I'm finally building a garage and I'm looking at LED lighting. I'm curious what everyone uses/prefers for garage lighting color temperature. My existing garage has 4100k T12 bulbs and the color is white to my eyes when the bulbs are new. However they dim and turn more yellow as they age. I'm finding it difficult to find affordable LED fixtures in 4100k. Most new integrated LED fixtures are 6500k which is way too blue for my liking. I have found a few that advertise as being 5000k. If I already had a bunch of 4' fluorescent fixtures I could easily buy LED replacement bulbs in 4100k but I don't.

Looking online I get more confused than when I started. I think every manufacture has their own idea of what "warm white", "soft white", "bright white" and "daylight" are. One article I read said that 4000-4500k is good for a garage but then said 5000k is the norm for showrooms and when you will be doing detailed work.
The article also said that paint looks the best at 5000ish color temp. I went to the local big box store and had a look at their lighting display. One fixture toggled back and forth between 3000/4000/5000k. The 4000 looks best to me but maybe in an automotive garage setting 5000k would be acceptable. Just curious what everyone prefers. Thanks

My eyes are old.

When I updated the lighting in my garage a couple of years back I went with 4, 4' 5000k led tubes. What a remarkable improvement, originally had 2 100w incandescent bulbs, lol.

You may be able to go to a good hardware store and check out the colors at the lighting display.

I bought the 4' LEDs from Harbor Freight - $19 each on sale - a couple years ago, and they were a huge improvement over the double 4' fluorescents I had.
I beleive they're 5000.
Much brighter with half the bulbs. Just plug in & voila !

I like 5000 to 5600. Bright but not glaring and everything stays it's normal color whch is great if you are doing any wiring.

You can't have "too much" light. And ideally - IMHO - you want that as close to "daylight" as possible. That said, I still have florecents in my shop and all the bulbs are labelled "daylight".

I agree.
Human eyes function best in bright light. The job requiring the brightest light is brain surgery. That says it all for me.
5000K is the best color temp for any work environment, IMO.

I buy 4100k T8s. 96 bulbs in my main shop. To me they are pretty white. I won’t go any higher.

I updated a few yeas back to double (string?) LED fixtures. The ones I bought are adjustable with dip switches. They're set on Daylight which I think is 6500? Not sure but I need to tone them down as my eyes start watering after ~ 8 hours. Eye drops help but I just need to find the time to dim them down a bit as I am concerned about the long term effects. When I had fluorescent I always went with daylight bulbs and was fine. But the LED's seem to have a different idea on what daylight is IMO.
I have another post going on monitors due to the brightness of one. Just swapped it out an hour or so ago and OMG what a difference.

After trying a couple different bulbs these have met my needs. Have them in the garages and my work shed.

What I would add is that you also need to look at lumen output when choosing a fixture or bulb. My garage has 4’ Florescent fixtures. I looked into replacing the tubes with the led tubes and discovered that they were not as bright as a t8 5k fluorescent tube.

Also . Led sounds great , but they often fail sooner than a fluorescent. Keep in mind they are just cheap junk from CHINA . At least with a fluorescent you can replace tubes or ballast easily and inexpensively .

T5 fluorescent are even brighter.

I used 5000k LED's. This is what that looks like.

I had fluorescent in my garage and I replaced them with LEDs from Home Depot. I used the kind with the LEDs built in to the fixture and thankfully i haven't had any failures yet but if I do I will have to replace the entire fixture. This was about 5 years ago so I don't even know if they still sell the same exact fixtures I bought. Next time would definitely get LED fixtures with replaceable lights.

The reason I went with LEDs was because I live in the northeast and in the winter the fluorescent lamps took about 20 to 25 minutes to start lighting up. Unfortunately, my garage is not insulated and the fluorescent lamps don't do very well in the cold.

I used the highest K rating I could find at the time. I think they were 4100K. If I were doing it today I would go with 5000K.

Having the walls and ceiling white really helps too.

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Although white is not IMO real practical for a garage floor, I use light grey.

i went with 5000k units when i replaced all the lighting in the garage.
12, four foot lights in a 28x32 space really light up the place !

I bought some 5K led bulbs from Lowes a few years ago, Best investment i ever made. Don't remember the brand but i kept the box because i will be using them again. It's awesome when it's cold out and you turn on the lights and bam, Instant light compared to waiting 20 minuets for florescent lights to warm up.

Looking at the bulb pricing vs built in I don't see an advantage price wise or am I missing something ???

I like the 5000K light during the day.

At the other extreme, I use pure green LED light only for middle of the night bathroom visits.
It makes a difference in getting back to sleep.

If you are installing lighting you can get a permanent style. If you already have florescent fixtures just get bulbs.

Using LED bulbs in typical T8 fixtures means(?) the transformers are still in the circuit, and if so, seems to me that negates some of the power/heat/reliability savings LED's are intended to provide.