LED light bulbs have gotten cheaper and affordable recently. In the past, LED light bulbs were expensive, and large, and strange looking. Worst, some have incomplete colour spectrum, casting blue or greenish light creating somewhat strange effects.

The good news is prices have become affordable, and quality have gone up. There are all types from E27 mount, E14 mount, tube style, many others. Most LED lights still need adequate cooling or their lifespan will be reduced significantly.

There is a new category of LED light bulbs that is based on a newer design and technology. Instead of have a few powerful LEDs that create a lot of heat, and requires a large heatsink, these newer LEDs run much cooler and don’t require a large heatsink.

At a glance, they look like incandescent light with glass bulb. If you take a closer look, you will notice a difference. Instead of a small coil of wire, these filament style LED lights have a strip or filament of tiny LEDS. You can’t see the LEDs and the filament looks like plastic.

Once you switch them on, they look exactly like incandescent light which is great if you have light fixtures like chandelier that cast nice patterns.

The advantage besides running cooler, is the light pattern is non directional unlike earlier LED light bulbs which tends to be around 180 degrees.

Having tried a few low wattage Edison LEDs, I think this will be an option you can consider. In Malaysia, most of these light bulbs tend to be warm white. So look carefully before you buy them. I’m sure, in the near future, more daylight white and higher power filament style LED will be available.