Solar landscape lighting comes in a variety of styles from various manufacturers. You can generally find solar landscape lighting to match whatever your personal style and taste are. You can find durable stainless steel, or decorative bamboo lighting fixtures.

So what should you consider with solar landscape lighting? While solar landscape lighting is practical for use in the majority of the 50 states, it's important to consider where you plan to place the solar landscape lights. It is also important to consider the surrounding geography of your home. Basically when it comes to solar landscape lighting, the key factor is that the PV panel used to charge the battery must be in a place where it will receive sunlight. Otherwise it won't work!

You want to place your solar landscape lighting PV panel in a location where it will receive as much sunlight as possible. Placing it in the shade of landscape features or other interference (trees, buildings, bird droppings, etc.) can have a large impact on battery charging and consequently the nightly "run-time" of the solar landscape lights. If your yard has many trees or does not receive a lot of sunlight because of surrounding buildings, solar landscape lighting may not be right for you. However, there are some very advanced solar panels that can collect solar power even when covered in 2 feet or more of snow. However, these cost significantly more, and the cost is often not justified.

Most solar landscape lights will run for about eight to ten hours per night, based on the amount of sunlight they receive during the day. This means your solar landscape lights should run all night during the summer, but probably won't in the winter. Generally in the winter there just isn't enough sunlight to charge the batteries enough to get through a 14-hour winter night. However, this will vary depending on your location.

Many manufacturers of solar landscape lighting integrate the PV cell into the light fixture itself, others have a separate PV panel. Having the cell directly in the fixture will not work for you if you place the lights in the shade of a large tree or under a bush. So, for getting the maximum usage, and maximum sunlight on the PV panel having it separate is best, but then you run into the problem of wires, and the need to bury them, or protect them somehow.

Solar landscape lights are not all created equal, many of the early versions of solar landscape lighting only offered poor lighting and a limited run time. The incandescent bulbs used in these fixtures burned out quickly and did not produce much light. They used lead-acid batteries, which were difficult to charge and had short life expectancy. Unfortunately some of these features are still a problem, so as you shop for your solar landscape lighting watch out for these features, especailly in lower-priced solar landscape lighting products.

You want to get solar landscape lights that use LED (light-emitting diode) light bulbs and nickel-cadmium or nickel-metal-hydride batteries. LED's produce brighter light, use much less electricity, and last significantly longer than the old incandescent bulbs. The new batteries take and hold a charge much better than the old lead-acid units. However, you should realize that even with these improved bulbs and batteries, solar landscape lighting won't be as bright as traditional low-voltage lighting.

Before you buy any solar landscape lights, check with the manufacturer or the store where you buy them on the availability of replacement bulbs and batteries. It will not do any good to install lighting that you cannot maintain.