8 Most Efficient LED High Bay Fixtures
A listing of highly efficacious LED high bays. Ranked by Lumens per Watt.
High efficacy isn't the only factor one should consider when selecting a high bay, but it certainly is a major part of the decision process.
LED technology and fixtures are in a mode of continuous performance improvement. The bar continues to rise on the performance of LED packages, drivers and fixtures. As a result of these perpetual improvements, we decided to crunch some data in a valiant quest to discover the lighting industry's most efficacious LED high bay fixtures.
This was originally supposed to be a Top 11 list. Yet, when we organized the report into two categories loosley intended to mimic 400W metal halide and 1000W metal halide equivalencies, we found that the two lists had three overlapping products...so we arrive at a Top 8 list.
Simply stated, Luminous Efficacy is the ratio of light output and power measured in Lumens per Watt (lm/W).
Efficacy is certainly an important consideration when selecting fixtures of nearly any type. But it should not be the sole consideration. Just like price, aesthetics, installation-ease, quality, warranty, manufacturer reputation and other factors are not typically the sole reason to decide on a fixture, efficacy is simply one measure of many when lighting decision makers evaluate their options. The decision makers determine how much importance and weight to apply to the efficacy factor in comparison to the other important considerations.
It should also be noted that there are often trade-offs to achieving high efficacy. Light distribution, glare, diode image, visual comfort and other factors may be negatively affected in fixtures with ultra-high efficacy. The best manufacturers have found effective ways to maximize efficacy while minimizing the impact of those potentially negative drawbacks. By nature, high bay fixtures are often mounted at 15' - 40' heights, so negative side effects that reduce visual comfort are usually acccepted and tolerated.
All information was pulled from two sources: the U.S. Department of Energy Lighting Facts database and DesignLights Consortium Qualified Products list.
Category 1: 400W metal halide replacements
Over 18,000 lumens
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209 lm/W Orion Energy Systems ISON™
Listed model: HBIF3C1OAUNVFDXX750NLXXXXXXXXXX, 22,610 lumens |
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201 lm/W Lithonia Lighting I-BEAM®
Listed model: IBGN 4' 18000LM HEF GND L/LENS [All Voltages] 50K 70CRI [All Options], 20,554 lumens |
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181 lm/W Metalux HB LED5
Listed model: HBLED-LD5-18HE-W-[All Voltage]-L850-[Driver Includes CD and 5LTD]2-[All Emergency Options]-[Blank or MP]-[Blank MS & SVPD3]-[All Packaging], 21,056 lumens |
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171 lm/W GE Albeo™ LED Luminaire – ABV2
Listed model: ABV2(5D)2T471NXXXXXW, 18,300 lumens |
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164 Lm/W Energy Solutions International (ESI) DT Series
Listed model: F-24DT-P6LL-50, 19,464 lumens |
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162 Lm/W Industrial Light Products (ILP) PHB Series
Listed model: PHB-168WLED-UNIV-50-XXXXX (Excluded SD480**), 27,730 lumens |
Category 2: Ultra-high lumen output
Greater than 40,000 lumens
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198 lm/W Lithonia Lighting I-BEAM®
Listed model: IBGN 4' 36000LM HEF GND L/LENS [All Voltages] 50K 70CRI [All Options] 40,368 lumens |
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171 lm/W Orion Energy Systems ISON™
Listed model: HBIF2G1OAUNVFDXX850XXXXXXXXXX, 41,292 lumens |
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164 Lm/W Industrial Light Products (ILP) PHB Series
Listed model: PHB-336WLED-UNIV-50-XXXXX (Excluded SD480**), 55,505 lumens |
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162 Lm/W Visionaire Lighting Bow High Bay
Listed model: BHB-6-T1-192LC-5-5K-[UNV 5 8]-PMXX-XX-DIM-[MS or blank] Lumens: 50,944 |
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152 Lm/W Flextronics Essentials Series
Listed model: ES3P-UL-6M-50-WIDE-CA-HV Lumens: 40,140 |
Related Report:
Methodology
There is probably over a dozen different satisfying ways that we could have sliced and diced the data to come up with this list. We chose to keep the list relatively short and decided upon the following methods that we believe provide a useful snapshot for lighting professionals. Since all of the source information is publicly available for download, interested parties who want to do research beyond our list, can do so by visiting the DOE and DLC websites.
Source:
Information was downloaded on March 9, 2017 from the U.S. Department of Energy Lighting Facts database and the DesignLights Consortium Qualified Products List. If you have issues with the specifications that we cite on inside.lighting, please know that we pulled the data directly from the DLC and DOE websites.
Information was gathered using the Reported Efficacy and Reported CCT of each fixture. Initially, we wanted to report only on fixtures that were actually tested by the DOE and DLC, but doing so eliminated a large quantity of highly efficient fixtures from many reputable manufacturers.
It's quite possible that fixtures that are not listed with the DLC or Lighting Facts outperform the fixtures above. These two sources cast the largest net over the LED high bay category.
Fixtures:
- Fixtures are full, complete LED high bays; not retrofit kits.
- The fixtures must also be commercially available. (i.e. If a fixture was not cited on the manufacturer's website, we would exclude it.)
Color Rendering Index:
All fixtures must be greater than 70 CRI.
Manufacturers:
Since inside.lighting primarily serves lighting professionals in the U.S. and Canada, we thought it would be prudent to list manufacturers that meet at least one of the following criteria:
- Manufacturer has a U.S. or Canadian office.
- Manufacturer's website cites U.S. or Canadian lighting agent partners
- Manufacturer's website cites U.S. or Canadian distributors or dealers.
- A Google search for the manufacturer name and "representative" returns results with North American agents that represent the product.
- A Google search for the manufacturer name and "distributor" returns results with North American electrical distributors that sell the product.
Undoubtedly there are high-performing products from off-shore companies that do not meet this eleigble manufacturer criteria. North American OEMs likely sell them under different brand names.