Author Topic: How many bulbs do you go through in a year?  (Read 916 times)
beatoven
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How many bulbs do you go through in a year? « on: December 28, 2025, 04:38:42 AM » Author: beatoven
In my case, I average between 40-50 of them. As would be expected, the bulk are in areas that see heavy use (kitchen, living room, etc.) with several lights going through a half dozen in a year. Virtually everything is incandescent, and with some lights on 15+ hours a day, the number of replacements seems reasonable. I've tracked bulb life by fixture, brand, and estimated usage over the last five years, and have found that I can predict with surprising accuracy when and where a failure will occur.

Does anyone else here track this sort of thing, or am I just a nerd?
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Laurens
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Re: How many bulbs do you go through in a year? « Reply #1 on: December 28, 2025, 06:37:54 AM » Author: Laurens
Zero, as of yet i haven't had a failure in my new house where i've been living for one year now. But everything except for 1 is LED or fluorescent.
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rapidstart_12
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Re: How many bulbs do you go through in a year? « Reply #2 on: December 28, 2025, 07:31:05 AM » Author: rapidstart_12
Probably less than 10 a year. We have a healthy mix of incandescent and fluorescent (and a few LED items that were installed back when I liked LED that, for the record, seem to be lasting OK). The incandescent stuff all seems to last a very long time, though I think most of the bulbs are considered long-life bulbs. Most of the incandescent lights are also ones that that my parents and I just don’t turn on that often. I have kept most of the lights that are frequently used CFL or fluorescent.

I would like to mention the kitchen light because it is used every day for multiple hours and takes 120V halogen MR16 bulbs. I have had extremely good luck with the GE-branded ones that Lowe’s sells, they are rated for 2,000 hours but I have found that they last a lot longer than that.There are a couple that have been installed since April 2023 and are still working to this day, after at least 4,000 hours of use!
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Roi_hartmann
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Re: How many bulbs do you go through in a year? « Reply #3 on: December 28, 2025, 03:31:27 PM » Author: Roi_hartmann
I would say maybe 1-4 per year. I mostly use fluorescent, low voltage halogens and some LEDs. I try to use light sources the way intended so for an example fluorescent lamps in places where they will do long hours in single switch on while LED in locations where switching on and off happens more frequently.
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xmaslightguy
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Re: How many bulbs do you go through in a year? « Reply #4 on: December 28, 2025, 04:08:04 PM » Author: xmaslightguy
I have never kept count .lol.
But can say its usually multiple linear fluorescents - as I use them for both my fishtanks & houseplants(so daily 8-10 hours use), plus parts of the house are fluorescent.
Plus multiple standard screw-in incandescent and/or CFL lamps.
Then if you add Christmas lights during holiday season, there's always a number of little bulbs - both LED and incandescent.

Oh and seems its not uncommon to replace a ballast or 2 a year as well.
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Ash
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Re: How many bulbs do you go through in a year? « Reply #5 on: December 28, 2025, 04:49:39 PM » Author: Ash
One 36W T8 tube that lasted ~10 years, some days whole day on till the night, some days not used at all, probably somewhere around 20..25K hours in all - Osram Energy Saver L36W/765 made in China ~2014

One 8W LED filament lamp that lasted a month of D2D in my use, it was found with a fitting and have done unknown number of hours before - Eurolux 8W/2200K A60 made in China ~2020s
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fluorescent lover 40
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Re: How many bulbs do you go through in a year? « Reply #6 on: December 28, 2025, 09:45:13 PM » Author: fluorescent lover 40
Anywhere from one to three

My house is mostly LED, though I do have a few fluorescents (CFL and linear) and incandescents in use. The fluorescents are in medium/long use and incandescents in short use places.
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Alex
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Re: How many bulbs do you go through in a year? « Reply #7 on: December 29, 2025, 02:40:11 AM » Author: Alex
one in three years. When you buy high quality led, then you invest one and its quiet for quite some time...
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bulb_tester2009
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Re: How many bulbs do you go through in a year? « Reply #8 on: March 05, 2026, 02:05:15 AM » Author: bulb_tester2009
Over the past two years, we have replaced 4 EOL bulbs. All four bulbs are LED bulbs, but there is a significant difference in their lifespan. The bulb with the longest lifespan was installed in early 2017 and worked normally until the beginning of last year. Calculated based on a daily usage of 4 hours, it has used for approximately 12,000 hours before EOL, exceeding the nominal lifespan of 10,000 hours. The bulb with the shortest lifespan is a Philips CRI 90 10W bulb manufactured by Signify. It was installed in March 2025 and was used for five hours every day. It EOLed in October of the same year and only worked for about 1,000 hours, which is the worst bulb I've ever used (Even worse than any of the CFLs and Incandescent lamps used in my home). After that, I replaced both of the mentioned bulbs with the same Philips CRI 90 bulbs. However, after only three months, the color of the light from these two bulbs became visibly different. This is sufficient evidence that the Philips bulbs currently sold in China have very poor quality. I will no longer purchase any Philips LED bulbs for installation in my home in the future. Fortunately, there were no EOL fluorescent lamps in my home in the past two years. Most of them will be replaced with LED modules customized by me this year, and the removed tubes and ballasts will add to my personal collection.
« Last Edit: March 05, 2026, 02:08:48 AM by bulb_tester2009 » Logged

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