A plain LED already delivers the big efficiency win. Smart lighting adds control on top of it — and control is worth money only in the rooms where lights get left on, or where dimming happens often.
What smart lighting adds
Schedules and away modes stop lights burning through the night. Dimming to 50 percent roughly halves draw. Occupancy automation catches the hallway light nobody switched off.
There is also a non-energy case: security lighting patterns while you travel, waking to a gradual sunrise, and turning everything off from one button at bedtime.
The honest cost side
A smart bulb typically costs several times a plain LED. Each one also draws a small standby load — commonly 0.3 to 0.5 watts — to stay connected, which runs 24 hours a day.
Across ten bulbs, half a watt of standby each is about 44 kWh a year. At $0.17/kWh that is roughly $7.50 annually, which the automation needs to beat before the upgrade is energy-positive.
Where it pays off
Concentrate smart bulbs where behaviour, not efficiency, is the problem.
- Rooms where lights are routinely left on for hours
- Outdoor and porch lighting that should follow sunset and sunrise
- Kids' rooms and hallways with no reliable switch discipline
- Living spaces where you would genuinely dim most evenings
Where a plain LED is the better buy
Closets, garages, basements and any fixture you switch deliberately and briefly. A $3 LED there beats a $15 smart bulb every time.
A useful middle ground is a smart switch on a circuit of plain LEDs: one device, one standby draw, whole-room control.
FAQ
- Do smart bulbs use electricity when off?
- Yes, a small standby amount to stay on the network — typically 0.3 to 0.5 watts per bulb. It is minor per bulb but worth counting across a whole house.
- Smart bulbs or smart switches?
- Use smart bulbs where you want per-bulb color and dimming. Use a smart switch when you simply want reliable whole-room control over existing LEDs.
Keep reading
Free guide
10 Key Tips to Lower Your Electric Bill
A short, practical PDF you can work through in a weekend. No fluff, no hype — just the changes that move a real electric bill.
- The 3 changes that cut the most kWh first
- A room-by-room LED swap checklist
- How to read your bill and spot the expensive habits
- Where phantom loads hide — and how to measure them
