Warm, neutral or cool: choosing colour temperature room by room

Colour temperature is printed in kelvin. Lower numbers are warmer and yellower; higher numbers are cooler and bluer. It is the setting people most often get wrong.

The three bands

• 2700–3000K (warm white) — bedrooms, living rooms, anywhere you sit in the evening.
• 4000K (neutral) — kitchens, bathrooms, study desks. Clear without feeling clinical.
• 5000–6500K (cool daylight) — utility areas, garages, task lighting where you need to see detail.

Keep one temperature per room

The most common mistake is mixing. Two bulbs of different temperatures in the same room read as one being broken. When you replace a failed bulb, match the kelvin of the others, not just the wattage.

Warm light in the evening

Cooler light later in the evening is generally found less restful, which is why warm white is the usual choice for bedrooms. That is a comfort preference — we are a retailer and we make no health claim about lighting.

On our pages

Colour temperature is listed where the supplier states it. Where a bulb is sold as tunable, the page says the range.