A Guide to Dimming LEDs: How to tell if your Lights are Dimmable

Today's world is filled with more and more LED lights. They are a great replacement option that significantly reduces energy consumption when replacing existing lights in both commercial and residential settings. If you want to preserve your existing fixtures but replace outdated lighting (incandescent, fluorescent, halogen, etc.) with improved LED bulbs, you can do so since LEDs have been integrated into common bulb types that can be retrofitted into traditional fittings in only a few seconds.

BUT HOLD ON, not all Lights can be dimmed.

This implies that before selecting your LED lights, you must evaluate your demands. This is crucial when replacing outdated lighting for the first time with newer LED technology and anticipating that they may dip.

In this post, we'll cover both how to utilise LED dimmers and how to quickly assess whether an LED can be dimmed or not.

Are dimmable LED lights really necessary?

It is fairly usual for rooms in our houses to have several uses. Modern kitchens may be used for cooking, eating, and even working during the day.

You have the freedom to adjust the lighting around you to your activities thanks to dimmable lighting. When working on your chequebook, you could like a bright light, but when eating in the evening, you might prefer a dark, soothing light.

Also, the usage of dimming has increased in commercial and industrial settings. Dimmable lighting gives your office space flexibility and enables the best illumination for your staff's tastes or needs. There has been a lot of study on both dimming and colour tuning in workspaces. For additional information on adjustable white lighting, see this.

Can you dip your LED lighting?

You need check a few things to make sure you have a dimmable bulb to begin with because not all LED lights can be dimmed:

#1 - Be sure the packaging for any completed LED fixtures or bulbs you purchase expressly specifies that they are dimmable. This has to be made clear in the light's technical description or specs. The lifespan of the bulb will be shortened if you put a non-dimmable LED on a dimmer because of the excessive flickering that will result.

Occasionally, a sign resembling the one below is used to indicate that a light may be dimmed; sadly, there is no one universal symbol.

Why can't some Lights be dimmed?

The LED driver that the light utilises determines whether an LED bulb may be dimmed.

Every LED bulb has a driver, which transforms electrical energy into the low-voltage constant current required by LEDs for operation. Uncertain about LED drivers? See our complete LED driver guide.

You have the luxury of selecting whatever LED driver you choose, with the dimming choices you want, if you are creating your own setup using component LEDs. Nevertheless, you are only able to choose from the manufacturer's selection of dimming settings when purchasing a completed LED fixture or bulb.

Non-dimmable LED drivers only recognise ON and OFF as states. The non-dimmable driver will attempt to adjust and maintain a constant current if you start to vary the current to an LED bulb. Eventually, the LED driver will become overworked and stop working.

On the other hand, dimmable drivers are designed to manage current fluctuations. Dimmable drivers will dip the LED using analogue or pulse width modulation (PWM) dimming to make up for the current loss.

How are LEDs dimmed precisely?

When designing an LED retrofit, dimming must be properly taken into account because LEDs dull differently from legacy lighting sources.

Using incandescent lights as an illustration

By heating a filament wire until it glows, they create light. Just reduce the voltage to make it dull; as the wire cools, less light is produced. As you can dip from 0 to 100% by altering the voltage to the light source, this is an illustration of analogue dimming.

Instead of a heated filament, LED bulbs use diodes to produce light. A diode only has two possible states: ON, where it is emitting light, and OFF, when it is, you guessed it, dark.

Because of this, producing a dimmable LED lighting solution requires a different approach than dimming LEDs. Pulse Width Modulation (PWM) and analogue dimming are the two basic techniques for dimming LEDs.

Modulation of the pulse width (PWM)

By adjusting the length of time the signal is ON or OFF, PWM provides a wide range of dimming. The light-emitting diode can only be ON or OFF at any one time when using PWM dimming. This is distinct from analogue dimming, which dims LEDs by changing the output power.

If you wanted to dip an LED to 80% brightness with pulse width modulation, you would keep the LED on for 80% of the time and turn it off for the other 20%. How can we not notice the LED turning on and off? It makes reasonable that you would have roughly 80% the light output.

PWM dimming takes use of an issue in human vision. The human eye can see from roughly 50 to 90 Hz, therefore the light is flickering at such a fast pace that the human eye cannot perceive it (about 60 frames per second). Our brains fill up the gaps to make our eyesight feel smooth when the light is flashing so quickly.

PWM dimming should be used with caution, especially if you want to use the lights for filming or videography. A high-quality camera will undoubtedly capture a little strobe when the light is set to a low level, even if human eye might not be able to detect PWM flickering. While working with videography, you should search for a better dimming alternative than PWM.

Digital dimming

If you have read our guide on driving LEDs, you are aware that analogue dimming decreases the amount of light an LED emits by adjusting the current going to it. Although it may appear like a simpler alternative to dimming, an LED's colour may occasionally shift at lower current levels, resulting in problems with light quality and uniformity.

What Dimming kinds should I employ, then?

The ability to quickly change light levels from dim to bright is the most crucial aspect of dimming. In the end, it relies on the kind of dimming that your LED driver and/or bulb can support, but if you're designing your own system, you may make your own decisions. If all you want is advice, move on to the list of our top dimmer choices below.

0-10V Dimming

This style of dimming quickly gained popularity for fluorescent lighting in commercial settings. The good news is that it can also be used for LED installations, making it a popular option for upgrading fluorescent lights in particular. A separate DC voltage signal with a zero to ten volt voltage range is used to control the lights. You now comprehend the name? As a result, the controlled light may function with a 100% output when the full voltage is applied and a 0% output when no voltage is applied. When the voltage level of the control signal varies, so does the brightness of your light.

Cutting-Edge Dimming

The most used dimming technique is leading edge dimming, also known as forward phase-cut, incandescent, or TRIAC dimming.
As it is perfect for high voltage applications, which most heritage lighting needs, this type of dimmer is present in the majority of homes. The main issue with TRIAC dimming is that the light may occasionally buzz or flicker. This may occur as a result of vibrations brought on by the AC signal's chopping.

Luckily, many of the more recent TRIAC dimmers have considered this and taken steps to prevent flickering. Many dimmable LED drivers or LED dimmers will be marked as having a flicker-free design. Be sure to shop around and choose a high-quality dimmer; you can start with our top picks below.

Below is the LED Bulb from BENWEI, any interest or any questions, PLS feel free to contact us.