Best Hps Grow Lights On The Market: - Our Top Picks 2024

Gardening is a lovely thing to do. It's a wonderful thing to do. Gardening, on the other hand, comes with a set of obligations. We all want to provide the ideal environment for our plants to thrive in. What is the best way to describe it? We want them to be happy, after all. That's because gardening isn't just a hobby for us; it's a way of life. It's not a job. It's a joy to meet you.

As a gardener, I want to make sure that my plants have the greatest available tools to aid their growth. As a result, I devote close attention to every little detail.

As a result, I've compiled a list of HPS grow lights that I've found to be the most satisfying and worthy of review.

In greenhouse illumination, these lights act as a form of supplement to daylight. It can, of course, be utilized as the sole source of light in a grow room or an indoor chamber.

Even football stadiums are now using HPS grow lights to promote grass growth.

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Construction

Not all metals are made equal when it comes to the design of your fixture. Some of the fittings are really fragile and not built to last. Due to the harsh circumstances of a grow room, this is very crucial.

Heat Dispersion

It's no secret that HPS technology is extremely hot. Manufacturers have updated their designs to help with heat dissipation in recent years. Whether air cooled or not, certain HPS fixtures perform a superior job of dispersing heat and transferring it away from the canopy. Another area where materials have a role is in heat retention, as some materials will not hold as much heat as others. In our blog post, we go through how to manage grow room heat.

Reflectivity

Examining the reflectivity of the fixture is maybe the most critical component of selecting the finest HPS grow light. How a fixture retains its reflectivity over time is more essential. Some reflectors soon lose a lot of efficiency, which we don't want. More information on this may be found in our post on the best grow light reflectors.

Wattage

Anything less than 400 watts, in my opinion, is inefficient for serious indoor gardening. As I previously stated, the 600 watt HPS grow light produces the greatest light per watt of electricity.

However, it is also dependent on the size of your garden. A 600w grow lamp, for example, covers 16 square feet.

Furthermore, many people would agree that covering your grow space with more 600w grow lights is preferable to covering it with less 1000w.

In any case, the decision is yours to make.

Type

The two types of light bulbs included in most kits are HPS and MH (metal halide in case you have never heard of it).

I recommend that you use both because the plants will require both. How? HPS bulbs, on the other hand, provide a lot of orange and red light, which is ideal for the flowering period.

Cooler light, on the other hand, is required for plant growth (light with a lot of blue color in it). As a result, MH bulbs are required. Of course, if you're growing plants that don't flower, you won't need HPS bulbs.

To summarize, the MHs' vegging stage demands are different from the HPS' flowering stage demands.

Double-ended and single-ended type of bulbs

This is something more to consider before purchasing a bulb or a kit in general. First and foremost, I strongly advise newcomers to purchase a starter kit.

It includes everything you'll need, and you'll learn how to use 600w HPS grow lights, for example.

The primary distinction between double-ended and single-ended bulbs is that double-ended bulbs live longer.

Furthermore, they provide a more powerful output. Double-ended, on the other hand, are more expensive and provide more heat.

As a result, if you're a beginner, stick with the single-ended. You can then make a decision based on your own experience rather than only on the recommendation.

The Ballasts

A built-in ballast is required for an HPS grow light to function. Ballasts come in a variety of shapes and sizes. One of the most prevalent solutions is a digital ballast, which is compatible with most bulbs, runs relatively cool, produces a high intensity of light, and is more energy efficient because it requires the least amount of electricity.

The best digital ballasts offer a wide choice of dimming options, bulb protection, and radio frequency shielding. It will also be adaptable to varying wattage requirements.

Cost

As you can see from our list, HPS grow lights come in a wide range of prices, so think about how much you want to spend before you go shopping. The construction, size, power, and features, for example, all have an impact on the cost of an HPS lamp.

FAQS

How far should a 1000 watt HPS light be from plants?

The distance between the bulb and the plant, of course, varies. Everything is dependent on the wattage of the HPS. Always remember that too much light is just as bad as not enough light.

 

As a result, be cautious when altering the distance. The hottest and most powerful HPS light is the 1000 watt. They should be put at a height of around 5 feet (152.4 cm) above the plant.

Why is HPS better than led?

I'm smitten by the results of HPS bulbs. The best HPS grow lights strike a compromise between intensity and light penetration; for example, 600-watt HPS grow lights are far less expensive than LED, and HPS is more constant.

Why is HPS better for flowering?

HPS, or high-pressure sodium, is a lighting solution that generates light from a high-intensity vapor-filled bulb. HPS bulbs are most typically used in conjunction with metal halide (MH) bulbs when growing plants inside with artificial light.

This is because HPS bulbs emit light in the red-orange-yellow spectrum, whereas MH bulbs emit light in the blue spectrum.

When it comes to plant growth, the metal halide's blue light is just what plants want throughout their vegetative stage. Plants use light from this end of the spectrum to build the cells that make up their fibrous tissues, such as stems, branches, and leaves.

After using blue light to get the plant's greenery to where they want it, the indoor gardener will transition to an HPS grow light, which emits light with a characteristic yellowish hue. While increasing the amount of time the plants are exposed to light will cause them to enter their flowering stage, they will require light from the red-yellow end of the spectrum to bloom the healthiest buds, bulbs, or flowers possible.

In summary, HPS lights are superior for flowering since the yellow light they provide is just what plants require to generate the healthiest flowers.

What lights do professional growers use?

Grow light selection is frequently influenced by a grower's aims or available resources, rather than their level of experience. In their personal garden, a seasoned indoor gardener may utilize LED grow lights, but in their business greenhouse, MH/HPS grow lights.

The initial cost of MH/HPS grow lights is frequently lower, and many of their components are interchangeable or replaced. This is extremely beneficial to a commercial enterprise, which frequently needs to purchase a large number of lights at once and prefers to replace a single bulb or ballast rather than the entire assembly in the case of a failure.

Nonetheless, the energy savings provided by LED lighting are difficult to overlook, and when you consider that LED grow lights may last anywhere from 100,000 to 200,000 hours, investing in LED technology is far from foolish.

In the end, MH/HPS grow lighting is used in more commercial greenhouses than LED. This is partly owing to the cost of purchasing hundreds of lights at once, but it's also due to the industry's long-standing reputation for MH/HPS grow lights. These lights have been used successfully in greenhouses for decades, indicating that they have been tried and true.

Conclusion

This finishes our examination of the best HPS grow lights available. We hope you found it useful and interesting, and that it assisted you in making an informed decision on the grow lighting in your own garden. We urge you to go around the rest of our website and read some of our other useful articles about hydroponics. Thank you for taking the time to read this, and until next time, be safe and gardening!

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