Hi all,
I’ve been having some trouble getting some decent lightbulbs. Which brand do you guys recommend? I’ve bought some Livarno (Lidl) ones, not full RGB, but when I choose a warmer color they become a little red/pink.
Edit: Thanks for all the suggestions! I’ll check out Ikea or Philips if I can find a good deal on them.
I have tried a lot of different ZigBee bulbs over the years so here is my two cents. All of these are referring to the white spectrum bulbs from these brands as that’s all I buy, no RGB.
The BEST are probably Phillips Hue. I only use white spectrum bulbs not RGB so they are not $50 each, but they are still by far the most expensive.
My favorite are the cheap white label ones I used to buy from Amazon and Home Depot under different brand names for $5 dollars and were clearly made by the same manufacturer. The ZigBee stick even saw them the same. But I can no longer find them. They have an amazing price to quality ratio.
I really like the IKEA Tradfri bulbs but they are by far the most finicky bulbs I have when using a ZigBee stick instead of their native hub. They are fine 95% of the time, but sometimes they get annoying and won’t turn off or respond too slowly, or they just stop responding and need to be powered off completely to reset them.
My least favorite is SengLED. They are cheap but do not act as repeaters so they will ruin your mesh network. I will never buy more of them.
I would also avoid the OSRAM Lightify brand, I think it’s a Sylvania brand. Those have had the highest failure rate for me and it’s clearly because they run insanely hot. They will burn your hands if you don’t shut them off before changing them.