The number of lights you are planning looks good to me. Make sure you have plenty in the kitchen too. The only room I'm not sure about is the dining room. I would usually have a larger chandelier to might up the entire space and don't think recessed lights are necessary.

Also make sure your own lays out the locations of the recessed lights, and verify in person that it's where you want them before they drywall.

Your plan, now owns....

*not owns

NO NO NO to 6 inch anything!!!!!!! they look like a flying saucer and dated beyond all reason. Four inches is the absolute max, and three inch is better, with temperature adjustment included.

The number is nothing without the PLACEMENT FOR the lights, which you are not showing. So......this is the el cheapo hack job and you need an electrician not the contractor.

Your framing plan should be blown up to full 1/4 inch scale, you should be shown the placement and number of recessed lights to include any SURFACE mount such as in the dining room, or very secondary bedrooms. ......or a pendant over the peninsula.

Your bath needs to consider the vanities, and fans, and any surface on wall. You need to consider what your furniture arrangement is in the family room, and the living room. when that is all on paper? You do a walk through with the electrician

In short, before you pay a lot of money? Get the PLAN. On paper.

NO NO NO 6 INCH

Not all lighting should come from the ceiling. You will have table lamps, standing lamps, you may want some under cabinet lighting in the kitchen.

Get a real electrician to the site

You want to pay attention the Kelvin, Lumens and CRI numbers of the lights you are considering. I would also go with the 4" size ... just make sure they put out enough Lumens. Use dimmers for all the lights.

You do not want those wafer ones. You will see the glare from each light from everywhere. You want the recessed lights where the light source is recessed into the can, so you don't see the light source from across the room.

I don't think you need recessed lighting in your dining room or bedrooms. A dining room just needs a chandelier. My dining room is 11 X 15 and a six light chandelier is plenty of light. It's on a dimmer and rarely turned up to full brightness. Bedrooms are better lit with beside table lamps. It's not a bad idea to have a central fixture. These are probably used more often in children's rooms. Have you thought about your furniture placement? Add your furniture layout to a drawing and show where they intend to put the recessed lighting. You're telling us about the number of lights, but nothing about the placement, so it's impossible to have an opinion. Is this a new build where the builder has budgeted for a particular number of fixtures or are you trying to update an existing build? If this is an update, be more strategic about how you spend your money. Put lights in closets and put everything else on a dimmer switch. Reduce the number of recessed fixtures and buy lamps. Light at eye level is more useful. You don't need to light your home like it's office space.

As mentioned above, don't use 6" diameter lights or wafers. Better choice:

Halo RL 4" baffle: https://www.homedepot.com/p/306659330

The location of fixtures placed by electricians is guaranteed to be in a 4- or 6-die pattern regardless of anything about the room. That works well in gymnasiums, but here those locations will probably light up only 1 pillow on a bed, a dead skinny corner next to a dresser, the floor instead of the surface of a dining table, or your foot on an ottoman. It's like reproducing a Monet painting with primary color by numbers for your kindergartner. For a good learning experience visit LanguageofLight(dot)blog for placement and layering.

For your 3 choices of product questions:

- the $13 is a fixed light with a single set color temperature

- the $21 is a fixed light with 5 choices of color temperature switched on the fixture

- the $39 is a gimbal (rotate aim) light with 5 choices of color temperature switched on the fixture

Hello all,

Thank you for the great advice and comments. I really learned a lot.

Background:

We're first time home-buyer (clueless) moving into a townhouse next month. We're planning some upgrades. We wanted to fix/add things before we move in, as we have little ones. We're under somewhat tight budgets, so we were just considering wafer recessed for the low cost (both labor and part)

More I research after reading your comments, I understand many new things.

Here's my tentative plans:

1. Plan the exact layout of lighting with the electricians before starting the work.

2. For dining room, one bright chandelier is sufficient.

3. For smaller bedrooms 2/3, I'm considering centered light fixture (either just light or fan/light).

4. Use 4 inch LED recessed with can. But we may not have enough budget for now though.

5. For all new lights, install dimmer switches. I'm considering this one (https://a.co/d/8KiMzPV)

Some additional questions:

1. If we were to add 4" LED, will the numbers of lighting be sufficient in LR (6), FR (4), and master bedrooms (4)?

2. What'd be the best budget friendly site/place to shop for LED recessed and other light fixtures? We only know homedepot, Lowes, and Wayfair.

3. Is there any wafer LED recessed (or brand) that has reduced glare?

4. Yes; I thought we could divide the room by # of lights and evenly place them, but I see it's not as simple.

5. The bed 2/3 closets are quite small. Would battery-motion censored light be an okay option?

Again, thank you all for the help!

Hi Chispa,
Thanks for your comments. We (being in our 30s) have been wanting bright rooms with lots of lights. I also agree with having lights in rooms but we're confused now.

Do you recommend any particular LED recessed lights from particular brand or model? We thought wafle provides what we need for the budget, but I see the huge against it due to glare.

Yet online or YouTube search still shows people using 6" wafer type quite often.

Here's a thought . . . do you really need ceiling lights in every room? I am not a fan of recessed lights in living and dining rooms unless they are used to highlight art. I want those rooms to feel more intimate and relaxing and to foster conversation. IMO overhead lighting does just the opposite. I much prefer lamps in living rooms and a chandelier in dining areas. Recessed lights are great in areas where you need to see what you're doing -- kitchens, bathrooms, hallways and (sometimes) bedrooms. Consider using the money you save on installing lights in your living and dining rooms on some very cool light fixtures instead. P.S. If you decide to disregard my unpopular advice, PUT DIMMERS ON ALL OF YOUR FIXTURES. Good luck with your new home.

Pay. For an independent electrician to consult. Being "in your thirties", has nothing to do with lighting, it just means you are young and in your thirties and would prefer not live in a dark cave.. You'd need more light in your nineties!

There are three types of light"

Ambient..... A recessed. A surface mount in the ceiling

Task..... The lamp on your desk. A wall mount swing arm next to your bed. Can also be decorative and surface, and task such as pendants over an Island.

Accent.... A sconce in a stairwell. A light over a great piece of art....

The best result comes form using a combination, and they are not ALL installed In the ceiling. You want to know what will turn on what, ( switching ) You want to know you can plug in a table lamp and where. Do you want a phone charger? Where?

It all involves electricity. The what , where, what type , how much.

You don't just install two dozen 6" flying saucers in speed mode, and call it done. It's a lot easier when walls are open....where is the TV going to be located, will there be cable or not?

Plan it all.

I highly recommend adding recessed lights in all bedrooms. You can't have too much light and as chispa stated, it's really important to be able to have it bright enough to see well and task.

In our bedrooms, we did four recessed lights in each bedroom with a ceiling fan and light combo in the center of each room. The four recessed lights light up entire bedrooms and there aren't dim areas if you use a wide spread bulb or fixture. This works well for smaller rooms as well as larger (16x18). If we want it bright, we turn on the recessed lights. If we don't want it that bright, we can use the ceiling fan light, or use the recessed lights on a dimmer. There's no way table lamps on night stands can come anywhere close to the amount of lighting we're able to get with the recessed lights in the ceiling. I'll also go against the grain here and say that I am fine with having recessed cans with BR30 bulbs in them. I prefer to be able to change out the LED bulbs, rather than replace the entire fixture with integrated LEDs.

@T T: "I am fine with having recessed cans with BR30 bulbs in them"

There is nothing makes a ceiling look like it was constructed in the 1970's than recessed lights with fat, BR30 "bulged reflector" bulbs. (OK, popcorn ceilings are worse.) If you want to use recessed lights with replaceable bulbs, use 4" housings, trims, and PAR20 bulbs.

@wdccruise I have to say that I have never looked up at the ceiling and noticed the recessed lighting details in any home I've been in. The deep recessed can has the BR30 bulb sitting up in the ceiling recessed and doesn't stick out. In some ways it is less noticeable than the integrated LEDs that we also have that sit flush with the ceiling surface. I know I'm the minority opinion here but I suspect this is a detail that most people wouldn't notice or think twice about.

On the side topic of ceilings, I agree everyone would notice popcorn ceilings. But another detail that I would say most people wouldn't notice is a textured versus smooth ceiling. We've had both and like the smooth better, but I can't say that I can ever recall what anyone else's ceiling texture was.

@T T: "I have never looked up at the ceiling and noticed the recessed lighting details in any home I've been in."

If you don't install 6" fixtures with BR30 bulbs, you'll be able to look up and not think, "Am I in a diner?"

"we're confused now."

The lighting in your house should be designed for the level of the house and your personal level of design.

Wafer recessed lights are very popular, being "modern technology," cheap, readily obtainable at the big box store or online, and easy to install without much complication. For many people, these attributes are more than satisfactory to purchase them and make YouTube videos promoting them.

If you browse this forum, there are quite a few professionals and homeowners of high-end houses or have focused on design as a hobby. So when asking about a design issue, responses are typically going to be a step or three beyond what the general population considers satisfactory.

It's the same with most anything: an Army mess hall cook asking a chef if salt and pepper is all you need; a 16 year old needing new tires asking a race car driver what sticks to pavement best; etc. The answer is anywhere on the spectrum is fine, but it doesn't hurt to broaden knowledge and decide for yourself what to do.

FWIW electricians prefer 6" recessed lights because they can install less of them ("brighter", larger throw), and wafers because they don't have to worry too much about where they go. The equation they are solving for is just allowing you to see in a room at night, nothing more.