Understanding the Color Temperature of White Light: From Warm to Cold

When it comes to lighting, the color temperature of white light plays a pivotal role in setting the mood and functionality of a space or other areas of illumination, for instance aquarium or greenhouse lighting. The terminology used to describe these types of white — warm white, soft white, neutral white, natural white, cool white, and cold white — can often be confusing. This blog post aims to clarify these terms. The Basics of Color Temperature The Color temperature (or more precisely Correlated Color Temperature – CCT) is a way to describe the color appearance of a light source by comparing its color to the color of light emitted by a theoretical black body when heated to a particular temperature, measured in Kelvin. The idea is that if a light source has a CCT of 3,000K, its color appearance is similar to the light emitted by a black body heated…