Choosing Christmas lights LED or electric

When the time comes to go shopping for Christmas gifts and decorations, don’t forget about the lighting options for your home, garden and for your Christmas tree. The broad choice will be between candles (but not for the tree – it’s too dangerous), electricity and Christmas lights LED.

Of course LED implies – although isn’t always – solar power. LED stands for light emitting diode, which is a technical term that really means that the bits and pieces that give us light are electronically generated rather than using loads of electrical current. LEDs were first discovered by a Russian inventor in the 1920s, but it wasn’t until relatively recently that their usefulness in everyday life was recognized. Now they’re the best thing since sliced bread – they are environmentally friendly, last just about forever, and they don’t get hot and burn out.

LEDs – including Christmas lights LED – look quite different to ordinary light bulbs, both incandescent and fluorescent. The earliest lights, and indeed the very earliest Christmas tree lights, were made using incandescent light bulbs. The very first tree lights were hand-made by a chap called Edward H. Johnson who worked with Thomas Edison, the world famous American inventor who started the Edison Electric Light Company. In fact Mr. Johnson was vice president of the company. It was long ago in 1882 that Mr. Johnson came up with his original Christmas tree light idea, and decorated his own tree with little hand-wired lights colored red, white and blue (no doubt for the sake of the American people). The joke is that at the time the media considered his invention to be a publicity stunt and they largely ignored him. Yet this funny little invention turned out to be a money-spinner of note. Check our selection of solar string lights and solar rope lights

It was round about that same time that Thomas Edison had patented various electric light bulbs, with various different types of filaments that allowed them to burn bright light. These were incandescent heat-driven light emissions. LEDs on the other hand don’t get hot – but they do generate lots of light. Therein lies the major difference between the two types.

So when we talk about Christmas lights LED, the type that are made with LED bulbs, we are looking at lights that are much more energy efficient than other types. While LEDs may be used with electricity, they are generally considered to be the best option for solar power. More on Solar Christmas lights

In the early days LEDs were red. Since scientists have come up with ways to make them other colors – including white, green and blue – their usefulness has increased quite dramatically.

And now comes even better news. Having chosen Christmas lights LED to decorate your Christmas tree, you’ve got yourself LED string lights that have an even wider range of uses. Instead of chucking the LED Christmas lights into a box to be used again in 12 months time, these gorgeous light strings can be used to decorate patios and gardens, rooms and house exteriors, any time of the year. They’re fun and pretty, easy to use, and you can use them on the Christmas tree again next year. More on outdoor solar lights