LED strip lights have become one of the most versatile and effective lighting solutions for modern spaces. For refreshing a kitchen, upgrading retail shelving, highlighting architectural details, or creating ambience in a hospitality venue, LED strips offer performance, flexibility and long-term energy savings. At Display Lighting, we supply one of New Zealand’s widest ranges of LED lighting products, designed for both residential and commercial environments and supported by high quality power supplies, profiles and accessories.
Here is a practical guide to the best uses and key benefits of LED strip lighting, and how they can transform your space.
What Makes LED Strip Lights So Effective
LED strip lights are slim, flexible linear tapes fitted with high efficiency LED chips. They adhere to surfaces, curve around edges and can be cut to length, making them ideal for custom installations. They are available in a range of wattages, colour temperatures, colour changing formats and waterproof ratings.
When paired with quality LED power supplies and control systems, strip lights offer smooth dimming, colour control and consistent performance. For spaces that need a professional finish, installing them within aluminium profiles creates a clean architectural look with even light diffusion.
Best Uses in the Home
1. Kitchen Task and Feature Lighting
LED strips excel in kitchens where you need both practical illumination and visual enhancement. Installing them under overhead cabinetry brightens benchtops and reduces shadows while providing safe, comfortable task lighting.
Warm white strips create a welcoming feel, while cooler tones help emphasise clean surfaces. For a seamless finish, pair LED strips with our aluminium LED profiles to hide hotspots and achieve a sleek, custom look.
Living Rooms and Entertainment Areas
Strips can be used behind TVs, inside shelving or along ceiling coves to create depth and atmosphere. Their compact size allows subtle integrations that highlight textures, objects or wall features without dominating the room.
If you want to set different moods, colour changing RGB or RGBW strips are ideal. They offer soft accent lighting for relaxed evenings or brighter tones when entertaining guests.
Bathrooms and Outdoor Areas
Waterproof-rated strips (IP65 and above) are perfect for bathroom vanity lighting or for adding ambience under floating shelves and mirrors. Outdoor-rated strips can be used to highlight decking edges, pathways or patio features.
Best Uses for Businesses
Retail Displays and Product Shelving
LED strips are one of the best tools for retail merchandising. Their directional, consistent output enhances colours and textures, helping products stand out. Placing strips along shelving, cabinet edges or display cases ensures even illumination and reduces shadows.
For commercial displays, combining strips with rigid LED light bars can provide additional punch for food displays, signage or feature walls.
Hospitality and Customer Experience
Restaurants, cafés and bars often rely on layered lighting to build atmosphere. LED strips are ideal for bar fronts, counters, booth seating, ceiling details and decorative elements.
Warm and neutral tones enhance materials such as timber, stone and fabric. Colour changing options can support themes or events, offering operators complete flexibility.
Offices and Commercial Fitouts
Strips help create clean, modern lines in meeting rooms, open-plan workspaces and reception areas. When installed in recessed aluminium channels, they provide professional linear illumination that can support brand identity and enhance architectural details.
Commercial fitouts often pair strip lighting with reliable LED power supplies and control systems to ensure long term performance and safe integration with existing electrical plans.
4. Signage and Architectural Features
Strip lighting is widely used to emphasise building contours, reception desks, staircases and internal features. Tunable white strips also support human centric lighting principles when paired with appropriate controls, promoting comfortable working environments.
Key Benefits of LED Strip Lights
Energy Efficiency and Low Running Costs
LED strips use far less energy than traditional lighting, giving significantly lower operating costs. High lumen-per-watt outputs ensure bright, clear illumination without excessive power consumption.
Long Lifespan and Low Maintenance
Quality LED strips last for tens of thousands of hours, reducing replacement frequency and minimising downtime in commercial settings.
Design Flexibility
From curved shelves to tight joinery spaces, strips can fit where traditional fixtures cannot. Their small footprint allows discreet placement that highlights the best parts of a space.
Customisable Colour and Control
With options including warm white, cool white, RGB and RGBW, you can tailor lighting to your exact needs. When connected to compatible controllers, strips offer smooth dimming and scene setting.
Professional Results with Profiles and Accessories
Using aluminium LED profiles helps create a cleaner finish, manage heat, and reduce glare. Pairing strips with the right LED power supplies ensures stable output and long-term reliability.
Choosing the Right Strip Lighting Solution
Selecting the right strip involves balancing wattage, output, colour temperature and IP rating. For homes, focus on ambience and practicality. For businesses, prioritise brightness, consistency and durability.
Our team can help you match the right strip to your project, whether you need subtle cove lighting or high-output illumination for displays. Explore our full collection of LED strip lighting, LED light bars, aluminium profiles, LED power supplies and more to create a complete solution that suits your space.
