SMD LED Strips

SMD strip carries individually packaged diodes at a set spacing. Where the strip is hidden behind a deep diffuser or throws light onto a surface rather than being looked at, the dotting that COB eliminates never becomes visible — and SMD does several things better in return.

It reaches higher R9 and deeper reds, because a discrete package can carry a phosphor blend that a continuous COB layer cannot. It is the only construction available for RGB, RGBW and addressable, since those need separate emitters to mix. And at the same output it usually costs less.

The failure mode is predictable: an SMD strip in a shallow channel, or behind a clear lens, shows a row of dots. If the run will be seen directly, that is a COB job.