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Sheet 12 · Lighting

How bright is 800 lumens?

The box says 806 lumens and 60 W equivalent and 8 W, and all three are true, and only one of them is the brightness. Watts were never brightness. Watts were how much electricity the old bulb burnt turning itself into a small heater that happened to glow, and the glow was the by-product. Lumens are the light. The reason the box still says 60 W is that everyone’s head still runs on the old bulbs, and the regulation lets a maker print the equivalence, so long as the lumens meet its table.

Type the lumens off a box and the sheet tells you which old bulb that is. Type the old bulb and it tells you the lumens to look for. Or put a room in and it tells you how much light the whole room wants, which is the question the shop never asks.

1Work it out

What you know
Start from
60W old bulb

800 lumens is the light of the old 60 W bulb (the regulation’s row is 806 lm). In an LED that is about 8 to 12 W, and it is what the old 13 to 18 W energy-saving CFL gave.

Get Philips B22 bayonet LED bulbs, 60 W equivalent (806 lm) on Amazon.co.ukor search Amazon.co.uk for “Philips LED B22 bayonet 60W equivalent 806 lumens pack”

The equivalence table

LumensOld bulbLED, aboutCFL, about
13615 Wn/an/a
24925 W4 to 5 W7 to 9 W
47040 W6 to 9 W9 to 13 W
80660 W8 to 12 W13 to 18 W
1,05575 W11 to 15 W18 to 22 W
1,521100 W16 to 20 W23 to 30 W
2,452150 W25 to 28 W30 to 55 W
3,452200 W28 to 40 W55 to 75 W

The lumens and the old-bulb watts are the regulation’s own equivalence table, the one a maker has to meet before it may print “60 W equivalent” on the box; between the rows the maker has to interpolate. The LED and CFL columns are LEDVANCE’s own conversion chart, given as the ranges it prints, because the regulation says nothing about either. A plain LED at the bottom of its range is the usual thing on the shelf now; a filament-style or dimmable one sits nearer the top.

2The table, and who wrote it

The equivalence table isn’t a maker’s marketing. It’s law. The energy labelling regulation the UK kept after Brexit, and the 2021 regulations that replaced it, print one table: a bulb may be sold as a 60 W equivalent only if it gives at least 806 lumens, a 40 W only at 470, a 100 W at 1,521, and between the rows the maker has to interpolate, to the nearest watt. So when a box says 60 W equivalent, 806 lumens is the least it can honestly mean, and a box that says 60 W over 700 lumens is breaking the rule, which happens on the cheap packs. Read the lumens. The watts beside them are a translation for people who still think in the old bulbs, which is everyone.

3The LED watts, and the CFL you’re throwing out

A 60 W bulb’s worth of light from an LED takes about 8 to 12 watts, says LEDVANCE, which is Osram’s lamp business, and the ones at the bottom of that range are the ones on the shelf. The curly CFL that was the energy-saving bulb of the 2000s took 13 to 18 watts for the same light, and a minute to warm up to it. Halogen spots are the other old thing still in houses: Integral’s guide pairs a 50 W halogen spotlight with a 6.5 W LED. None of that changes the lumens you want. It changes what the bulb costs to run, and the running-cost sheet will tell you that a bulb barely registers next to a heater.

4Lumens for a room

Lux is lumens per square metre, so the lumens a whole room wants is its floor area times the lux. The figures the sheet uses are Collingwood’s for homes, quoted with a nod to CIBSE’s guidance: 100 to 200 lux in a living room or a bedroom, 300 to 500 in a kitchen, 200 to 300 in a bathroom, 100 to 150 in a hall, and the sheet takes the same points in those ranges as the downlights sheet does, so the two agree with each other. The makers don’t agree with each other. LEDVANCE’s room guide says 100 lumens a square metre for a living room and 300 for a kitchen; Integral’s says 400 to 500 for a living room, which is a waiting room. The honest range is wide because a living room is a ceiling light and three lamps and a telly, and the ceiling light is a third of it. Work out the total, then split it: a 60 W-worth in the middle, the rest in lamps where you actually read.

5Warm, cool, and the number nobody reads

The other number on the box is the colour, in kelvin, and the lower it is the yellower the light. The old bulb sat at the warm end, and ‘warm white’ is the LED that matches it. ‘Cool white’ and ‘daylight’ are bluer and look like an office, which is fine in an office. Neither is brighter than the other. The lumens are the brightness, the kelvin are the colour, and a pack that shouts about one is usually quiet about the other.

6Where to get it

Those links go to Amazon.co.uk and earn this site a commission if you buy. The price is the same either way, and nothing on this sheet changes because of it.

7Where the numbers come from

  1. The Ecodesign for Energy-Related Products and Energy Information (Lighting Products) Regulations 2021, Schedule 8, Table 10: equivalence claims for non-directional light sources, UK legislation (SI 2021/1095). 136 lm is 15 W, 249 is 25, 470 is 40, 806 is 60, 1,055 is 75, 1,521 is 100, 2,452 is 150, 3,452 is 200; intermediate values by linear interpolation, rounded to the watt (read 17 October 2026)
  2. Commission Delegated Regulation (EU) 2019/2015 on energy labelling of light sources, Annex V, Table 7, Retained EU law on legislation.gov.uk. The same eight rows, where the table came from; a claimed equivalent incandescent power shall be that corresponding in Table 7 to the luminous flux of the light source (read 17 October 2026)
  3. Lumens to watts conversion chart, LEDVANCE. 250 lm: 25 W incandescent, 4 to 5 W LED, 7 to 9 W CFL; 450: 40, 6 to 9, 9 to 13; 800: 60, 8 to 12, 13 to 18; 1,100: 75, 11 to 15, 18 to 22; 1,600: 100, 16 to 20, 23 to 30; 2,600: 150, 25 to 28, 30 to 55; 3,200: 200, 28 to 40, 55 to 75. The chart’s lumen bands are rounder than the regulation’s; the sheet pairs each with its wattage row. The page says the values are approximate (read 17 October 2026)
  4. What are lumens?, Integral LED. A 60 W conventional bulb needs an LED of around 800 to 850 lumens; a 6.5 W LED gives a similar output to a 50 W halogen; lumens per square metre by room, 300 to 400 for a kitchen and 400 to 500 for a living room (read 17 October 2026)
  5. Living room lighting, LEDVANCE UK. 100 lumens per square metre; a 20 square metre living room needs 2,000 lumens in total; a central ceiling light can give 730 lumens, the old 60 W bulb’s worth (read 17 October 2026)
  6. Kitchen lighting, LEDVANCE UK. Around 300 lumens per square metre (read 17 October 2026)
  7. Downlights: how to get the lighting levels in a home right, Collingwood Lighting. Living room 100 to 200 lux, kitchen 300 to 500, bathroom 200 to 300, bedroom 100 to 200, hallway or landing 100 to 150, office or study 400 to 500, as a starting point from CIBSE’s guidance (read 17 October 2026)
  8. Lighting requirements in residential and commercial settings, LEDVANCE. Formal dining room 200 lux (read 17 October 2026)
  9. Technical application guide, MASTER LEDbulb 7-40 W and 10-60 W, Signify (Philips). 40 W is 470 lm, 60 W is 806 lm, on E27 and B22 bulbs (read 17 October 2026)

Data on this sheet last changed 17 October 2026.