Why Permanent LED Lighting Is Replacing Christmas Lights

Every November, homeowners across the GTA climb ladders in the cold, untangle last year’s cords and spend a weekend hanging temporary lights. Then in January they do it all again in reverse. Permanent LED lighting is installed once, disappears during the day, and turns your roofline into whatever you want it to be from your phone.

The problem with temporary lights

Temporary lights mean ladder work twice a year in the coldest months, clips that damage shingles and eavestroughs, strands that fail after a season, and a box of tangled cords in the garage. Hiring a company to hang and remove them costs money every single year and you still only get lights for six weeks.

How permanent lighting works

The lights sit in a slim aluminum track installed along the underside of your soffit and roofline. The track is colour-matched to your home from more than 100 colours and the wiring is hidden, so during the day most people cannot tell the system is there. Each LED is individually controlled, which is what makes patterns, zones and animations possible.

What it can do

• 16 million colours plus true warm white: warm white from 2800K to 7000K for everyday architectural lighting, and full colour for holidays.
• Scenes and patterns: Christmas, Halloween, Canada Day, team colours, a birthday, or a quiet warm evening, each one tap away.
• Schedules: sunset to bedtime, every night, without touching anything.
• Zones: light the front gable only, the porch only, or the whole house.
• Voice control: works with Alexa and Google Home, and the app has no monthly fee.

Running cost and lifespan

Each LED draws under one watt. Running 150 lights for six hours a night costs about four to five dollars a month in electricity. The LEDs are rated for about 50,000 hours, which works out to roughly 25 years at four to five hours a night, and AmberMount replaces a failed LED under the lifetime warranty with no trip charge.

Is it worth it?

If you only want lights for Christmas and you are happy on a ladder, temporary lights are cheaper up front. If you want lighting you will use all year, want it to look built in, and never want to climb a ladder in December again, permanent lighting is the better buy. Try the interactive demo on our lighting page to see what it looks like on a real installation.