Sometimes, all it takes is a fun new gadget to completely transform a home, and one of the most noticeable (and often overlooked) upgrades to any space is adding smart LED strip lights. This is an affordable way to illuminate areas like the undersides of your kitchen cabinets or add mood lighting along baseboards in a hallway.
The Govee M1 Smart LED Strip Light (available on Amazon for $99.99) is our pick for the best LED strip light. It came out on top after thorough evaluation of a variety of customizable lighting features, ease of setup, and durability. As one of the brightest Matter-enabled LED strip lights you can buy, the Nanoleaf Essentials Matter Lightstrip (available on Amazon) is our pick. However, we also looked at other compelling options, each with their own appeal.
Amazon Prime Day is fast approaching, making it the perfect time to stock up on your favorite LED strip lights, with many products available at huge discounts.
Credit: Review / Jill Schildhaus
The Govee M1 is the best LED strip light you can buy.
Credit: Phillips Hue
The Philips Hue Bluetooth Lightstrip Plus is our pick for the best upgrade.
Credit: Nanoleaf
This Nanoleaf strip light is the brightest we tested.
Credit: Review / Rachel Murphy
We’ve fallen in love with the LIFX Lightstrip with Color Zones for its incredibly simple setup, ease of use, and range of fantastic features.
Credit: Eve
The Eve Light Strip is a great option for Apple HomeKit.
Other Smart Light Strips We Tested
How to test the best LED strip lights
test
We thoroughly field-tested each Lightstrip to fully understand its performance, features, and shortcomings, and we also looked at necessary app security features like two-factor authentication.
We placed the lights in various indoor locations in our testers’ homes to test which lights worked best in low light, offered the best connectivity, and integrated with smart assistants for easy control. We also tested the companion iOS and Android apps to get a feel for connectivity, ease of use, and features.
What you need to know about buying LED strip lights
LED strips are a versatile lighting option that can be added anywhere in your home. Often seen in home theater setups, bendable adhesive lights are a quick and easy way to brighten up dark areas of your home and add accent lighting. Before purchasing LED strip lights, there are a few things to consider.
Surgery
When buying smart LED strip lights for your home, make sure you check whether they require a hub. Unless you already have a compatible smart home hub, we recommend choosing smart strip lights that don’t require you to buy a separate device.
It’s also important to choose a strip light that can easily integrate into your existing smart home environment: We tested models that work with Siri, Alexa, and Google Assistant, although only some of these strip lights are compatible with all three popular smart assistants.
Most of the lights we tested connect via Wi-Fi, but some only use Bluetooth, and some can use both. We found the Bluetooth connection to be unreliable and slow, so we recommend opting for a Wi-Fi-enabled strip light.
Luminance
The amount of light a bulb gives off is measured in lumens; the higher the lumens, the brighter the light. Many of the lightstrips we tested were adjustable in brightness to suit the space you were using them in. However, even one of the lower-brightness sets, the 800-lumen Cync LED Lightstrip, was able to light up a dark room.
length
Most LED strip lights can be shortened or extended in length with additional light strip sections; however, not all lights are customizable. Strategically consider where you need extra lighting and measure the area. During testing, we installed strip lights around TVs and mirrors, on baseboards and door edges, on bookshelves and office desks, and under kitchen cabinets.