Our List Of The Most Useful LED Garage Lighting Ideas
Welcome to our list of LED garage lighting ideas to make your shop or workspace more functional!
When you’re planning to use your garage for more than just a place to park a car, those single bulb fixtures or the limited light from a garage door opener just wont cut it.
If you’re looking for functional shop lights to improve the overall brightness of your garage, you need want lighting that is both practical and cost-effective to get the job done.
As we have been building our own home, we were faced with this same issue. With a four car garage that will have a significant amount of space dedicated to Ryan’s tools and other things needed for work, good lighting is essential.
In order to make our own decision, we did some talking with our subcontractors to hear what different guys were using in their garage workspace.
These guys either install lights, or use their garage fixtures themselves everyday, so they know better than anyone what the best of the best are for usability and longevity in shop lighting.
Using their ideas and suggestions we then compiled this list of our very own garage lighting ideas and decided to share it with all of you.
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Why LED Garage Lighting?
LED lighting uses about half the wattage of their fluorescent tube counterparts and as much as 90% less than an incandescent bulb. That means you can have more lighting using less electricity, which saves you money. Even beyond the fact that LED lighting is more efficient, it can also last almost twice as long as a florescent tube light, which can save you money and hassle since you won’t have to replace them as often.
Types Of LED Garage Lighting To Consider:
LED Tube Garage Lighting Fixtures -
These lights can be single or double tube fixtures. The tubes are the actual bulbs for the fixture which is meant to offer the most direct bright light where you need it.
Depending on the fixture you choose, some can be mounted flush to the ceiling, others are suspended so they can hang lower, and some have the option to be installed either way.
LED Bulb Garage Light Fixtures -
LED bulb garage fixtures have a bulb base can be screwed into an existing fixture on the ceiling. They come in a variety of styles and sizes which offer extra benefits as far as the lighting output and other features such as adjustability of the direction of the lighting.
LED Wraparound Garage Light Fixtures -
Wraparound garage fixtures come with an acrylic lens that covers over the LED bulbs inside. It is meant to diffuse the lighting in all directions equally. This look is sometimes preferred when you want a more finished look to the space as the bulbs are not exposed like they are with the other fixtures.
Similar to the tube lights above, depending on the fixture you choose, some can be mounted flush to the ceiling, others are suspended so they can hang lower, and some have the option to be installed either way.
Suggested Lumens For LED Garage Lighting And Garage Lighting Layout Ideas
When considering the amount of light needed for a garage, you’ll want to start by multiplying the length of the room by the width of the room to get the square footage.
This number is necessary in order to calculate the recommended amount of Lumens you will need for your overall garage lighting.
The general rule of thumb for how many lumens are necessary for overall lighting in a garage would be 50 lumens per square foot. That means, if you have an average size single car garage that is 14 feet wide by 22 feet long, you’ll have 308 square feet in your garage. Multiply 308 by 50, and you get 15,400. So the overall recommend lumens for that garage space would be 15,400.
Similarly, if you had an average size two car garage at roughly 24 feet long by 24 feet wide, you would need roughly 28,800 lumens for the ideal amount of overall lighting.
Below is are examples of a one car and two car garage, as I described above.
To get the recommended amount of lumens for the single car garage, you could swap out your existing single bulbs for two LED bulb garage light fixtures that offer at least 7500 lumens each to add the necessary brightness to the space.
For the two car garage, you could add two LED bulb garage light fixtures that offer at least 12,500 lumens each or four LED bulb garage light fixtures that offer at least 7,500 lumens each. Both would get you close to the recommended amount of overall lighting for the space.
Now, if you plan to have a dedicated workspace in the garage such as a workbench, the recommended lumens per square foot would be up to 300. Meaning, if you add a workbench that is 14’ long by 2’ deep along the end of the single car garage, you might want to add an LED tube garage light directly above the in order to add the recommended 8,400 lumens of task lighting above that workspace.
Below are some examples of how the LED tube lighting would potentially look over a workbench for task lighting and over the garage to add the necessary overall ambient lighting.
Our List Of The Top LED Garage Lighting Ideas:
Conclusion
The right LED garage and shop lighting can make a huge difference in how you are able to use your space. No matter the size of garage or how handy you are, one of the options above can help you transform your shop with bright LED lights. We hope our list helped you find the right one for you!
Now we want to hear from you - How do you use your garage? What type of lighting did you choose to improve the function of your space? Let us know in the comments below!
