Ultimate load-shedding lightbulb battle — with one clear winner

MyBroadband tested several load-shedding lightbulbs in South Africa to see which offered the best battery life and brightness.

Rechargeable lightbulbs provide a cost-effective way to have light around the house during power outages without using a larger backup system.

The bulbs feature the same fittings as regular lightbulbs — including screw-in and bayonet-style — but are fitted with small batteries for backup power.

These can support their light-emitting diodes (LEDs) for a limited period — often enough to last two hours of load-shedding.

The bulbs’ batteries are charged whenever they are switched on, and electricity is available.

As is evident from the reviews of these bulbs on online shops like Takealot, user experiences can vary significantly from one product to the next — with some praising their usefulness and others bemoaning battery life below the claimed performance.

We performed comprehensive tests on the battery life, charging times, and brightness of seven load-shedding bulbs available on the South African market to see which were the best options.

To gauge battery life, we ran two sets of tests that continuously measured the brightness of the bulbs over time. We used the longest consistently achievable results to ensure accuracy.

First, we only charged each bulb for two hours after their batteries had run empty to see how long they would last with only a short charge equal to the typical duration of a single load-shedding slot.

For the second battery life test, we charged each bulb overnight for a minimum of 14 hours.

The bulb with the longest battery life across both tests was the Magneto Rechargeable 7W LED with a 2,000mAh battery.

The Magneto brand was created by South African home goods company Vevo and has become well-known in the country for its portable rechargeable lanterns.

After the two-hour charge, it remained lit for two hours and 25 minutes. With the overnight charge, it achieved an impressive six hours and 51 minutes of on-time.

The latter correlated with Magneto’s claim of over six hours of battery life.

In both tests, the Magneto bulb’s battery life was more than double that of all the other bulbs we tested.

Aside from the Magneto bulb, three of the remaining bulbs could provide light over their claimed battery life as long as they had been charged overnight.

These were the bulbs from Philips, LEDvance, and Eurolux. The Litemate, Lumaglo, and Teempeest did not perform as advertised.

The Litemate fell 33 minutes short of its claimed three hours of battery life on a full charge, while the Lumaglo was close — missing the two-hour mark by three minutes.

The poorest-performing bulb was also the cheapest — a Teempeest 9W bulb bought from a local shop specialising in low-cost imports for R65.

It came nowhere near its claimed battery life of four hours, with only one hour and six minutes of on-time after an overnight charge.

The brightness of the Teempeest was also substantially lower than advertised — at 550 lumens compared to a claimed 810.

Although the Eurolux bulb had a poor battery life, its charging rate over two hours was the fastest overall.

The Philips was the most expensive of the bunch, but it is important to note that the prices can vary greatly depending on the shop of choice and timing of your purchase.

The chart below compares how long the batteries of each bulb lasted after a two-hour and overnight charge and how that stacked up to their claimed battery life.

We also compared the brightness of the bulbs when using electricity and on battery backup.

The brightness was measured in lux and converted to lumen, assuming a hemisphere of light, normalised to an average claimed brightness to account for testing error.

It is important to emphasise that brightness does not scale linearly.

Therefore, a 200-lumen bulb would not be twice as bright as a 100-lumen bulb. The difference could be observed, but not with a quick glance.

Generally, we found that anywhere between 100–200 lumens would be perfectly suited for most people to light up a dark room.

The Magneto’s strong performance could be partially attributed to its lower 125 lumens brightness when using its backup battery.

This was the same as the cheap Teempeest bulb, although the Magneto could carry on this brightness for six times longer.

The bulb with the highest brightness on backup power was the LEDvance, which put out 250 lumens when running off its battery.

Despite its higher brightness, it achieved its advertised battery life on a full charge.

The Lumaglo had the second-highest brightness of 225 lumens, followed by the Philips with 200 lumens.

The Eurolux and Litemate were the in-betweeners, with respective brightnesses of 175 and 150 lumens.

The graph below shows the differences in brightness of the tested bulbs when powered by electricity and battery backup.

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