Why You Can Trust CNET Hyperikon 60W Equivalent LED review: Strong color quality helps the Hyperikon LED impress
At 8 bucks per bulb, the Hyperikon LED offers strong dimming performance and better-looking colors in your home.
- 10 years product testing experience with the CNET Home team
Most people buy their light bulbs at a hardware store, or maybe in the housewares aisle at their local grocery, but there's a growing number of LED options available online. That includes a line of LED light bulbs from Hyperikon, an up-and-coming lighting manufacturer based out of California. The price for a single, dimmable 60W replacement LED? $8 on Amazon, or $7 direct.
Hyperikon 60W Equivalent LED
The Good
The Bad
The Bottom Line
Hyperikon pitches its bulb as an easy efficiency upgrade over a 60W incandescent, and at just 9 watts, it certainly fits the bill. On top of that, it offers strong dimming performance and above average color-rendering capabilities, which means that it'll help the colors in your home look a little more vivid. That last bit gives Hyperikon a slight edge over alternatives that cost a little less per bulb, and makes this light a worthy option if you're looking for a color rendering bump.
Dimmable 60W Replacement LEDs
| Hyperikon | Sylvania Ultra | GE HD Relax | GE HD Reveal | Cree | Feit | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Brightness in lumens (measured/stated) | 750 / 820 | 827 / 800 | 813 / 800 | 554 / 570 | 824 / 815 | 855 / 800 |
| Energy consumption | 9W | 9W | 10.5W | 11W | 9.5W | 9.8W |
| Efficiency (lumens per watt) | 83 | 92 | 77 | 50 | 87 | 87 |
| Yearly energy cost (3 hours of use per day at $0.11 per kWh) | $1.08 | $1.08 | $1.26 | $1.32 | $1.14 | $1.18 |
| Color temperature | 2,776 K | 2,752 K | 2,611 K | 2,598 K | 2,657 K | 2,673 K |
| Stated color rendering score | 95 | N/A | 90 | 88 | 85 | 90+ |
| Dimmable | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Dimmable range | 8.6 - 94.9% | 9.1 - 88.1% | 25.7 - 89.6% | 28.8 - 88.6% | 5.1 - 88.5% | 3.8 - 75.4% |
| Expected lifespan | 45,000 hours | 15,000 hours | 15,000 hours | 15,000 hours | 25,000 hours | 25,000 hours |
| Warranty | 5-year | 3-year | 10-year | 10-year | 10-year | 5-year |
| Average price | $8 | $7 (2-pack) | $8 (2-pack) | $10 (2-pack) | $20 (4-pack) | $11 (2-pack) |
While Hyperikon's LED doesn't come with any real weak spots, it didn't ace all of my tests, either. With 750 lumens to its name, its brightness fell slightly short of the 820 lumens printed on the box, though not enough so to make for a noticeably dimmer light bulb. With a power draw of 9 watts, it's putting out 83 lumens per watt -- that's good but not groundbreaking, and not quite as efficient as a competing Sylvania Ultra LED that's about twice s affordable as Hyperikon.
Still, this bulb gets all of the important stuff right. Replace a burnt-out incandescent with the Hyperikon LED and you'll knock about six bucks off of your yearly energy bill, all without compromising on things like light quality or dimmability.
Speaking of dimmability, the Hyperikon LED promises to dim smoothly between 10 and 100 percent brightness on most modern dimming hardware. I tested it out on a number of switches and came away impressed. On modern switches, the bulb consistently dimmed down to about 8 percent at minimum while staying above 90 percent at maximum, which is a very good dimmable range.
More than the numbers, I was impressed with the bulb's consistency, at least on modern dimming hardware. Switch for switch, the Hyperikon LED always dimmed as expected, hitting that same approximate dimmable rage and doing so without buzzing or flickering. However, things were less impressive with older dimming hardware. Though the dimmable range stayed solid, I definitely noticed some flicker when I tested the bulb out on an old rotary dial not intended for LEDs.
The Hyperikon LED produces noticeably better-looking colors and cleaner whites.
The bulb's real strength -- the one that sets it apart from a majority of LEDs on the market today -- is its color rendering score. Hyperikon pegs it at 95 out of 100, which would make it noticeably better than the average LED at producing clean whites and vivid colors. My tests bore that claim out -- though to my eye, Hyperikon isn't quite as good as the GE Reveal LED at boosting red tones. Still, it's an impressive result, especially considering that the Hyperikon LED is much brighter and more more efficient than that GE Reveal LED.
The other thing I look for in my tests is how well each bulb handles heat. When you turn an LED light bulb on, it'll typically be slightly brighter than advertised. Then, as the bulb heats up, that brightness will slowly fall. After about thirty minutes, the bulb's heat sinks should kick in and stabilize things. It's too subtle to notice with the naked eye, but it's still a good indication of how well the bulb is designed -- and something to keep in mind if you're looking for a bulb to use in an enclosed fixture, where heat gets trapped.
The Hyperikon LED finished this 90-minute test about 15 percent less bright than at the start. That's an acceptable result, and normal with LEDs, but competitors from Feit and Cree did better.
Hyperikon did OK here, finishing my 90-minute test about 15 percent less bright than it started -- basically par for the course when it comes to LEDs. Bulbs from Feit and Cree did better here, losing only about 10 percent of that initial brightness, while the "HD Light" versions of both the GE Relax and GE Reveal LED did worse, each losing over twenty percent of their initial brightness readings.
All in all, Hyperikon looks to have a pretty good bulb here -- and both the above average 45,000-hour lifespan and the very strong five-year warranty sweeten the deal still. You don't need to look any further than your local lighting aisle to find a good LED, but if you decide to look online, keep Hyperikon on your radar.