Why Are My LED Lights Not Bright? Personal Experience + Fixing Guide

Switching to LED lights can revolutionize your home lighting setup, making it much more energy efficient.

But if you don’t make the right choices, you might find that your new LED bulb isn’t as bright as you were expecting, or you might find your LED light suddenly dim, when you were expecting a dazzling effect.

LED bulbs can lose their brightness due to premature aging, bad internal components like a capacitor or LED arrays, or the common cause of loose wiring. Heavy load appliances on the circuit can also cause that LED lights are dim.

This guide will help, as I cover:

• Potential causes when LED lights dim
• How to fix your LED lighting and make it brighter
• Why new LED lights may appear dim

What Causes LED Lights To Dim? Personal Encounter

There are lots of potential reasons your LED lights could dim:

• Individual faulty diodes
• Loose wiring
• External wiring failure from your local transformer
• Surge wattage
• Wear and tear
• Failed capacitors
• Overheating
• Failed drivers

Some of these will cause LED lights to dim over time, others can make LED lights suddenly dim. So I’ll cover these below. But first, my own experience:

One LED Light Dimmer Than The Other In The Same Fixture

As you can see in the picture, there are two originally, identically bright LED bulbs. However, one led light is significantly dimmer than the other.

I decided to open the bulb to investigate why this particular LED light has become suddenly dim.

Clearly, you can see that two out of eight LED chips had gone bust. I also suspected that the LED chip next to the damaged one is faulty.

I investigated further to see if any of the mother-plate components are damaged, but as you can tell, they were all fine.

I didn’t test each of them, and just did a brief visual check. From that, I concluded that the faulty LED diode in the array was the cause of the light problem.

But that’s just what happened with my lights. Here’s a breakdown of other potential causes.

Why Could An LED Light Suddenly Dim?

An LED light suddenly dims when there’s a new problem – a diode might fail, there may be a loose or corroded wire in the control panel, or it could be that your local transformer has been damaged in a storm.

I’ve explained a failed diode already with my example above, so let’s address the other two potential causes.

A loose or corroded neutral wire in the electrical panel is extremely serious – you need to get it fixed immediately to prevent arcing and a short circuit, which could lead to fatal house fires.

In the rarest setting, if house lights are dimming after a big storm, check with your neighbors.

If they are also experiencing the same thing. In that case, the service cable running from your electrical panel to the meter and further on to the transformer is at fault.

These are called brownouts, as opposed to complete power failures called blackouts. Call your city or power company, and they will remedy the loose or disconnected wiring.

LED Light Starts Dim Then Gets Brighter

If you have an LED light suddenly dim and then get brighter, you’re probably experiencing surge wattage, where the appliances in your home put a sudden unexpected drain on the power.

Usually, this happens when you have high-load appliances like washers, dryers, or microwaves in the same circuit as your bulb, and the appliances are switched on.

Appliances draw a high surge power to turn on than to continue running. So the sudden change in voltage affects your bulb’s overall brightness, which then corrects itself within a few seconds.

Why Do LED Lights Get Dimmer Over Time?

An LED bulb will get dimmer over time because it is just getting old, which can cause diodes, capacitors or drivers to fail.

It can also be caused by overheating.

A natural cause for LED losing brightness is simply life span: the bulb has reached the end of its life.

This somber-sounding event is when the LED has reached its life rating down to L-70 or L-50 luminosity, emitting only 70 or 50% of its original light output.

Or it might be the capacitor – which you can check in the same way as you would check the failed diodes.

You have to look out for at least one swollen or bulged capacitor on the circuit board or the damaged LED chip.

Overheating

Another simple reason could be a tight and non-ventilated fixture that traps heat, prematurely and rapidly reducing the LED’s lifespan.

LEDs typically operate efficiently in temperature ranges between 40°C and 60°C (104°F – 140°F), and otherwise love cool environments. A light fixture with poor airflow could be why your LED light starts dimming before its time.

Finally, it could be surge voltage shortening the lifespan. For a light bulb, this means the internal driver has failed to lower the voltage.

For LED lights powered by a plug, such as an LED strip, it means the plug power supply is failing.

How To Fix Dim LED Lights

Because there are a lot of potential reasons for dim lights, you need to work through these steps to fix them:

• Firstly, rule out external issues. Has there been a storm, and are your neighbor’s lights also dim? If yes, speak to your local power company.
• Next, do the bulbs rectify themselves? If so, change your circuit wiring so your light fixtures aren’t sharing a circuit with high-demand appliances
• Is it affecting all of your LED fixtures? It’s a wiring problem – check your circuit board for a loose wire.
• Now, replace the bulb with another. If the new bulb is dim, it’s a wiring issue, so look for a loose wire in the fixture.
• Otherwise, open up the bulb and check for faulty diodes or bulging capacitors.

If you’re experienced with handling electrical DIY, a simple fix for this is to short the bad LED out or remove it from the circuit board.

You also need to understand that by shorting the faulty diode within the bulb, it will get naturally dimmer because that one diode was contributing to the total brightness.

So the light output will still be lower than initially – but it should improve a little.

Here is a video on how to do it.

Although this quick fix will work, the voltage within the bulb changes and now needs to be distributed between fewer diodes. Long-term exposure will damage them, so eventually, they will all become faulty.

New LED Light Is Very Dim

If your brand-new LEDs are dim, it could be:

• You’ve bought low-brightness bulbs
• You’re using them on an incompatible dimmer circuit
• You’ve overloaded the wires in your home

For LED light bulbs, you need to look for Lumen output per Watt as opposed to Wattage rating (as is the norm for traditional light bulbs, such as incandescent bulbs).

The higher the lumen rating, the brighter the LED bulb will be.

Secondly, if you’ve bought LED lights and you’re connecting them to your old dimmer switch, incompatibility might be at play.

Your LEDs need to be dimmable, and the dimmer switch needs to be compatible with a dimmable LED; otherwise, the lights may be permanently dim.

So your bulb might be okay but need a new compatible dimmer switch.

Finally, older houses may have wires that are no longer able to handle the load of today’s high-powered and numerous electronics around the house.

Too much current running through old wiring to power a home or office can lead to low overall voltage, and your brand-new bulbs might end up being dim.

Final Words

At this point, you must have a fair idea of what might have caused your LED to dim.

Any LED dimming can be frustrating but they’re still better than older bulbs, with many benefits. Dim LED bulbs isn’t a common problem, and you should be able to find the fix in this guide.

If you’re having other problems with your light bulbs, your LED strips or your dimmer switches, check out some of the most common problems with LED lights for solutions.