LED Lighting - Advantages and Challenges

LED advantages

Robust and less breakable.
More energy efficient.
Vivid saturated colors with minimal radiated heat.
High switching speed. This is a major improvement over conventional lighting, which requires a filament or gas medium to heat up to emit light, followed by a cooling-off time to stop light emission.

LED challenges

White LEDs offer the advantages of long lifetimes, superior color and brightness, this solution comes with a higher price tag. Still cost have continued to decrease roughly 15% every year.
LEDs need to be driven at a constant current in order to maintain consistent brightness and color.
Despite being widely available from many sources, LEDs still require careful selection. Testing can help ensure that you will not be surprised by premature dimming or fading after only 1,000 hours or use, especially when you were expecting the LED to last 100,000 hours.
A low-quality LED may initially appear brighter than a high-quality one if the low-quality device has a higher drive current. However, the extra current causes the LED to heat up more quickly and ultimately fade or burnout.
Not every application requires a high-end LED. Ultimately, the LED must be affordable relative to the expectations for the end product.