Best garden lighting 2020: lights for every garden decor and occasion

Looking for the best garden lighting, with the darker autumn nights in mind? Garden lighting is the easiest way to ensure you can enjoy your garden during the darker, cooler months, and it makes a great stylistic addition to your garden, too.

Garden lighting is simpler during the summer months, when you can just light a few candles or lanterns. With proper planning, however, you can create truly beautiful illumination in your garden whatever the season. The autumn and winter, think sturdier, weatherproof lighting, and more of it. 

Next, decide where you want to position your lighting: will you be suspending yours above a dining area or patio, or placing it on the table or porch? Then, choose from one of our top picks. 

If you need a bit more practical advice first, find guidance in our guide to how to plan your garden lighting. Then, check out our sourcebook of garden suppliers for all your garden shopping needs. 

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What are the best garden lights?

The most decorative garden lights are fairy lights, which can be woven intricately through trees, trellises, shrubs or bushes to create a subtle, atmospheric feel. In that instance, 100 Warm White Micro Solar Fairy Lights from Lights4fun are our top pick.

Alternatively, sculpture pieces, like the Solar Bay Tree Lights, are a fantastic ‘quick fix’ decorative solution and can be placed along entrance ways or pathways for a pretty, illuminating feature. Read on for more information on both – and more.

The best garden lighting you can buy right now

Truly the most versatile garden lighting option, these Warm White Micro Solar Fairy Lights are special for two reasons. Firstly, the lightbulbs are micro sized, which creates a really beautiful and subtle effect or a dazzling glow if you use multiple strings. Secondly, the bendy wire allows for total freedom of expression: tie them around your favourite garden tree, or bunch them up and display them in a jar.  

Lights4fun promise eight hours of illumination on the solar setting, but you can run them off AA batteries during the colder months. The 3m cable lead is plenty to work with. 

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These multi-purpose, Long Life Lamp Company Outdoor Garden Spike Lights are a great choice if you’re looking for a subtle security feature or a way to illuminate a garden path.

Mains powered, they’re a much more reliable choice than solar power, and they’re capable of a much brighter output, too. They’re compatible with both LED and halogen bulbs, and with white, blue, green and red just some of the colours available, there’s plenty of scope for you to make them the perfect decorative feature for your garden.  

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If you’re looking to create a stylish outside area in which to wine and dine, this modern John Lewis Strom LED Outdoor Wall Light could be the perfect choice. Available in copper, silver and black, these mains powered lights will provide your outside area with a warm, reliable light. Unlike our previous choice, the wall light comes with long-lasting LED bulbs, which can be dimmed to create your ideal ambiance.  

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Taking inspiration from traditional nautical style, this David Hunt Admiral Wall Light combines the old with new ideas to create contemporary lighting that will look great on your outside wall.

Designed in the UK and made in the Cotswolds, those passionate about investing in UK products will be pleased to know about the origins of this unique light. Blending textures, colours and materials, David Hunt has a range of nautical themed lighting, enabling you to create an exterior theme for your outside area.  

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If you’re looking to invest in garden lighting to place near windows and doors, you may want to look at low level lighting, which won’t filter inside and interrupt sleeping. 

While strong and sturdy, these Nordlux Vejers Outdoor Wall Lanterns  have been designed to softly filter light downwards, rather than outwards, which means the light emitted is contained, rather than dispersed. Featuring anti-rust coating with a black stainless steel finish, these are traditional lights that will look great in almost any outside environment. 

Shop more wall lights at John Lewis, and find more porch lights in our buyer's guide.

These Argos Home festoon lights have the beautiful shape of vintage tungsten lightbulbs, and look whimsical and delicate when put up in a tree or above your garden dining table on a string. Solar powered, they won’t cost you anything to run. And at just £20 for 20, these lights are incredibly cost effective, making them a great addition to your outside area.  

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Love having candles out in the garden, but are concerned about safety, or rainy weather? These good-looking, battery-powered LED candle lights from Lights4fun can withstand any weather, with clever small holes at the top and bottom allowing rain water to drain instead of pooling inside them. The amber LED lights flicker to create a realistic candlelit ambience, and the plastic used for the body is durable and smooth. You can also set these lights on a six-hour timer, so you won't need to remember to switch them off when you go in. 

How to buy the best garden lights

Function

Before you choose garden lighting, you'll want to think carefully about the function you'd like it to serve. Practical, aesthetic, or both?

Wall lights are the perfect example of a practical yet decorative garden lighting, and they’re a warmer alternative to harsh floodlights which are probably a bit too intrusive if you’re planning on having friends round for an evening BBQ. Outdoor wall lights exist in all shapes and sizes, providing an opportunity for style aficionados to indulge their keen eye in their garden, as well as their interior decor.

Those who are tired of tripping over the edges of their garden path may want to consider floor lights. Floor lights are often solar powered, so they’ll be ready and waiting to guide you safely down the middle of your path every time you return home in the dark. Our second pick, Long Life Lamp Company Outdoor Garden Spike Lights, provides an effective, decorative parameter for those who want to avoid stepping on their delicate shrubs in the dark. 

Power

As we’ve already suggested, garden lighting is, more often than not, solar powered, which means it involves absolutely no running costs. That being said, it relies on the sun’s power for their charge, so you may find that the light begins to dim fairly early into the night if the day has been particularly dull. Alternatively, you can purchase mains powered lights. These are often more powerful and are a more reliable addition, especially if you plan to be hosting late evenings in your garden during the summer. 

Looking for more garden advice and inspiration?

• Best outdoor flood lights: 5 security lights for your garden
• How to plan and design a new garden from scratch