As you search for the best lights for your home, you need to understand that different color temperature lights serve different purposes. So, even as you consider the wattage of your preferred light bulbs, you also need to pay close attention to their colors.
There are two main color temperatures that most homeowners prefer: daylight and soft white. This article talks about daylight vs soft white and their differences.
What Is Daylight LED Light?
As its name suggests, a daylight LED light is a very bright white LED light designed to produce an enjoyable calming effect owing to its broader light spectrum. Furthermore, the color temperature produced by a daylight LED light is quite high, ranging between 5000 and 6500 K. This makes this light suitable for bathrooms, kitchens, and basements.
Its advanced color contrast allows it to create a natural effect, allowing you to use it virtually anywhere in your house. Another important aspect of this daylight LED light is the fact that it is exceptionally friendly to the eyes, despite its brightness.
And just like the natural light from the sun, this LED light offers a warm glow to your interiors instantly. The full-spectrum LED lights emit light through the full spectrum of natural light.
What Is Soft White LED Light?
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A soft LED light is the type of light that generates a yellow color and a lower color temperature. Its color temperature ranges between 2700 and 3000 K. This light imitates a yellowish-white light emitted by ordinary incandescent bulbs. If a bulb is marked as soft white, warm white, or Kelvins and it’s lower than 3000 K, it will produce a warm white light that will offer your interiors a warm, comfortable feel.
It is also important to mention that soft white light is very rich in yellow and red. Therefore, it generates a very warm light. Also, a soft LED white light is the yellowest of all LED bulbs and is suitable for areas that require soft lighting. Its low color intensity makes its light feel warm, creating a more calming environment.
That’s why soft white lights are ideal for complete illumination in different parts of your house, including your living room, bedroom, and dining room.
Differences Between Daylight and Soft White Lights
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Obviously, there exist major differences between these two types of lights. In fact, the other way of describing the two lights is warm and cool, or 3000K vs 6000K. So, you are looking at two extremely different color temperatures sitting on opposite edges of the scale. If you didn’t know, there is an actual scale to measure LED light colors commonly referred to as the Kelvin scale.
This scale moves from 1,000K up to 10,000K. The higher side of the scale represents blueish colors, while the lower side represents yellowish tones. So, you can use the Kelvin scale to tell the main difference between daylight and a soft white bulb.
Warm vs Cool
The soft white bulb offers more warm tones and is always in the yellow color range, while a daylight bulb is cooler and offers white and even blueish tones. Furthermore, a soft white bulb is suitable for residential environments and produces earthier tones such as apartments for rent in Boulder, CO, while a daylight bulb is perfect for commercial environments and has more blueish tints to it.
If you are still undecided, you should compare both 3000K vs 4000K options along with 4000K vs 5000K. There is an indirect difference between these ranges, even though these color temperatures are within the range where most consumers find a perfect fit for their applications.
Soft white bulbs are suitable for:
• Residential
• Kitchen
• Bedrooms
• Bathrooms
• Closets
• Under Cabinets
Daylight bulbs are suitable for:
• Commercial
• Garages
• Display Cases
• Offices
• Signage
Daylight vs White Soft Lights: Which Is Better?
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The suitability of these two types of lights depends on the amount of light color temperature you need and the part of your house you want to illuminate. However, you need to keep the following points in mind when choosing between daylight and soft white bulbs.
Daylight LED Light
• It generates a higher color temperature in the range of 3000k to 6000K. This color temperature range is known to be very white.
• It emits light across the full spectrum of natural light, and therefore it produces more of a bluish-white color.
• It produces bright white or mimics the natural light of the sun and its ambient color makes it suitable for kitchens, bathrooms, and basements. It is also perfect for recording videos.
• It is exceptionally bright yet natural. This light causes less strain on your eyes, making it suitable for reading, working on projects, and accent lighting.
• It offers an instantaneous warm glow to your interiors just like the sun’s natural light.
• Its lower color intensity makes the light feel warm, creating a more calming ambiance.
Soft White Light
• This bulb produces a lower color temperature in the range of 2700K to 3000K.
• Soft white light is richer in yellow and red thus creating a warm light.
• It produces a warm white light creating a warm, convenient feel in your interiors.
• A soft white bulb is suitable for the general illumination of areas such as living rooms, bedrooms, dining halls, among others.
• A soft white bulb replicates the yellowish-white light generated by ordinary incandescent bulbs.
• Because of its lower color intensity, this bulb makes the light in your house feel warm thus creating a more soothing ambiance.
• Since the soft white bulb produces a yellowish light, it might cause some stress on your eyes and therefore may not be appropriate for reading or working on projects.
• Exposing yourself to soft white or blue light for a long time at night can decrease your melatonin production. This means that you may delay your sleep time by up to three hours. Many studies have also shown that prolonged over-exposure to soft white light can damage your eyes.
Featured image source: Pinterest.com
