LED Drivers

With LEDs becoming the preferred lighting for homes and businesses, it’s important to know about LED drivers, which are required for many kinds of LED fixtures. While many commercial LED fixtures like downlights and ceiling lay-ins, as well as most lamps, have their own internal drivers, many accent LED fixture like undercabinet lights and tape lights require an external driver to operate. Using the correct LED driver for your unit will efficiently reduce the 120V or 277V line voltage to the proper power requirements for your fixture.

There are two main kinds of LED drivers:

• Constant-Voltage driver – Outputs a fixed voltage of 12 or 24 volts direct current to the fixture (12VDC or 24VDC)
• Constant-Current driver – Outputs a fixed current to the fixture over a range of output voltages based on the load

Refer to the specifications of your LED fixture to see which type of driver you should use. When sizing your LED driver, pick a wattage capacity that is greater than the total wattage of the light fixtures that will be connected to it.