Miljoe Lighting ---Professional Lighting Solutions: Tips for Choosing Under Cabinet Lighting

If you're only going to choose just one lighting feature to add your kitchen, make it under cabinet lighting. It provides task lighting for your countertops to make them ideal for food preparation and cooking, it illuminates the backsplash on your wall to create beautiful accent lighting, and it can also be used as night lighting for your kitchen. Once you install under cabinet lighting, you'll never want to go back.

Many lighting designers talk about creating "layers of light" for your kitchen. Under cabinet lighting serves as a crucial "layer" for great design.

That being said, there are a ton of options to choose from. How do you know what style of under cabinet lighting is right for your kitchen? Hopefully, this guide will make it a little easier to make your selection.

It's a good idea to choose your light source first.

1. Fluorescent, Xenon, Or LED?

Fluorescent under cabinet lights are very energy efficient in providing a given amount of light. Moreover, fluorescent light sources give off very little heat. This is a great feature depending on what is stored in the cabinet immediately above the under cabinet fixture or, perhaps, what is lying 12 to 18 inches below the light. While most fluorescent fixtures cannot be dimmed, they can be a wonderful, inexpensive option.

Xenon lights are not quite as energy efficient and do give off some heat but they have full dimming capacity, and they give off an attractive warm light. (If you love the warm glow of an incandescent light bulb, xenon under cabinet lights are for you). While they are not cool to the touch, the amount of heat emitted is still substantially lower than halogen lights. Heat output can be an important consideration with under cabinet lighting since you're often installing the lights directly on the underside of food storage cabinets - and above any produce sitting out on the counter.

If you're looking for the most energy efficient option, go with LEDs, which are often dimmable. LEDs are also cool to the touch and will last for 50,000 hours before needing replacement bulbs (that's almost six years). The initial price tag is a bit more expensive but if you consider your future savings in energy, LED under cabinet lights start to make a lot of sense. They also give off a brilliant white light that is very appealing for kitchen design.

2. Puck Or Linear?

The style of the fixture is another consideration. We usually recommend installing linear under cabinet lights because they provide uniform, well-distributed light for the entire countertop and eliminate shadows. However, a number of people prefer the style of under cabinet puck lights for the kitchen, which create pools of light in more focused areas. Either type of light works fine, this is really just a matter of preference.

3. Recessed Or Surface Mount?

A lot of people assume that non-recessed under cabinet lights will have fixtures jutting out unattractively from underneath the cabinets. This really isn't the case - most of the surface-mount options are so thin that you'd have to literally stick your head underneath the cabinet and look up to see the actual fixture. The good news is that it's hard to go wrong on this decision.

4. Hardwire, Plug-In Or Battery Operated?

Lighting fixtures that are "hardwired" are connected directly to the power source. Plug-in under cabinet lights, of course, require you to plug in a cord to your nearest electrical outlet. Decide what your preference is for type of installation and placement - if there's not a well-placed outlet in your kitchen, you will probably want to choose hardwire, or go completely cordless with a battery operated under cabinet light. A number of our under cabinet lights can be set up to be either hardwire or plug-in, but there are a few that do not have both options, so just check out the product listings of hardwire under cabinet lighting and plug-in under cabinet lighting.

Our under cabinet lighting page has some really helpful information to explain the options even further. Good luck installing your under cabinet lights, and don't forget to tell us how it goes!