Your practical usages of high CRI flashlights?

It seems many people like high CRI flashlights. They think it's easier on the eyes, helps with visibility, and looks nice. While, some flashlight buyers may not care much about CRI, and choose relatively low CRI flashlights with higher efficiency and better output. CRI plays a much more subtle visual effect on the light output of the LED than the color temperature and tint deviation of the light. And it will really depend on the practical application. For example, using a flashlight for walking dogs everyday, you know what colour he/she is, so won't care for high CRI much. As for high CRI flashlights, do you think how important it is? Feel free to share your practical application. Thanks!

This is a curious train of thought. Practical usages? How about sorting socks from the laundry? Someone who needs to be able to connect many different colors of wire would benefit from high CRI. The overall color (may be pallor?) of a patient needing medical attention is of course very important for a paramedic working in the field at night. Blood circulation can be seen by looking at skin with an accurate light source. As has been written before here at CPF, cooking meat outside in the dark would benefit from high CRI to know when it is cooked properly.

The idea that walking dogs with a dingy, colorless flashlight beam is somehow ok... well not if you find your animals nice looking and enjoy seeing them out and about. Maybe if it is just a chore...

XTAR Light said:

For example, using a flashlight for walking dogs everyday, you know what colour he/she is, so won't care for high CRI much.

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I don't think many people carry flashlights while walking their dogs to check their dogs' colors at night. Lol!
But it is nice to be able to shine a high cri light at something on the ground and be able to see the browns, reds, and yellows more clearly, so that we can tell whether the thing the dog is walking up to is a snake or a stick.

Electrical work: When I worked as an electrical apprentice, I used high c.r.i. lights for identifying wire colors so I didn't die hooking up the wrong 220 volt wires.
Hiking around rattlesnakes and scorpions: I often go on night hikes in the summer when it's cooler. There are rattlesnakes and scorpions blending in with the trail. High c.r.i. lights makes them stand out so I can avoid them and not die.

For backpacking and longer hikes, I'll use low c.r.i. lights for the higher brightness and longer runtimes. If there is a safety issue involved that could get me killed or lost (ability to identify trail markers), I'll use high c.r.i. lights.

I can't think of a single application where I wouldn't prefer a high CRI light.

Alas, back when I bought all my LED flashlights the closest I could get was neutral white. They work well enough and enjoy their modes/spacing, but if I would trade them all straight across for high CRI versions in a heartbeat. At present, the selection of high CRI lights and their costs are more of a premium than the other tints in my country anyway.

I roast my own coffee, and besides a thermometer, a high cri flashlight is essential to know when the beans are done. Different beans change color at different temps and times so I ultimately rely on color as the best indicator of roast and 100 lumens or so is sufficient to get through the smoke.

I have owned a lot of lights over the years, and leaned towards warm white as soon as I found out about it and it started to appear more often. Nowadays, a light would have to offer something really special if it was not a high CRI or I won't even consider it. And this applies to throwers as well. In my experience, a loss of 10-15% in distance is more than made up by being able to clearly make out what is out there at the end of my beam.

Detecting spiders and snakes. Their camouflage is very good, but under high CRI light you can tell the difference between them and the brush.

XTAR Light said:

It seems many people like high CRI flashlights. They think it's easier on the eyes, helps with visibility, and looks nice. While, some flashlight buyers may not care much about CRI, and choose relatively low CRI flashlights with higher efficiency and better output. CRI plays a much more subtle visual effect on the light output of the LED than the color temperature and tint deviation of the light. And it will really depend on the practical application. For example, using a flashlight for walking dogs everyday, you know what colour he/she is, so won't care for high CRI much. As for high CRI flashlights, do you think how important it is? Feel free to share your practical application. Thanks!

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For some, it's important to distinguish between vehicle colors (e.g., between champagne and gray, or between blue and black) or clothing colors.

KITROBASKIN said:

well not if you find your animals nice looking and enjoy seeing them out and about.

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Yeah! I want to see my animals' excellent fur. I enjoy their colors.


I usually have an older M61W in my lights, and I'm excited to try the new M61W with the new Luminous SST-20, which, I believe, is 95 CRI (wow!). However, I also use an M61 with a Nichia 219B (92 CRI?) from Illumn that is so very nice and rosy, and under which colors really pop (even reds, with the emitter's high R9 value).

Also, I got a 6P recently and originally intended to replace the stock incandescent P60 with the new M61W, but I started using the incan and I love it waay more than I thought I would. I guess it's 100 CRI. It's absolutely beautiful and really does seem to tell the truth about colors. The hotspot is pretty tight and the spill is pretty dim, so it has remarkably good throw given its 65 lumens.

ledbetter said:

I roast my own coffee, and besides a thermometer, a high cri flashlight is essential to know when the beans are done. Different beans change color at different temps and times so I ultimately rely on color as the best indicator of roast and 100 lumens or so is sufficient to get through the smoke.

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thinking about thos Beans

I don't require a high CRI flashlight and prefer the increased brightness of non-CRI lights.

Wow ELZ, welcome to your home away from home here at candlepowerforums. Love hearing about your gear, and your dogs. We have a thread somewhere where folks post photos of our pooches. If it is an affectionate shot in any way, feel free to post on the thread "Animals Showing Affection". Boss lady here seems to not be keen on using a lot of server space for images, so try using something like a Google Photos link or image host service.

You know it seems that some of us may be in some way color blind, or otherwise not distracted by low CRI, and that's OK. To each his own. Actually, for throwers, a cooler high contrast (and less CRI for my torches) beam gives more detail at distance. Discerning nuances of color seem to be less of an issue farther away.

Eliminating illumination distraction when out at night is a primary goal here. And seeing our light brown/cream colored dog with a dull lifeless (green tinge if the tint is also off) is unnecessarily distracting.

badtziscool said:

I don't think many people carry flashlights while walking their dogs to check their dogs' colors at night. Lol!
But it is nice to be able to shine a high cri light at something on the ground and be able to see the browns, reds, and yellows more clearly, so that we can tell whether the thing the dog is walking up to is a snake or a stick.

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Or a pile of crap. Seriously, I can't even begin to count how many times during the fall and early winter I've stepped on a land mine because the light I was using was lacking in CRI. Having good CRI is also a must for searching for ticks or pretty much anything involving looking at something that's alive. Checking throats, rashes, bites, wounds, lip color, eyes, ear and so on. Having high CRI could be the difference maker in determining if your child had snuck downstairs in the middle of the night and ate something blue or if you should be getting medical attention ASAP.

Does anybody remember Quickbeam talking about how our eyes are very sensitive to blue light but it mostly gets interpreted by the brain as glare? You can see more light with higher efficiency leds, but you can see more things with high cri light. That was more in reference to LED vs incan, but works for this as well.

There is more information being carried by high cri light than by standard led light, so faster recognition is possible and reaction time can go down. This can be applied to weapon lights, trail running, downhill riding, car headlights, medical applications, etc. The only times I can think of where higher efficiency leds are at an advantage, is where you want to be seen rather than to see by, and by colorblind people who can't see the additional frequencies .

As mentioned, electrical. Telling brown from black from grey wires for example.
A bit more niche, but comparing gels (color filters for lighting on film sets, photo shoots, theater stages etc) in the dark. A lot of them are fairly close and under poor lighting can be hard to differentiate. (Is this two pieces of 1/2 orange or one 1/4 and one 1/2? Or am I holding one CTO and one CTS?)
I'm also just USED TO high CRI lighting (tungesten, HMI, and the LEDs used for film and photography are all 95+ AFAIK), so to me anything under 90-ish just looks ugly. So I guess, because I'm spoiled. If it didn't devour batteries I'd happily carry an SF p9, a Peli M3, or something of comparable tungsten output at work.

KITROBASKIN said:

Wow ELZ, welcome to your home away from home here at candlepowerforums. Love hearing about your gear, and your dogs. We have a thread somewhere where folks post photos of our pooches. If it is an affectionate shot in any way, feel free to post on the thread "Animals Showing Affection". Boss lady here seems to not be keen on using a lot of server space for images, so try using something like a Google Photos link or image host service.

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Thank you for the welcome, KITROBASKIN! I'll try to find that thread. My dogs are mighty handsome under a good light. If I can keep from shining in their eyes, I might try using a pup to exhibit a comparison between the new 95 CRI M61W, the Nichia 219B, and the stock P60 incandescent in my 6P.


Lots of great examples of practical use of high CRI lights. I think that any situation where it is important to distinguish between similar colors is one in which a high CRI light would be helpful, especially where there is gradation between the similar colors (like skin or food, as KITRO mentioned).