How Many Lights Do I Need In My Office?

Office lighting has a direct connection with productivity, energy level, and mood. Too many lights can make the employees tired and worn out and strain their eyes. Too much-dimmed light can also decrease their productivity and harm their eyesight in the long run.

How many lights you need in your home office depends on the size of the room and how you are using it. For a medium-sized 100 square ft room, you need 2000 lumens or 25 LED watts to mediumly light your office, 5 bulbs with every 500 lumens can do that easily for you (For scale we are using 100 square ft). For bigger rooms, you can calculate it by adding or dividing the 100 square ft result.

How many lights you need in your office depends on various factors. It also depends on your taste, budget, and the illumination intensity you want. Remember too much anything is bad, and it is crucially true for office lighting.

In this article, we will answer how many lights do you need for your office and the very basics of choosing lights for your office. We will also show you a detailed guide on how you can make your office lighting better and some amazing tips on it.

So, stay with us, and let’s get started.

How Bright Should My Office Lights Be?

This question arises whenever you are thinking about lighting your office. So, what is the ideal lighting? Are there any standards you may even ask. The answer is that you are the standard. You get to decide and choose the standard for this.

If the lighting of the office is not tolerable it can harm the efficiency of the employees deeply. The ideal brightness of an office would be that lets you work peacefully without making you tired and straining your eyes.

Too dimmed light can make you sleepy, irritable, or even ill-tempered. Too bright light can make you tired, a burning sensation in your skin, straining eyes, or even trigger a migraine. Too many lights can even ruin the interior and it will make the office space look ugly.

So, office lighting should be medium bright and comfortable. Not too dim, not too bright and disciplined, stylish but that kind of light that will let you work without any hassle.

How Many Lumens For Home Office Lighting

Lumen is the measurement unit used by scientists to measure the light coming out from any source. It is also known as the output of any light source. For example, a normal 100-watt bulb makes approximately 1500-1700 lumens.

Meanwhile, a watt is used for the energy consumption of any light. Watt numbers mean, the light will consume that much energy such as 100 watts, or 50 watts for an hour to work.

Lumen requirement varies depending on the illumination intensity. But for ideal home offices, you have to determine it for bright illumination. Medium-sized offices need 5000-6000 lumens to brightly light them.

So, 5000-6000 lumens can easily help you light the room comfortably.

How Do You Calculate Office Lighting Requirements?

Office lighting is easy once you know and understand the basics. Here is how you calculate office lighting requirements.

Determine the total area of the room. For doing that, just simply multiply the length and width of the room together.
Find out the footcandle requirement of your needs.
Now, multiply the room square ft by the footcandle number (offices require 20-75 footcandles).

Let’s look at this table to determine how many lumens and bulbs you need for your office lighting.

Room size	Lumen	Bulbs
100 sq ft	2000	4 bulbs producing 500 lumens
150 sq ft	3000	5 bulbs producing 600 lumens
200 sq ft	4000	5 bulbs producing 800 lumens
250 sq ft	5000	5 bulbs producing 1000 lumen

So, this is how you can easily calculate how many lights you need in your office. A lot of the time you don’t even need to calculate it, you just have to understand how many lumens you need and then you can just divide the lumens into bulbs according to your needs. One thing you should consider is decoration and interior. Don’t install unnecessary bulbs, this will ruin the outlook of your office.

How Many LED Lights Do I Need In Office?

Light emitting diodes or LED lights are energy efficient and durable. They consume less energy and emit more light. These features make them ideal for office use. Less energy consumption means you can save some extra bucks on electricity bills.

LED bulbs come in different watts and lumens. You can easily find them on market. You can install 5 LED lights consisting of 1000 lumens in your office. Or you can even add smaller watt LED lights for decoration purposes.

LEDs are a great option for offices. They are durable, and energy sufficient plus they have a variety of options to choose from which makes them more customizable. Even, 500 lumens 10 bulbs will give you 5000 lumens, and this will also add some interior values and optical illusions. So, how many LED lights you need depends on your choice and taste.

How Do You Calculate How Many LED Lights Do I Need?

Calculating how many LED lights you need is just the same as we have mentioned before. Normal 100 sq ft office rooms require 2000 lumen, and you can use this to measure your whole office easily, no need to do hard math.

If your office area is 250 square ft and needs 20 footcandle light to brighten it, then it will require 5000 lumens. Now, if you know how many lumens you need, it becomes easier to calculate how many lights you need.

You can simply divide the 5000 lumens into how many lights you need. For example, you can buy 5 LED lights with 1000 lumens each, and installing them in different positions will do your work. And if you think you need more depth then you can make a panel of LED lights.

Or even you can divide that 5000 lumens into smaller parts. You can add 3000 lumen or 5 LED lights with 600 lumens on one side of your room and add the rest 2000 lumen or 5 LED lights with 400 lumens on the other.

Dividing or dispersing light is helpful for your health, you don’t want bright light to come to your eyes and harm them. It also adds interior value to your office, which can help you attract more clients, and it also ensures the productivity and comfort of the employees.

Is Soft White Or Daylight Better For Office?

The answer is daylight bulbs. They are great for mimicking natural light and they also help energize the employees. They increase the overall productivity of your office space.

First, you need to know how the lights affect us. Lights help us stay motivated, active, and conscience. They will help you visualize more by increasing your productivity.

Daylight bulbs are ranged from 5000k-6000k. They mimic natural light perfectly. Soft white lights on the other hand can make you feel dull and tired. If you want to use soft white in your office, then you can mix them with daylight bulbs.

Daylight bulbs are productivity boosters, they are great for keeping us awake and active. Installing daylight bulbs will increase the productivity of the office and it also brightly lights your home office space.

Things To Keep In Mind

There are several things to keep in mind for selecting lights in your office. Some of them are down below.

1. Bulb Type

There are several types of bulbs on the market. You need to keep your health and productivity in mind to choose the bulb type for your office.

2. Color Temperature

Color temperature is a crucial factor because health and productivity are deeply related to it. Too bright or too dull a color temperature can trigger migraine and make your employees sleepy.

3. Brightness

Too bright light seems good in reality it is harmful to the human body. Imagine standing in front of the sun. Too bright light can give you a burning sensation on your skin. Too dim light can also make you dull and sleepy. Choose something in between them.

4. Costing

Not all the bulbs in the market are energy sufficient and cheap. Your overall lighting depends on the cost, so spend wisely on wise things that are offering you comfort for a value for money.

5. Decoration

Choose your decorations wisely. Do not let heavy decoration or furniture block your light. Take a minimalist approach to choosing decoration.

Tips For Arranging Lights And Light Scheme

You might just want to buy some lights and install them and be done with it. but trust me, the underlying relation of lights with interior design is deep. An undisciplined arrangement of lights can ruin your image or even ruin the output of your hard work.

You might have heard about the lighting scheme, to help you arrange your office lighting and bulbs today we are going to follow this method. Want to learn more about that? Keep reading.

Light scheme: Light scheme is the percentage of light falling from upwards and downwards from the sources. Meaning the light coming out from the bulbs or the sources installed. There are 5 types of the lighting scheme.

Direct
Indirect
Semi-indirect
Diffused

Direct Light Scheme:

In this method, 90-100% of light emits from the light source with the help of deflectors. It is the most common type of lighting scheme that is used everywhere. It is mostly used for industrial and outdoor purposes.

Semi-Direct Light Scheme

With the help of semi-direct reflectors, 60-90% of lumen emits from the light source. It is mostly used in rooms with high ceilings and where the uniform distribution of light is required. Mostly used in working place.

Indirect Light Scheme

This is the reverted process of the direct light scheme. In this, the light is thrown upward to the ceiling to get 90% diffused reflection. Mostly used for decoration purposes to create an optical illusion and in cinemas, hotels, etc.

Semi-indirect Light scheme

Here 60-90% of light is thrown upward with the help of defused reflector to get this light scheme. The remaining lights reach the working surface without getting absorbed. Mostly used for decoration purposes

Diffused Light Scheme

Here most of the light is diffused around the subjects. It is done by using lighting fixtures. It is used where uniform illumination is required.

Tips For Arranging Light Bulbs

Light bulb arrangement is important hence dispersed use of light bulbs can make everything look ugly and indisciplined. Here is how you can arrange them.

Use a direct light scheme for the working space where the most important tasks will be done. Use 5-6 bulbs with 1000 lumen, and install them uniformly to get the best result. Also, the uniform installation will make them look good.
You can also use a semi-direct light scheme with 4-5 bulbs and install them at the corners to get the best results. Desk lamps with lids are also semi-direct, use them for interior design and light effects.
Use an indirect light scheme with 3-4 bulbs in the resting area or reception where guests are welcomed, you can also use it in the conference room just in a corner for decoration purposes to handle new clients.
You can use a simple diffused light scheme on the walls to give them more depth and interior value.

Wrapping up

Choosing how many lights you need can be a hassle if you don’t know how to do them right. In this article, we tried to answer all the questions that come along with how many lights you need for your office.

How many lights you need depends on your need and choice. Plus take caution about decoration. Everything is interrelated. But comfort should be your top priority. Choose lights that are durable and energy efficient. Hope you found this article helpful.

So, let the actual work begin now.