Top 4 Landscape Lighting Fixtures – Which Are Best for Your Yard?

You already understand the value that landscape lighting can have on your home, and now you’re ready for the perfect design to highlight those special features of your home and gardens. Let’s look at the top four outdoor lighting fixtures, what they’re used for, and the type of power they use, to help you decide which fixtures are best for your yard.

1. Box Lights

These lights are called box lights because of their shape. They are set at a height, often affixed to a building, and point downward, used to brightly illuminate a large area. For maximum output, they are high voltage, meaning they would be hard-wired into your home’s hydro.  Because of this, they are usually used as security lighting, or if you wish to light a larger area such as a tennis or basketball court.

2. Canister Lights

Canister lights are aptly named because the lights are set into a “canister” or tube made of PVC pipe. The PVC is cut at an angle for the light to sit in, and the canisters are slightly buried into the ground, with the light pointing slightly upward. Canister fixtures are ideal to illuminate the walls of your house, or a large shrub or tree because they give off a wide band of light, unlike spotlights which are narrower. These lights can be used with a high or low voltage lighting system.

3. Bullet Lights

Like the others, bullet lights are so named because of their shape. The light sits just inside the bullet-shaped fixture and are used for spotlighting or floodlights. Because of the light output required of large bullet lights, they are often part of a high voltage lighting system and would be used to flood a large tree or a unique architectural feature of your home.
You can buy smaller bullet fixtures which can be used with solar power or low voltage systems. These will often contain an LED bulb, but you won’t get the same bright output as with a high voltage fixture, so they’re best used to highlight a small sign or bush.

4. Dome Lights

Dome lights are by far the most popular type of outdoor lighting fixture because they come available in each type of power system, including solar. Solar dome lights are the ones most often found in home improvement stores and are easy for people to install as they are just staked into the ground. They project lights downwards at a low height but the solar dome lights project very little light, making them almost useless for any real lighting.
More expensive dome lights are often made of copper or brass and are often tied into a low voltage system, creating enough light to be effecting at lighting a pathway or walkway.

Just remember that whichever type of fixture, or fixtures are best for your home, quality is key and a professional landscape lighting artist can point you in the right direction.