of day also sends signals to the plant. As the summer turns into fall and fall turns into winter the days get shorter and the nights get longer. In your indoor garden you control the seasons by using a timer with your light to control the day and night length.
Some plants decide when to flower based on the length of the day / night cycle. Plants such as lettuce flower when the nights get short; plants like cucumbers will flower when they are large enough regardless of the length of the day or night.
Cannabis plants flower when the days get short and the night gets long. Cannabis determines this cycle based on the amount of dark time it receives every day. For proper vegetative cycle you need to have more than 12 hours of darkness and less than 12 hours of light- 18 hours of light is recommended, followed by 6 hours of darkness. For flowering Cannabis 12 hours of darkness and 12 hours of light are required. You can set up your LED grow lights on a timer to make the light and darkness fall any time you want in the day. This allows you to have the lights on when you are most likely to have time to care for your garden.
The longer you leave a Cannabis plant in the vegetative state the larger it will get. You can keep a plant in the vegetative state for extended periods of time either waiting for it to get to the size you want for flower or to keep it as a mother plant which can be used to take clones from. By using a mother plant for clones you can save a significant amount of time versus growing plants from seeds every time. It also allows you to keep growing a favorite plant over and over again.
When the plants are the right size you can transition to flower from the veg stage and this is where things get exciting. The plants grow more rapidly and require more attention and this is also the most important time in terms of affecting your yields.
Once a plant has left the seedling stage or the cloning stage, if coming from a clone instead of a seed, it will remain in the vegetative state until you are ready to flower the plant. During this stage you need to provide your plant with a longer time period of light from your LED grow light but the light can be less intense than during flower. Due to this lower requirement of power you can use less watts per square foot and save money on both the cost of the LED grow light as well as the savings from the more efficient LEDs.
During the vegetative period we recommend 16 or 18 hours of light per day. How long you remain in vegetative state before going into flower will depend on many things such as how large you want them to be at the end of flower, the particular genetics you are working with, and your style of growing (sea of green, screen of green, etc.). Other external forces can affect the duration of veg can be items such as a relatively short ceiling which can require you to keep plants smaller.
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For most gardeners 4-6 weeks is a good rule of thumb for the veg stage with their plants. This time allows the roots to develop and fill out the pot. This is also when you would do your repotting into larger pots. A larger root mass in a larger pot will increase your yields. When repotting it is best not to jump from a small pot to a large pot. You should take intermediary steps so the roots can develop in the new pot before moving to a larger pot. This will help avoid issues with overwatering. Also note, it is never a good idea to transplant to a new pot right before going into flower as the transplant will shock the plant and you always want to go into flower with a strong plant that has recovered from any transplant.
To switch the light cycle on your LED grow lights to the 12/12 of light/dark for flower is often referred to as “flipping” the plants into flower. Once you make this change to 12 hours of darkness you need to be careful to ensure the dark period is uninterrupted with no light getting to the plants. If your plants are exposed to light during the dark period they will become stressed and your yields will be affected, or you will have none at all.
Once you flip into flower the plants will generally grow rapidly for a period of time dependent on the strain you are growing. This is called “stretching” and it will happen until the plant diverts all energy to growing flowers. The spectrum in well-designed LED grow lights will minimize this stretching by creating a hormonal response using specific wavelengths (colors) in specific ratios.
Part of moving to flower is increasing their feeding through nutrients and also changing the nutrients to be specific to the flowering cycle. Select a reputable nutrient company and follow their instructions before branching out and mixing and matching different nutrients. Some say that LED grow lights cause the plants to use less nutrients but this is not based in any science. In fact the nutrient needs can go up with LED grow lights if the temperatures are correct and the light is the proper power for the size of garden.
If you are flowering these plants for the first time and not going from clone you will need to watch the plants as they develop flowers to determine the sex of the plant. As soon as you can determine the sex you should pull any male plants before they can pollinate the females in your garden, unless of course you are trying to breed your plants.
The flower cycle can take anywhere from 8 to 12 weeks for the flowers to reach maturity and be ready for harvest. Most strains have information on how long the plants will take to reach maturity. It is good to note some plants will finish a few days early under LED grow lights due to the optimized spectrum.
While other lights such as HPS have been used for over 30 years in indoor gardens, they were created specifically for lighting with the human eye in mind. It was only later people realized they could be used for growing plants as well as lighting a ballpark or parking lot. LED grow lights can be tuned specifically for plants by selecting specific nanometers (colors) that are much more efficient for growing plants and waste less energy. Of course LEDs are inherently more efficient than other lighting technologies so they are particularly well adapted for use in grow lights.
If you care about the planet as well LEDs are a superior choice. All HID bulbs must contain toxic heavy metals such as mercury to work. Every time a bulb is replaced more heavy metals need to be disposed of.
When looking to buy grow lights the obvious choice has become LEDs thanks to the advances in technology and the proof offered for better yields with higher quality.
LED grow lights are easier to turn on and off than traditional HID lighting since they do not require a cool-down period after turning them off. However, you should still automate the process of turning the lights on and off using a timer. A quality timer is recommended since the less expensive models may have a problem handling the power requirements of larger LED grow lights.
There are many advantages of use LED grow lights in your grow instead of traditional HPS or other lighting. These advantages include but are not limited to lower power use per fixture, reduced cooling needs, increased quality, increased output per watt, fewer maintenance needs, etc. But once you come to the final conclusion that LED grow lights are the best way to go, why is it so important to buy the best LED grow lights, how do you know what the best lights are, and how do you find these lights?
In the past with indoor grow lights it was less important to completely understand the purchase you were making. A HPS bulb from one manufacturer was very similar to a HPS bulb from another manufacturer. Yes, there were some quality and longevity differences but since the core technology of how HPS works did not allow for too much variance between products. Today you often hear people say LEDs don’t work because they or someone they know tried some LEDs and they didn’t work as advertised. The problem with this conclusion is that they tried one brand of LEDs and failed. While there are LED grow light products being sold that do not work, there are ones that do. Trying one brand and concluding all LED grow lights do not work is just not an accurate assessment of the technology.
Avoiding this problem of buying LED grow lights brand that doesn’t perform is key to saving time and money. To avoid this you need to understand what makes LED grow lights so revolutionary for growing indoors and you need to ensure your selection has all of these advantages in place
If you compare LED grow light prices before buying them you will need to find a way to compare one brand of LED-grow-lights to another brand of LED grow lights. Older technologies such as High Pressure Sodium (HPS) have bulbs that are very similar in quality with only minor variations in longevity and spectral output due to the limitations of the technology. With LEDs the range of grow lights goes from lights that won’t even keep a plant alive to lights that will outperform any grow light in the world.
By dividing the cost of a light by the actual wattage of the light you can determine the cost per watt. You can use this cost per watt number to compare one LED grow light to another with equal quality and features. Just looking at cost will likely give you a light that will break quickly or won’t grow plants well, so it is critical to consider the lights’ features, warranty and build quality as well.
Commercial grade, heavy duty equipment is required if you want your grow lights to last in the demanding environment of an indoor garden. Build quality includes things like a heavy-duty metal housing, use of quality components throughout the construction, and a full spectrum including UV and IR light. Low-end components can result in inferior quantity and quality yields, short lifespan for the light, as well as unsafe operating conditions. The main consideration when looking at build quality when buying LED grow lights is heat or thermal management for the LEDs. If heat is not removed from the LEDs properly, it will build up and cause the LEDs to degrade prematurely or even fail completely. The best way to remove heat quickly and effectively is to use active cooling with moving air. This is attained through the use of cooling fans and allows much more power to be run in a much smaller package safely and effectively.
There has been talk for many years about whether or not LED grow lights work for flowering Cannabis. Not only do LED grow lights work for flowering Cannabis, but the most advanced LED grow lights are available to the home gardener or the commercial grower. These LED grow lights are not only more efficient at creating high quality yields, but also doing so while providing significant savings on air conditioning and cooling costs as well.
There are many different technologies for creating light, some of which can work for growing plants indoors. There are a lot of choices- here’s a basic summary table:
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Fluorescent lights work by passing electricity between two electrodes in a glass tube filled with a low-pressure mixture of gasses including xenon and mercury. When electricity excites a mercury atom, it gives off a photon of ultraviolet (UV) light, which is not visible to humans. To convert this UV light into visible light, the inside of the glass tube is covered with chemicals called phosphors. When a UV photon hits one of these phosphor molecules, some of its energy is converted into heat and the rest is re-emitted as a different color of light. Carefully selecting and mixing the phosphor chemicals creates several different colors of light, which the human eye perceives as white. Varying the proportions of the phosphors can create redder, “warm white” light, or bluer, “cool white” light.
Fluorescent lights don’t produce very intense light, so you have to keep them close to your plants, and they don’t penetrate plant canopies very well so they don’t work well for growing taller plants. High-intensity LED grow lights can work much better for taller plants.
The balance of red and blue light in fluorescent grow lights can keep plants happy, but they produce a lot of green light that plants don’t use well. Only certain phosphors are available for fluorescent lights, so it isn’t possible to cover the light spectrum as evenly as is possible with LEDs. The phosphors allow some tuning of the light spectrum, but again not as completely as is possible with LED grow lights.
Each time a fluorescent light is turned on, a small amount of metal from the electrodes vaporizes as the electric arc gets started. This metal deposits itself on the glass tube, blocking light from getting out. This is why the ends of fluorescent tubes become black over time.
Essentially, every time you turn on the fluorescent light, its light output decreases and the lifespan is shortened! Typically, fluorescent tubes degrade quickly enough that you need to replace them every 6 months of use; they may still light up but they aren’t as bright as they need to be for growing plants.
LEDs don’t degrade every time they are turned on, and typically remain bright enough to grow plants with for 50,000 hours or more- over 5 years of continuous use, or 11 years at 12 hours per day!
Since all fluorescent lights contain mercury, they contaminate the environment when you throw them out at the end of their life, unlike LEDs.
LEDs are more efficient at creating light than fluorescent tubes. Per watt used, LEDs can be over twice as efficient as fluorescent lights at creating photons.
Induction lights are basically fluorescent lights without electrodes. A magnetic field is used to induce an electric current in a glass or plastic tube filled with a low-pressure mixture of gasses including xenon and mercury. Just like fluorescent lights, when electricity excites a mercury atom, it gives off a photon of ultraviolet (UV) light invisible to humans. This UV light is converted into visible light by a phosphor coating inside of the tube, creating waste heat in the process. The colors of light induction bulbs can create are exactly the same as fluorescent tubes.
Because induction lights are just a variation of fluorescent lights, they don’t produce very intense light and are not good for taller plants. 3W LEDs are more intense, and 5W LEDs are significantly better.
Induction lights have the same red / blue balance options as fluorescent lights, but also create a lot of green light that plants don’t really use. LEDs offer better options for covering the spectrum plants want to grow with.
By eliminating the metal electrodes that cause fluorescent lights to degrade every time they are turned on, induction lights offer a substantially improved lifespan. Some induction lights can have lifespans as long as LED grow lights, but unlike LEDs the induction lights have mercury in the tube that will contaminate the environment when they are disposed of.
Induction lights are about half as efficient as LEDs at creating light. For the same wattage, you can get more than twice the light from an LED grow light!
HID lights work by producing an electric arc between electrodes inside a translucent or transparent arc tube. Different chemicals inside the arc tube react to the electricity by producing different colors of light. A ballast is required to maintain the electric arc at the right current and voltage for all HID lights, otherwise the lamp will shut off or get too hot and fail. Using various chemicals, pressures and temperatures, several different kinds of HID grow lights are available, as described below.
HPS lights use sodium and mercury in their HID arc tube to create mostly green, yellow, orange and a little bit of red light. They look yellow-white to humans.
There are two types of HPS bulbs: single-ended bulbs screw into a socket like a normal incandescent light bulb, while double-ended (DE HPS) bulbs have an electrical contact at either end of the bulb.
Single-ended HPS lamps are very intense, producing a very bright light. Lower-wattage LEDs are not as intense, but 5W and lensed 3W LEDs can match the intensity of HPS.
DE HPS are even more intense than the single-ended bulbs, but again the 5W LEDs can match their intensity. Because of the amount of leaf-heating yellow and infrared light DE HPS fixtures put out, they must be kept 3 feet or even much higher above the plants to prevent leaves from burning; this can be a significant problem in indoor growing areas without high ceilings.
High Pressure Sodium lights give off almost no blue light, and virtually zero UV light. Some brands have a little bit more blue in their spectrum than others, but it still doesn’t provide the ideal balance of red and blue light that plants want. The lack of blue light causes plants grown with HPS lights to stretch their stems, becoming leggy and weak. This forces you to provide more support for plants grown under HPS lights.
Cannabis flowers grown under HPS lights are usually much less dense and “airier” than flowers grown with enough blue light for this reason.
HPE do create a fair amount of red light, which tends to work better for flowering and fruiting stages of plant growth.
Double-ended HPS lights have a little more of the red light plants want in their spectrum than the single-ended bulbs, which may explain some of why they seem to grow plants better, but they still lack significant blue light.
Every time a HPS bulb is turned on, some of the metal from the electrodes that create the arc is vaporized. This re-deposits on the inside of the arc tube and blocks light from escaping.
Single-ended HPS bulbs typically lose enough light because of this effect that they should be replaced every 6 months. Double-ended HPS bulbs have less metal electrode inside the arc tube so they degrade much slower, with some having lifespans of 10,000 hours or more, possibly even lasting 3 years (some manufacturers claim as high as 5) before they must be replaced. Properly-designed LED grow lights’ expected lifespan is still double to triple that of DE HPS lights.
Both kinds of HPS bulbs still contain significant amounts of mercury, which poisons the environment when you throw them out at the end of their life.
HPS lights are fairly efficient at creating light, and DE HPS even more so. LEDs are still more efficient at creating photons than HPS, but where they really shine is their ability to produce the colors of light that plants want.
HPS lights produce mainly yellow-green light, which plants can’t use efficiently. Green light is mostly reflected by plants (this is why they look green), but yellow light is absorbed by leaves. Chlorophyll can’t use this yellow light efficiently, so most of the energy ends up as heat inside the leaf.
So even though the HPS lights are relatively efficient at creating light, they aren’t nearly as efficient as LEDs at producing light colors plants directly use to grow. The light put off by HPS lights warms up your plants more, forcing you to keep your growing area cooler than if you were running LED grow lights with a plant-optimized spectrum.
In summary, HPS lights are only slightly less efficient at creating light than LEDs, but much less efficient than a properly-designed LED grow light at creating the colors of light plants want to grow.
MH grow lights are another variation of HID which use a mixture of different metal salts in the arc tube to create blue, green and yellow light, with a little bit of red. They look bluish-white to humans.
MH lights are not quite as intense as equal-wattage HPS lights, but they are still much brighter than fluorescent and induction lights. 1W and many 3W LEDs are not as intense as MH lights, but 5W and some lensed 3W LEDs match or beat metal halide lights for intensity.
MH lights produce a fair amount of the blue light, but little of the red light plants crave. They tend to work well for plants in vegetative growth stages, but don’t perform as well for flowering or fruiting plants. Over 50% of the light created by metal halide bulbs is in green and yellow colors, which plants aren’t efficient at using.
Metal halide does produce some UV light, which helps increase the quality of plants grown under it.
LED grow lights with plant-optimized spectrums including UV can provide all the benefits of the blue and UV light metal halide fixtures create, as well as the red light needed for good flowering and fruiting that MH bulbs lack.
MH lights don’t have a very long useful life and need to be replaced about twice as often, every 3 months to 1 year maximum. Properly-designed, well-cooled LED grow lights will last 5 to 40+ times as long!
Because MH bulbs contain toxic mercury, they cause environmental contamination whenever they are disposed of at the end of their life.
MH lights are more efficient at creating light than fluorescent and induction lights, but are less efficient than HPS and much less efficient than LEDs. When factoring in the spectral efficiency LED grow lights can offer, metal halides are significantly less efficient.
Sometimes also called Light Emitting Ceramic (LEC), these are a variation of metal halide (MH) lights which use a ceramic arc tube. This allows higher temperatures and better stability, which creates a more-even coverage of the light spectrum than regular MH lights. Because the ceramic tube can get over 1700 degrees Fahrenheit (920 degrees Celsius) it is difficult to make CMH lights in high wattage versions, so the largest bulbs typically run 300-400 watts.
Like all HID lights, ceramic metal halide lights are fairly bright and are certainly more intense than 1W or un-lensed 3W LEDs. 5W and some lensed 3W LEDs can be at least as intense as CMH.
CMH lights have the best overall plant-growing spectrum of any HID light, with blue and red and even some UV light. However, almost 40% of the light they create is green and yellow light plants cannot use efficiently. LEDs allow grow lights to be fine-tuned spectrally to more efficiently grow plants.
Ceramic metal halide lights have a longer lifespan than normal MH lights, but still need to be replaced every 6-12 months. As with all HID grow lights, they contain mercury which poses a health risk and contaminates the environment when they are disposed of.
LED grow lights last many times longer and contain no toxic mercury!
Ceramic metal halide lights aren’t as efficient at creating light as HPS, but they are more efficient at creating the colors of light plants want, making them more efficient grow lights than high pressure sodium. LEDs are more efficient at creating light than CMH, and when properly designed, LED grow lights are still much more efficient at growing plants than ceramic metal halide.
“Dual Arc” HID lights combine a high pressure sodium and a metal halide in a single HID bulb.
Dual arc bulbs are intermediate in intensity between their HPS and MH components. They are certainly brighter than 1W LEDs but 5W and some lensed 3W LED grow lights have higher intensity.
Combining the spectrum of MH and HPS yields a bulb with the blue and red plants want, but also with a double-dose of the green and yellow light that plants can’t use efficiently. The MH portion of the bulb does add some UV to the mix to enhance the quality of plants.
Because LEDs allow complete tuning of the spectrum, well-designed LED grow lights can provide just the colors of light that plants want without any of the waste.
Dual arc bulbs only last as long as the metal halide portion of the light, so they have a relatively short lifespan for an HID bulb. They typically need to be replaced every 6 months when used to grow plants. Well-cooled LED grow lights offer lifespans 10-20 times as long.
Dual arc bulbs are intermediate in efficiency between MH and HPS lights, but still nowhere near as efficient as LED grow lights.
Incandescent lights work by heating a wire filament until it glows. They are the least-efficient of all the types of grow lights compared here, and are being phased out across the globe for this reason.
Incandescent lights are very dim compared to any other technology; watt-for-watt LEDs are more than 10 times as intense.
Incandescent light bulbs produce mostly red light, then orange, yellow, green and blue in decreasing amounts. Their ratio of red to blue light is not ideal for growing plants, so many incandescent bulbs sold as grow lights have a blue filter applied to block much of the excess red light, making them even less efficient. LED grow lights can have a vastly superior plant-growing spectrum when properly designed.
Incandescent bulbs fail when the filament inside breaks, and have very short lifespans. When used 12 hours or more per day for growing plants, the bulbs typically fail within 2 months. LED grow lights last 30-60 times longer!
Incandescent lights are so inefficient that they are being phased out or banned by many countries for architectural use. The power required by incandescent lights to grow plants has always precluded them from being used in any serious indoor garden as a sole source of light. LEDs are more than 10 times as efficient at creating light, and with the right spectrum LED grow lights can easily be more than 20 times as efficient as incandescent lights.
Plasma grow lights work by exciting a substance with microwaves, until it heats up enough that it turns into plasma and emits light. In school many of us learned of 3 phases of matter: solid, liquid and gas; plasma is another phase of matter even more energetic than gas.
Like LEDs, plasma grow lights can come in a wide range of intensities. Some are bright enough to grow plants well, others aren’t.
Plasma systems create a fairly even spread of light across much of the visible spectrum, but no practical system can cover both the red and blue end of the spectrum equally. Plasma lights tend to either be more blue-weighted (like MH lights) or red-weighted (like HPS lights). Like dual-arc HID bulbs, some plasma lights combine both a blue and red bulb into one to cover both colors plants like. Just like dual-arc bulbs, this ends up doubling the amount of yellow light being created that plants cannot use efficiently.
LEDs allow a grow light to be created by cherry-picking just the colors plants want and leaving out the colors that are wasteful.
Plasma bulbs vary tremendously in how long they last, but due to the extreme temperatures used to create the glow inside the bulb, the plasma literally “eats into” the bulb and causes it to degrade, usually in 6-18 months. LED grow lights last 10-20 times longer.
Plasma lights are even more efficient at creating light than HIDs, and rival LEDs in efficiency for general photon output. LED grow lights can still be more efficient for growing plants because they allow complete control over spectral output, so energy isn’t wasted creating light plants can’t use efficiently.
Correct LED Grow Light Height is Critical – In the past with traditional grow lights the distance from the light to the plants was not as important. With LEDs the distance is critical and all of the recommendations should be followed.
Have enough LED Power – Many companies claim growing areas for their lights that are exaggerated. The lights recommended on this site all have accurate footprints. Trying to grow too large an area with any light will result in poor quality yields.
Grow Room Temperatures – The temperature of your grow room should be monitored and maintained to ensure the highest possible yields. This is one critical difference with traditional and other less efficient grow light technologies. The correct temperature for a garden LED grow lights is roughly 9 degrees warmer than the same garden using traditional grow lighting.
Allow for Proper Evaporation – Since LED grow lights do not generate the same heat signature they do not dry out soil the same as PS lights. It is beneficial to use a felt pot when gardening in a soil medium to allow the plants to dry out quickly enough between watering.
Once you realize how well LED grow lights can work for your garden you need to understand how to tell quality LED grow lights from cheap versions that will not work. While LED grow lights produce less heat while putting out more light than traditional HID or fluorescent and T5 lighting, they still create heat. This heat is what causes the LED in the grow lights to degrade over time. There are many other things to consider when buying LED grow lights for your indoor gardening needs:
Power: In the past the problem with LED grow lights was that they did not have enough power. Originally LED grow lights used 1 watt LEDs. These LEDs provided barely enough power to keep a plant alive, much less actually grow the plant or flower anything. The development of 3 watt LEDs allowed the first LED lights to truly grow plants. The current standard for high power LED grow lights is the use of all 5 watt LED diodes. In addition to high power LED diodes for these LED grow lights to work they need to have enough power in terms of actual watts to grow even high light plants such as flowering Cannabis.
Active Cooling System: High wattage grow lights, even with LED, create heat while creating light. This heat is the main cause of wear-and-tear on the LEDs in high power grow lights. To remove this heat active cooling has been proven to keep up even in the warm and sometimes damp environments of indoor gardens, including medical marijuana (MMJ) operations. Active cooling consists of the same cooling fins or heat sink you would find on a non-active cooled lower power LED grow light, but also includes fans that actively blow air over the heat sinks that remove heat from the LEDs. This active cooling allows more power to be put over the plant area while keeping the LEDs cool which helps ensure long life of the LED grow lights with kind yields that will rival even the new double ended HPS bulbs.
Spectrum: The first LED grow lights used simple red and blue diodes to create their spectrum. One of the greatest advantages of using LEDs to create grow lights is the ability to select different color LEDs which emit different specific nanometers. By creating a truly full spectrum LED grow light, photosynthesis can be efficiently stimulated without wasting energy on wavelengths of light that do not directly contribute to photosynthesis. When buying a full spectrum LED grow light you should look for a high number of individual discrete colors ranging from Ultra Violet (UV) to Infra-Red (IR).
Warranty: LED diodes last longer than any other grow light technology you can buy for your indoor garden. So why do you need a warranty? LED grow lights are based complex and cutting edge technology with complex circuit boards, high power LED diodes, active cooling fans, power converting drivers, and other parts. These parts can fail over time especially in demanding environments such as an indoor garden. If a LED grow light company has been around only for less time than the warranty they offer, they may not even know if their lights will really live that long!
Commercial Heavy Duty Construction: The indoor garden is a rough environment for any equipment but for complex electrical equipment such as LED grow lights it can be extremely tough. When designing the grow light the best materials and heavy duty construction should be used to ensure long operating life and efficiency of the LED grow lights. This includes things such as:
Heavy duty wiring to help reduce internal heat
High quality fans for active cooling
Large heat sinks for removing heat from the LEDs
Sturdy construction to ensure long life of the housing
Standard power cords and connectors such as IEC C13 to ensure easy setup
Inclusion of commercial-grade hanging system
Instructions that provide tips for using LED grow lights properly
Every garden has a footprint. These are the dimensions of the area in an indoor garden that require light, so thing like work areas and paths used to access plants are not included. In an enclosed area such as a tent it is generally the entire dimension of the tent.
Selecting the correct size light in terms of power or wattage is critical to your success as an indoor gardener. If you size too small you will not have the yields or quality you desire. If you select too large of a light you will end up wasting energy and possibly have issues with keeping your environment cool.
There are numerous LED grow light manufacturers you can consider when looking at LED grow lights. However if you look for a few key things you will quickly see the difference between the best company to buy your LED grow lights from and the rest. Some things to consider when reviewing companies are:
Time in Business: How long has the company been making and selling LED grow lights to buyers? Over the past 4-6 years an endless parade of new Led grow light manufacturers have tried their hand at selling LED grow lights. The majority of these companies just buy pre-made lights from overseas and never truly learn what it takes to make a leading and advanced LED grow light. All too often this results in growers who have lights with issues and the company that sold them is gone and no one is going support those products.
Proof: How much proof can you find that the lights do what you want in the garden? Can you find videos, images, grow journals, etc.? If a company has been around and sold lights for even a little while they should have successes with their lights documented and you should like what you see. If you cannot find any proof online or others using the lights through your local growing community then you should make sure to do your diligence.
Support: Does the company offer a solid warranty and even a return policy so that if not satisfied you can return the light? If a company is selling a quality product that works well they should not hesitate to stand behind that product and their claims. Try calling the company and asking some gardening questions to see what their knowledge level is of their product and also what kind of an organization you would be dealing with if you have questions after buying your LED grow light.
Honesty: If a company promises something too good to be true, then it probably is. There are still plenty of companies selling LED grow lights that are making claims that just aren’t possible to meet. Claims such as 600 watt or less LED grow lights that will match a 1000 watt HPS light in terms of yield. These sort of claims are what doom many indoor gardeners to failure when trying LED grow lights in their own gardens. Their expectation is completely unrealistic and when they finish growing with the lights they cannot help but be disappointed. A good LED grow light company will be honest about their lights performance and will base this on research, field testing, and science.
Science: Growing plants indoors is a science and requires significant knowledge about many areas such as nutrient management, environmental control, as well as numerous skills. Understanding lighting down to the wavelength is not something most gardeners strive for. Companies manufacturing LED grow lights should be experts in growing with artificial lighting. Look for a site with complete and real science note marketing hype. Understanding of not only the science but how to do research is critical in developing an efficient light that performs well in the real world.
Different Models for Different Gardens: In a commercial gardening environment you often want a light that is the equivalent of a 1000 watt High Pressure Sodium (HPS) or Metal Halide (MH) bulb. If you have more specific needs and limitations like a home gardener you may need different sizes of LED grow lights so it is best to look for a company that offers enough different models of lights to accommodate your needs if necessary.