High CRI, How important is it really?

I prefer quality (Cri) against quantity (Lumens)
Lights with High Cri Leds have better contrast and pop up colors
and details of objects.
Low CRI Leds 70/80 tends to wash colors and made objects flat.
Anyway some have nice tint.
But all depends how sensitive you are.

I used my high CRI Convoy S2+ for the first time last night for urbex photography. The improvement in colour rendering in both my photography, as well as to my eyesight was much more impressive than what I was expecting.

How do you know what CRI your light is? Its typically not stated when you buy it.

For example: Convoy L6 XHP70.2

Look into Cree datasheets for these bin codes and you will find all info needed. Not only what CRI but also output

I appreciate the data sheet but how do you know which version of XHP70.2 the light comes with? The spec sheet lists dozens of versions.

You need to ask Simon(Convoy) what exactly partnumber is but my guess is 70CRI

I think all warm lights CREE have a minimum of 80 CRI.

Not all. Just read datasheets.

Sellers don’t give a f@#^ what you want or what is better for you, they sell what is profitable. They investing big money in marketing to sell useless crap for stupid people. If you have no knowledge what are you buying in most cases you’ll get outdated product. LOW CRI IS OBSOLETE :slight_smile:

You are right, I checked the datasheet for this led and the minimum is still 70. There is 90+ CRI for 5700K but it must be super hard to find.
You can’t know the exact serial number of the LED, even most sellers doesn’t even know that. It is most likely to be the lowest CRI grade because its cheaper and you get more lumens.

I have noticed over the last couple of months that all the High CRI lights are showing more and more “Out of Stock”, so there`s definitely increasing market demand for them.

Yes they advertising “more lumens” , but they don’t write in advertisement: “crappy blueish, low color rendering, eyes damaging lumens”
What i can say: DO NOT BUY SNAKE OIL :smiley:

Olight likes that while claiming most efficient driver title...i wonder how efficient would be if they throw 90CRI emitter in their lights.

Low CRI is fine if you just need to see where the table is.
but I promise you that wood is not actually green, like the Low CRI shows it:

Low CRI is fine if you just want to see the food, but, I would rather see the color of the food Im eating.

Low CRI is fine if you just want to see the Green Bear, but its more fun to see what color he really is.

one of the most misguided ways to use Low CRI, is to look at leaves. It makes them greener. From this some people will claim that the Low CRI LED has great color rendering… NOT!

where Low CRI really falls down, is in its lack of Red output

Why do people buy lights with Low CRI?

because they dont now any better, or plan to swap the LED to High CRI :slight_smile:

Olight have good drivers and it have nothing common with color rendering , just HI-CRI led have a little bit lower efficiency. If 70cri have 1000 lumen output of crappy color rendering light , so 90cri have 900-850lumen output of close to natural color light.

Better try with 750-800lm...

the difference is much larger… 1000 lumens becomes 644 lumens

to compare these two TCR-1

I put the two different heads on the same body tube with the same battery, and measured their outputs on my light meter.

The High CRI decreased lumens by 36, while increasing Red output by 400

since I almost never use more than 200 lumens, maximum is irrelevant to me.

I will take the High CRI every time

==
another actual lumen test before and after
AA Tool w stock CW LED
5
32
153
300

AA Tool w sw45k

2 lumens
15 lumens
73 lumens
175 lumens (42% drop)

Thx Jonathan for proper explanation.

:beer:
for those who understand, no explanation is necessary
for those who refuse to understand, no explanation will be sufficient

All written in datasheets. Can be max 25% drop, but not like you say 36 % .OK in worst case 30% ;))

I’m about to swap emitter in Olight Warrior mini to 351D 5000K. I wonder how much i’ll have afterward...