I thought I read a favorable review on this light many months ago so kept an eye out for an Amazon sale which finally happened recently. Currently you can buy it for the same $8.99 I paid as a Prime member which felt fair given it comes with 4 Energizer AA cells. Now that I have it I can’t find that old review to compare notes…
I bought it as an emergency lighting lantern as we lose power enough that a lantern to light up a whole room is handy. I wish it was brighter - it doesn’t light up the whole room, but instead just produces a strong glow. It will be adequate, and in the dark I am sure I will be thankful, I just had higher hopes than what it produces.
I put some NiMHs in it to see how long it would run. I noticed output dipped after an hour or so, but cycling power caused it to go back to normal brightness. This happened several times and I don’t understand why. I never did a straight run but it ran a good 6 hours with usable output so I expect it would go much longer.
Quality seems adequate for an $8.99 light, nothing stood out as a problem.
I put some fresh batteries in and took it to a dark room. Again, disappointed in the output. I am not sure I would be able to read a book if I suspended this inside the top of a backpacking tent at night. It would give plenty of light to find things in the tent, or not stumble over things around a campsight, but not enough light to see clearly. I think it is working fine, just lower outpot than I had hoped.
This Energizer lantern is replacing this “Grip” brand lantern I had for many years. It also uses 4AA but was quite bright, I guess because it has a lot more LED’s on it. I’ve had the Grip lantern for so many years that I had hoped the more modern Energizer product would produce equal output with more modern, efficient LED’s. My Grip lantern got something that made the rubber housing permanently sticky so threw it away. Upon reflection it was a far superior product given the brightness, the swivel hook it had to hang it, and it also had a magnet on the back to stick to surfaces.
In fact, I am so disappointed in this Energizer that I would send it back to Amazon but already tossed the packaging.