Which nail lamp should I use to cure my gels?

The answer is pretty simple… the lamp the manufacturer of your gels recommends or a lamp with specifications that the brand recommends.

The sceptics among you may believe that a nail lamp is a nail lamp, I used to believe this myself, but knowing what I know now I can tell you that this is false.

 There are many factors that determine the efficacy of a UV/LED gel nail lamp, including but not limited to;

• Placement of the bulbs (are the bulbs placed in areas that are going to be most efficient for curing different fingers?)
• Number of bulbs
• Quality of bulbs
• Wavelength of the light being emitted by the bulbs
• Wattage of the lamp
• Irradiance value (intensity of the light emitted by the bulbs)
• Quality of the soldering in the elements of the lamp
• The materials used on the inside of the lamp ( does it have a reflective base and or roof?)

There is a common misconception that just matching the wavelength of the bulbs and or wattage of the lamp is enough to determine whether a lamp is suitable for your gels, if only it was as simple as this! In fact you can have a lamp of lower wattage offer a lot more power and curing efficacy than a lamp of a higher wattage because the lamp is of generally higher quality than the higher wattage lamp. At the end of the day the wattage is simply the amount of fuel that an electrical item will consume to operate but has little to do with the light being emitted by the machine.

Another factor to take into consideration is the lamp UV or LED?

 An LED lamp still emits UV light but the bulbs emitting the light are Light Emitting Diodes. LED lamps are more efficient and can cure gels typically faster and has less heat, they often consume less power and will therefore be a lower wattage.

 A UV lamp will have fluorescent tubes and will emit a broader spectrum of light but will consume more power and curing times will be longer.

 LED style lamps are the modern standard in the nail industry.

 As you can see there are many elements that will determine the quality and efficiency of a UV nail lamp and unfortunately, a universal nail lamp simply doesn't exist.