I am wound a little tight, so when I moved into my last home (just under 3 years ago) and had to replace all of the light bulbs I researched and tested multiple brands before deciding on the brand that I would use.

The two that had excellent reviews, the best daylight color (IMO), high CRI (color rendering indes) and low EMI (electromagnetic interference) were Cree and Feit. Cree won over Feit on dimmability. Fiet did not do as well when dimmed low - had some flickering. Cree was solid.

Things are changing fast in the world of LED lighting, but Cree has been forefront of many of the improvements and are a solid company.

The daylight bulb is the one I chose for my home. The Cree and Fiet daylight bulbs both had a clean white color without turning blue or yellow. Even though most brands list 5000K on the box, when measured the range from the mid 4000s to mid 5000s and they use different materials for the glass and the transmission of light, so each brand renders light a bit differently.

I have been very happy with the Cree bulbs.

5000 is good for areas like utility areas, craft/hobby rooms, offices, kids’ play rooms, garages, maybe kitchens, but it is pretty blue (cool) for general, whole-house lighting. For that, I’d recommend staying at 4000 and below. But to be on the safe side, the best thing to do would be to buy a few lamps (bulbs) of varying temperatures and try them out in the spaces where’ll they’ll be used.

Great! Thank you!! I am going to stick with Cree @Jennifer Hogan and 4000 @Sammy

I'm not seeing exactly what I want on the home depot website but I will know what to get when I got to the store this weekend. This was very helpful!

Sammy is kind of right. I think decor really matters when selecting lighting k values.

My one sister has antique furniture and fall colors in her Tudor style home. Daylight bulbs were too bright and too stark for her decor. She used the 2700 k equivalent bulbs. When measured the k value was actually closer to 3000 k. She has some antique fixtures which required the amber Edison bulbs which measured 2200 k.

My other sister has white walls, tan furniture, contemporary style and she and I both use the daylight bulbs. She could actually use either with her decor, but prefers the whiter light. It reduces eye fatigue.

My colors do not work with yellow light. I have taupe neutrals with a slight purple undertone. Yellow lighting makes it look dirty. My style is MCM / Scandinavian.

There really isn't a lot of choice between the 2 except with fixtures with permanent bulbs. Most light fixtures with permanent bulbs are around 3500 k. I think this was a compromise that was done for economy of purpose. They didn't want to sell the same fixture with multiple lighting choices, so they compromised between the two major choices. Then they went about training decorators and lighting people that you want something 4000 k or lower for that perfect balance.

I looked at some, but was not sold on replacing the entire fixture if the bulb burned out. I did see one that I was tempted to purchase for over my dining room table, but couldn't get a higher k value and didn't want to have two different color lights. Some people may not mind, but I am rather fussy about my lighting.

The bulbs sold commercially as "Daylight" really range in color and are not a true 5000 K. The Cree daylight actually measured closer to 4500 k.

They do now sell some smart bulbs where you can select your k value, but I have no idea how well they perform or how close they are to actual k values.

To know the actual k values of the bulbs you really need to use a light meter. To be perfectly accurate you should probably use one made specifically for LED bulbs - mine is old, but from my understanding it is the lumens measurement that is not accurate when measuring LED lights. I have not read anywhere that it impacts the k value.

I usually always suggest 4000K bulbs they are like natural bright daylight 5000K is too blue and best left for industrial applications. I find most people get bogged down with too mivh info that really is not needed. IMO there is no decor that does not benefit from natural daylight instaed of the yellow tones of old incandescent bulbs it does however take some time to get used to that different lighting. We had all halogens for years and we swithced them all to 4000K LEDs the MR16 and the GU10 no ton of info needed find the 4000K replacements and put them in.