What Are Full-Spectrum Plant LED Grow Lights?

In many horticultural lighting fixtures, full-spectrum plant LED growth lights are mentioned. You may have already realized the mental and health benefits associated with full-spectrum lighting and decided to purchase one for testing.

The advantages of full-spectrum LEDs are not always consistent, and there are still many cases waiting to be proven or disproven. Nevertheless, among many standard plant grow lights, full-spectrum lights do have different efficiencies than traditional lights. The greatest benefit of a full-spectrum LED growth lights are that they can produce multiple discharge spectra.

What is the traditional spectrum of LED growth light?

First, what is the spectrum of traditional LED growth lights? Typical plant LED growth lights usually mix blue and red LEDs. You can usually tell by the purple-pink light emitted, which is the result of mixing blue and red light. The reason typical LED plant grows use this formula is that plants are most effective in photosynthesis in the blue and red parts of the spectrum.

However, examining this spectrum clearly covers only a small part of the entire visible spectrum. This is definitely not what we call full spectrum. Usually, these plant grow lights use single LEDs - one blue LED and one red LED. You can usually tell by looking at the spectral power distribution, as shown below. However, if blue and red light are most conducive to photosynthesis, why should we respect other wavelengths?

The answer is that other factors can also affect plant health and vitality, not just how much photosynthesis occurs. Ultimately, this can mean higher quality plants, better aesthetic appeal, or higher nutrient content. In short, quality over quantity.

The definition of full-spectrum LED growth lights illumination

Further research is still required, but more and more experiments and research results indicate that plants grow ideally under a balanced spectrum.

Sunlight is called full-spectrum light because it includes the entire wavelength range necessary for any kind of life on earth to flourish. These wavelengths are infrared, visible light, and ultraviolet. Nevertheless, the human eye can only respond to one wavelength - visible light. The rest of the wavelengths are physically imperceptible to us.

This can be explained by the fact that plants have evolved to use natural daylight not only as a food source, but also as a signal for flowering and fruit production. For this reason, the strict definition of a full-spectrum spectrum will involve a range of energies from ultraviolet to infrared, just like natural daylight. Light with this spectrum is usually displayed as white.

Various methods for developing white light for plant LED growth lamp

Unlike the traditional LED growth light method of mixing single blue and red LEDs, full-spectrum plant grow lights usually use a phosphor coating. The fluorescence coating is actually the reason for the completely spectrum grow light, as the fluorescence powder takes light from a single narrow wavelength range, such as 460nm blue, and converts it into a wider range of longer wavelengths, such as 600-700nm red.

A wider spectrum can be achieved within the visible spectrum by modifying blue LEDs with green, yellow, and/or red fluorescent powders. Due to the many different wavelengths of light emitted by the phosphor, the result is a balanced mix of tones, resulting in white light. The fact that a plant LED growth light emits white light does not necessarily mean that it is an absolute full-spectrum light.

One way is to evaluate its spectral chart. This is because it tells us how comparable it is to natural light and how its spectral cycles are. When the light source is closer to natural daylight, it is a better full-spectrum light source for your greens.