Contents
- Benefits of Using LED Aquarium Lights
- 11 Best LED Aquarium Lights For Planted Tanks
- 1. Hygger 24/7 Planted Tank LED
- 2. Nicrew Planted Tank LED
- 3. Serene Sun Pro Freshwater Aquarium LED Light
- 4. AquaticLife Freshwater Wireless LED Aquarium Light
- 5. Kessil 160WE Controllable LED Aquarium Light
- 6. Finnex Planted+ 24-Inch Fully Automated (Freshwater)
- 7. Fluval Aquasky LED Strip Light
- 8. Current USA Satellite Plus PRO LED Light
- 9. Fluval Plant 3.0 LED Planted Aquarium Lighting
- 10. Finnex Stingray Aquarium LED Light
- 11. BeamsWork DA FSPEC LED Aquarium Light Pent Freshwater
- 7 Best LED Aquarium Lights for Reef Tanks
- Quick Comparison of the Best LED Aquarium Lights
The best LED aquarium lights will help enhance the colors of your fish, generate depth, and illuminate your aquascaping.
If you’re keeping, or considering the prospect of maintaining plants or corals, you’ll realize how essential lighting is.
Plants and corals rely on getting the proper spectrum of light and intensity so they can flourish and stay healthy.
If choosing the wrong light, you might risk the health of your inhabitants. That’s the reason why we’re now providing you with a collection of excellent LED aquarium light items. All the picked products are high-quality, so you can be assured to select the most suitable one for your tank.
Benefits of Using LED Aquarium Lights
LED lights are absolutely effective lights. An LED light bulb can create about 100-175 lumens per watt, making them the most powerful type of light prevailingly for aquariums.
Low Energy Consumption
Compared to incandescent lamps, they only need 10% of the energy to create the same quantity of light. LED lights are substantially more effective than fluorescent light too. Your energy cost savings will create a difference in the expense of the LED systems in the first year to 18 months.
Low Heat Emission
LED aquarium lights do not release the heat as fluorescent light bulbs do, so they won’t warm up your tank water. Nevertheless, they still require good air circulation so the heat they emit doesn’t affect the lifespan of the LED chip.
Long Life
LED lights are durable for a very long time, with an estimated lifetime of up to 50,000 hours (almost six years) as compared with 2 to 4 months for incandescent bulbs, 6 to 18 months for standard metal halide and fluorescent bulbs, and up to 28 months for compact fluorescent bulbs. While their prices are high, you can save $500 to $1,000 you would spend on replacing bulbs over 5 years for metal halide, T5, or compact fluorescent bulbs.
Adjustable Light Intensity
LED lights can be dimmed and set up, enabling a natural dimming at sunset and the reverse at sunrise. This is especially beneficial for nocturnal fish, as a dim blue light can be left on the aquarium to mimic moonlight and facilitate feeding and viewing purposes. There are even LED lighting strips that simulate the monthly lunar cycle. You can enjoy adjusting the light with the remote or app.
Moreover, you can let your smart lighting system choose the temperature and the stage of plant development and pick the proper colors and wavelengths.
Color Options
LED lights are available in a range of colors, which can be leveraged to accent the aquarium in intriguing ways. There are classified by spectrum (usually in the Kelvin or K system), and you can select which addresses your purpose.
For instance, the 8,000K white spectrum boosts the photosynthesis of your plants and promotes the colors of red, orange, and yellow fish. Include a magenta or magenta/ blue LED and you can have blues, greens, and reds while bringing more support for your plants. The 12K white and magenta blend can be great for planted tanks.
If you need a night lunar light that will make your fluorescent fish brilliant, you can consider 445-nanometer royal blue lights. Additionally, there are arrays with various colors of LED lights you can program for your requirements.
11 Best LED Aquarium Lights For Planted Tanks
Planted tanks often need more than just simple lighting. If you want your plants to thrive, and maintain your whole planted tank system, then lighting needs careful consideration.
PAR (Photosynthetic Active Radiation) is an excellent method to measure an LED’s ability to nurture aquatic plants. Cheaper LEDs often have a lower PAR output and thus a weaker capability to boost plants when the depth of your tank rises.
1. Hygger 24/7 Planted Tank LED
Hygger has been listed in the budget aquarium products for a while now and has become to be one of Amazon’s best sellers for aquarium LEDs.
The 24/7 module is comparatively new and provides a built-in timer to easily replicate a gradual change in lighting intensity across the day. This feature is popular in higher-end fixtures with a more expensive price tag, so it’s great to find an LED in this price range have it.
Specifically, with the 24/7 natural mode, you can set Gradient Orange Light (sunrise) between 6 am, and 8 am, Gradient White Light between 8 am and 6 pm, and Gradient Blue Light (moonlight) between 6 pm and 10:30 pm. In other time periods, the lights will be turned off. Moreover, you can flexibly set time, color, and brightness to your liking.
This LED light is waterproof and easy to clean, so you don’t have to worry even if it falls into the water. Plus, you can adjust the extendable mounting brackets in length, then they can fit multiple freshwater tanks both rimmed and rimless.
2. Nicrew Planted Tank LED
The Nicrew planted tank LED is a perfect starting point for someone just taking on planted aquariums with a limited budget. Its aluminum alloy shell is relatively stylish and durable. The full-spectrum array mixes blue, white, red, and green LEDs to be brighter than most lights in its price range.
In spite of the low price tag, this LED aquarium light provides a color spectrum appropriate for most low-tech aquatic plants.
Additionally, adjustable docking mounts make it simple to fit rimless or rimmed aquariums. The item is suggested for use over glass or acrylic canopy-covered tanks.
3. Serene Sun Pro Freshwater Aquarium LED Light
This is another effective LED aquarium light you can consider for your tank. Serene Sun Pro employs smart, high-output LED technology and more than a million shades of HDR color to create eye-catching color rendition evenly over your whole aquascape.
High output LED chips with 90-degree spherical lenses deliver high PAR for healthy plant development while improving the naturally vivid colors in plants and fish species. Besides, there’s an adjustable RGB+W color spectrum with true 660nm RED LEDs, bringing unlimited spectrum and intensity combinations.
What’s more, with the light’s integrated 24-hour timer function, you can also set what time to begin a gradual sunrise, glorious sunset, and both the color spectrum and intensity of your daylight and moonlight.
Furthermore, taller sliding docking legs support fast and simple adjustments for a large range of installations. The Serene Sun LED light is immersive ready, thanks to its ready-made background lighting and binaural audio control.
You can also connect speakers to watch and hear an upcoming thunderstorm or connect a background light for even more color therapy.
4. AquaticLife Freshwater Wireless LED Aquarium Light
The Aquatic Life LED aquarium light features a 3-channel timer, allowing you to control the bright white, mixed color, and moonlight LEDs independently. You can also set more color combinations and lighting which simulate underwater daylight, sunrise/sunset, glimmering blue moonlight.
Moreover, the Aquatic Life LED EDGE enables you to customize the ramp-up and fade between 10 minutes and 2 hours. The LEDs are evenly dispersed at 120 degrees, making sure the full spectrum of light spreads all corners of your aquarium.
Furthermore, an acrylic cover lens protects the lights from accidental water spray and condensation, enhancing the lifetime and durability. Plus, your settings will be saved in case of power failure, thanks to its backup battery.
5. Kessil 160WE Controllable LED Aquarium Light
Kessil A360WE series have two options: the Tuna Sun for freshwater tanks and Tuna Blue for saltwater ones.
These LEDs are not similar to the others above. Kessil designs and produces their own LEDs and has been working in lighting and optics for more than 27 years.
What makes them stand out from the competition is the ability to control the technology from the beginning with a certain purpose.
It is easy to hang the light above your aquarium, or you can utilize the Kessil A-Series Gooseneck to attach it to a rimmed or rimless aquarium. It consists of 45 LEDs that are tightly loading together, offering brilliant color blending.
You will not find specs of green or red light in your aquarium and the natural glimmering effect is unrivaled.
It might be the controllability turning you off. You have two knobs: one controls the intensity and the other handles light spectrum. Nevertheless, if you don’t want to waste time managing every individual spectrum, or you hook it up to your computer to program, this will be the go-to choice.
What’s more, you can have the extra ability to daisy-chain multiple lights, which you can manage from a stand-alone controller.
6. Finnex Planted+ 24-Inch Fully Automated (Freshwater)
What makes this outstanding is it’s a totally automated 24/7 system. Beginning with dawn, it will move to sunrise, followed by high noon, and then transitioning into afternoon, evening, sunset, and starry blue moonlight. It operates in real-time and will repeat itself each day, making it totally hands-free.
The Finnex LED aquarium light lets you customize and save your preferred color mixtures and lighting intensities. The 7000K Daylight LEDs are ideal for aquarium plants to flourish.
Remarkably, you can take control over everything via the remote control. You can choose the options for cloudy/sunny days, thunderstorms, and moonlighting effects.
7. Fluval Aquasky LED Strip Light
Fluval is a dominant manufacturer of high-quality and excellent aquarium equipment, such as fish tanks, filtration units, and lighting fixtures.
With the Aquasky LED, you can customize your lighting rig, pairing super-bright white LEDs with all-essential blue, red, and green tri-colored lights for optimum plant growth. There are also several interesting, gimmicky options that you can play around with, such as cloud cover, fading lunar, lightning, and stormy weather.
It is easy to adjust the sky and color effects via the Skypad infrared remote control. Even though they don’t have any significant effect on the boom of your plants, the 11 pre-made sky effects and a large range of color combination choices allow you to alter the mood in your tank and emphasize the coloration of the various fish species that you keep.
Besides, lensed LEDs offer 1200 light dispersion for incredible aquarium coverage and uniformity of lighting, so you won’t have to worry about dark corners where your plants don’t get sufficient light. In addition, the fixture contains extendable mounting brackets that can be modified to fit a number of aquarium widths from 36 to 48 inches.
8. Current USA Satellite Plus PRO LED Light
This is a decent LED aquarium light coming with a full-color spectrum for dramatic medium-light plant growth in planted tanks, which includes some carpet-cover plant types.
High PAR levels enhance plant growth, and the 32-key customizable infrared remote control unit makes modifications fast and simple. The fixture also includes a 24-hour timer and a neat fade-up, fade-down feature so that your fish will not be startled as the bright light is turned on.
This LED aquarium light is marketed as being totally water-resistant and low-voltage for extra safety. Nevertheless, the fixture might likely attract condensation, so it should be run over a glass top or cover slide to prevent damage to the product.
Even though the light spread is quite good and reaches the entire aquarium, the lights are not bright enough for the more demanding red plants. Having said that, the fixture is perfect for an aquarium to nurture plants and can be set up with various weather patterns, such as clouds and thunderstorms.
9. Fluval Plant 3.0 LED Planted Aquarium Lighting
This high-quality lighting fixture includes customizable features and is a good choice for aquariums up to 21 inches deep, which is generally all 55-gallon to 75-gallon tanks.
This LED aquarium light comes with a variety of preset modes, including one that’s tailored for planted aquariums. Additionally, the lighting fixture is totally customizable. Therefore, if you want to, you can increase the red and white lights and decrease the blue wavelengths to enhance plant thrive. The LED lenses are also created to provide 120 degrees of illumination, so there’s no worry about shadowy corners in your aquarium.
Different from most LED aquarium lights on the market, this has an app that manages the unit’s customization feature. That’s amazing in principle, yet you might face some connectivity issues, which completely take away your control over the aquarium lighting. Moreover, blackouts can make the light stick on blue until you reset it from your phone.
The lighting fixture is lightweight and sleek, with a water-resistance rating of IP67. That shows that splashing and evaporation from aeration units will not affect the LED lights, hence significantly prolonging the product’s life.
10. Finnex Stingray Aquarium LED Light
The Finnex Stingray Aquarium LED light is manufactured for smaller planted tanks from 5 gallons, making it appropriate for a betta tank.
The unit has been specifically designed to address the requirements of low-light plants and to highlight the colors of your fish. The fixture is relatively basic. There are no great customization options, but Finnex is a well-known brand whose products are well evaluated when it comes to their quality and lifespan.
Meanwhile, there are some downsides to this low-tech lighting product. The plastic mounting brackets might seem to be tag flimsy, and the power cord could be a bit more generous. However, in general, the unit proves good value for money, and it excellently provides enough light for your plants to stay healthy.
Finally, if you’re keeping a small betta tank or a beginner planted aquarium with some nano fish, you really should take this option into consideration.
11. BeamsWork DA FSPEC LED Aquarium Light Pent Freshwater
Another LED aquarium light for smaller tanks is the BeamsWork Pent that is suitable for any tank up to 12 inches in height. In this type of setup, the product will meet the requirements of high-light plants.
The lighting fixture is very cheap as you will not get any of the extra novelty features that you do with other manufacturers. There’s no timer, so you have to buy one separately.
That being said, for an item that belongs to the cheaper side of the market, the daylight spectrum does show off the colors of your fish, as well as helping your plants grow healthily and giving an attractive tint to the entire picture.
7 Best LED Aquarium Lights for Reef Tanks
12. Current USA Orbit Marine Pro LED Light
Specially designed for reef tanks, the broad spectrum of high-powered SMD LED chips utilize 8000K/ 12000K ultra-bright white LEDs, with 445nm/460m, actinic blue LEDs.
These provide the light spectrum necessary for saltwater fish species, invertebrates, live rock, and corals. Besides, with 120-degree lenses, they can equally disperse the light across your tank.
Importantly, the Ramp Timer Pro can recreate a realistic 24-hour light cycle. The timer utilizes slow ramp-up and down, which gradually acclimate fish – avoiding light shock.
What’s more, you will get four decent effects and presets, so there’s no complex programming. These include fading lunar, cloud cover, and lightning storms that can easily be controlled via a handy remote.
13. VIPARSPECTRA Timer Control 165W
The VIPARSPECTRA LED aquarium light features an appealing design. The color lights are created in a criss-cross style among the white bulbs. The manufacturer claims that this layout is optimized to help boost the health and development of plants and corals.
The LEDs contain two different channels: one for white and one for blue. This enables you to separately set up each one. In addition, the built-in timer helps you program a different intensity for each channel and the on and off times.
14. EcoTech Radion G5
The EcoTech Radion controllability is par excellence feature in the industry. The Radions LED aquarium lights are powered by a cloud-based command centre called EcoSmart Live that works on a web browser. The software upgrades the lighting system automatically and there are multiple lighting modes.
The Reeflink that is independently available enables you to connect your Radions through your mobile phones and the standard USB functionality that comes along with the unit. Additionally, users can flexibly make changes to the spectrum of lights, the intensity of lights, and the lighting schedule as well.
This LED aquarium light can be mounted with numerous options, such as rail-mounted or rim-mounted. Buyers can also get a diffuser kit separately to decrease PAR and remove hot pots and shadowing.
15. Hipargero LED Aquarium Light
One of the LED aquarium lights for saltwater tanks worth mentioning is from the Hipargero brand. The lighting fixture is created for marine aquariums with a touch of cutting-edge modern technology.
It simulates the ocean with its 3W high-power Cree LEDs, which offer precise proportions of blue and white light. Plus, it consists of two dimmable channels that can be modified between 0 to 100%. That helps replicate the natural conditions that your corals can flourish. Color uniformity and light efficiency are guaranteed by a 3 in 1 90-degree acrylic lens.
Moreover, this LED aquarium light is made from high-quality material. It’s very thin and includes an adjustable bracket to make your installation process effortless. Also, the touch controls are properly designed to fit the slippery situation in a tank.
16. MarsAqua Dimmable LED Aquarium Light
Great lighting for reef aquariums should imitate natural lighting. The MarsAqua LED aquarium light is tailored to produce day and night mode combinations.
This light is truly translucent and offers a transmittance of 25% higher than the standard LED aquarium lights. The light penetration can reach every corner of the tank with depths of up to 1 meter without consuming its luminous energy.
Furthermore, the light uses copper in its cooling system. Cooper’s thermal conductivity is well evaluated compared to other metals. This makes sure that the LED aquarium light does not get overheated and increases the temperature in your tank.
17. Phlizon Aquarium LED Light
The Phlizon LED aquarium light offers multiple spectrum options. It provides various colors of LEDs and you can toggle among red, blue, purple, green, and white lights. Particularly, the blue LED light is good for plants’ defense mechanism, purple light for fish boom, and red and white lights for corals development.
This lighting fixture comes with an adjustable brightness feature that lets you modify the brightness from 0 to 100.
The dimmer is also useful for generating day and night periods for your marine tank. It comes with two different channels and the dimmer knob works for both, so you can program each channel light evenly.
18. Lightimetunnel 165W LED Aquarium Light Full Spectrum
The Lightimetunnel LED aquarium light is equipped with high-quality 45 mil 3W Bridgelux chips that is one of the most powerful LED chips in the market.
These lighting units deliver great penetration to make sure your aquarium inhabitants receive sufficient light. It has a 120-degree dispersion angle so that the light can reach each corner of the tank.
Moreover, the LED light includes two dimmable channels that can be used for setting daytime and nighttime in the aquarium.
Quick Comparison of the Best LED Aquarium Lights
| # | Product Name | Image | Price | Action |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Hygger 24/7 Planted Tank LED |  | $$ | Buy on Amazon! |
| 2 | Nicrew Planted Tank LED |
| $$ | Buy on Amazon! |
| 3 | Current Serene Sun Pro LED |  | $$ | Buy on Amazon! |
| 4 | Aquatic Life LED EDGE (Freshwater) |  | $$ | Buy on Amazon! |
| 5 | Kessil A360WE Controllable LED Light Sun & Tuna (Freshwater) |  | $$ | Buy on Amazon! |
| 6 | Finnex Planted+ 24/7 Fully Automated (Freshwater) |  | $$ | Buy on Amazon! |
| 7 | Fluval Aquasky LED Strip Light |  | $$ | Buy on Amazon! |
| 8 | Current USA Satellite Plus PRO LED Light |
| $$ | Buy on Amazon! |
| 9 | Fluval Plant Spectrum Bluetooth LED 3.0 |  | $$ | Buy on Amazon! |
| 10 | Finnex Stingray Aquarium LED Light |  | $ | Buy on Amazon! |
| 11 | BeamsWork DA FSPEC LED Aquarium Light Pent Freshwater |  | $ | Buy on Amazon! |
| 12 | Current USA Orbit Marine Pro LED Light |  | $$ | Buy on Amazon! |
| 13 | VIPARSPECTRA Timer Control 165W |  | $$ | Buy on Amazon! |
| 14 | EcoTech Radion G5 |  | $$$ | Buy on Amazon! |
| 15 | Hipargero LED Aquarium Light |  | $ | Buy on Amazon! |
| 16 | MarsAqua Dimmable LED Aquarium Light |  | $$ | Buy on Amazon! |
| 17 | Phlizon Aquarium LED Light |  | $ | Buy on Amazon! |
| 18 | Lightimetunnel 165W LED Aquarium Light Full Spectrum |  | $$ | Buy on Amazon! |
Lighting is an integral part of a stunning community aquarium. The proper lighting is substantial to aquatic plant life in your home tank.
Breakthroughs in LED technologies have cut prices and made the LED aquarium lights available for any application. We hope that you can choose the most proper one for your aquarium from the list above.
Which one will be your go-to choice? Could you drop a line in the comment box? We would love to know your selection.
