USB Lighting

[NT2C]

Onite USB Lights - 5/5
 
I have more Onite USB-powered lights than all other USB light types combined and they represent pretty much every variation that Onite has sold within the last 6 years.  Simple on/off in both cold white (1x) and warm white (3x), dimmable touch-switch in warm white (1x) (this model is no longer available), dimmable color-temperature selectable button switch (2x), right up to the most recent 3-color dimmable (1x).  Yes, I've bought eight lights from them, plus splitters, extension cables, and dimmers.  What can I say, Onite makes some good stuff!
 
L to R, on/off only, touch dimmable, color selectable / dimmable, newest 3-color dimmable:
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These lights are great.  Okay, I'd love it if they were weatherproof (they're not), but that's about the only downside.  I've also had several friends who have bought them as emergency lights on my suggestion.  Last year, right after buying one, a friend had a power outage and posted a picture on Facebook showing her cooking dinner (gas stove) by the light of it and thanked me for the recommendation.
 
They're all variations on a theme.  It's a light-bulb shaped light with a metal hook and a 6-foot-ish cord with an inline switch and a USB-A plug on the end.  That's it.  But the lights are all around 600 lumens (on high), which makes them bright enough to light up a room.  Because of the half-globe, they also spread the light out fairly evenly:
 
One of the lights set up in my basement:
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Part of the reason that I have so many of them is that I've put together basic kits (using water resistant bags) that contain a light, some attachment methods (zip tie, carabiner, paracord, velcro cable ties), and a USB power bank.  I can then loan those out to people if needed, so that they'll have at least one good area light. 
 
One of the kits spread out, with a full kit still in the bag (on the right).  The bags are just basic 600D nylon, but I applied a coat of water repellent to help keep the contents dry and they have a loop on them that can be used to hang the bag with the power bank in it.
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This past weekend I worked at our local fireworks / carnival as part of our local CERT group.  For the last six or seven years, I've always provided a light for our pop-up so that we can see at night.  That light has almost always been one of these Onite lights and I've gotten multiple comments over the years about how useful they are.  This year, I added some USB-powered cafe lights as well, but the main light in the middle is one of the color selectable, dimmable Onite lights.  It's hard to see, but there's also a power bank strapped onto the frame right in the middle next to the light. The picture is fairly true-to-life on how bright it was:
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In short, they're inexpensive, don't draw much power (about 6.5w max on high with the medium color setting - which uses both the warm and cold LEDs at the same time), and really light up the area well.  Would I recommend them?  Absolutely!  These continue to be my go-to for area lighting using USB power banks.
 

I too have various sets of the Onite lights, all the splitters, etc. and, combined with a good power bank, find that they are more than adequate to light up a room, or most of our home, for long periods of time.  The lights are 5W ea and one of my 50,000 mAh banks can easily keep four of them running all night long.

[EBuff75]

How much power do these draw in laymans terms? Like how big are your power banks? How long will one run off the power bank? How many can you hook up at once and realistically run? How far can you run extensions?

I have a ton of different power banks, so there isn't just one answer.  The best way is to do some quick math.  On your power bank, you should have some small print that shows the capacity, hopefully in watt-hours (Wh).  

If your USB power bank only has the milliamp (mah) listed, you can still calculate the Wh capacity by dividing the mah by 1000 to get amp-hours and then multiplying by the voltage of the power bank, which is usually 3.7v.  E.g. if it's a 10,000mah bank, that would become 10 amp-hours, multiplied by 3.7v would be 37 Wh (watt-hours). 

Most power banks can't use their full capacity due to internal losses, which makes the usable capacity more like 80-90%.  I'll use 85% as a mid-range, which now makes our 37Wh into about 31.5Wh. 

The Onite light that draws the most power uses about 6.5w, so now we just divide the number above by that to see how long the power bank would run it, which would be right around 4.8hrs.  Of course, if I used a different setting on the light (either using the yellow light or cold white), or dimmed the light, the draw would be less and the USB power bank would last longer, but that's how the calculations work.

How many I could connect at once would depend on the exact power bank.  I'd basically be limited by the number of ports and the total output that the individual bank is capable of. 

I'm not sure how far I could run an extension.  The ones that I have max out around 20 or 25ft and those work fine.  But rather than using extensions, I just purchased a number of different power banks.  That makes it much easier to spread the lights around however I need to, or to loan them to friends / neighbors (give them one of the lights in its bag along with a power bank to use).

Lastly, how long to recharge your power banks with say a solar panel? How many days do you think you could light a small living room and kitchen? Just trying to get a general idea of how long you could get by with one of your kits?

How long to recharge on solar?  Same issue as above - I have a variety of solar panels, ranging from 5w up to 200w, so there isn't a single answer.  For the larger panels, those are intended to charge up the big power stations and generally don't have a USB output for charging smaller power banks like the ones used here.  However, I could charge those off of the large power stations if I wanted.  Charging speed on a power bank varies, and you'd need to remember that even a large panel can't necessarily use it's full output to charge a power bank if the input on it is limited (e.g. it uses 5v micro-USB at 2amps, then it can only accept up to 10w of output from the panel.

The power bank in the pictures above is 26,800mah, or 99.16Wh.  Using the same calculations as above, that would work out to around 13hrs of run time at the max output.  With two of the lights, you'd just divide that in half.  Hopefully you'd only need to use the lights a few hours each night, which should let you run a pair of them for several days on a charge.  That's an older power bank, so it uses micro-USB and is limited to 10w charging speed, which would require 10+ hrs of solar to charge it directly. 

Oh ya. And how much do these cost and from where? This is a great idea. So much more efficient than a lantern or flashlight.

I bought all of mine from Amazon, which appears to be their main point of sale here in the US.  A quick search also turned them up on Temu, eBay, and Walmart, but the best prices look to be on Amazon.  The basic on/off version is around $9 (there may be sellers who have them slightly cheaper, caveat emptor) and the newest 3-color version goes for around $15.  All of them are linked in the initial post.  Sometimes models go out of stock for a bit, but you can sometimes find them in different amounts (single, two-pack, or even four-pack) and they usually show back up again in a few weeks anyway. 

Flashlights and lanterns are great for their purposes, but for general room lighting, I love these things!  One of the problems with a lantern is that they're generally something you sit right in front of you on a table, which means you constantly have glare in your eyes.  A light that can be hooked up onto something higher up (yes, some lanterns can do that too) spreads the light out better and doesn't blind you by being in your line of sight.  I've hooked these onto room light fixtures, tops of cabinets, tent frames, or even the ceiling vents on my Suburban.  Heck, I carry one of them in my Suburban so that I always have that as an interior lighting option if needed.

Hope that helps!

[EBuff75]

Last year, right after buying one, a friend had a power outage and posted a picture on Facebook showing her cooking dinner (gas stove) by the light of it and thanked me for the recommendation.

I ran into this friend today and we got to talking about... lights!

She's a self-published author (steampunk / fantasy) and frequently goes to events where she has a table set up to sell her books.  Earlier this year she asked for recommendations on how to light up her table in a poorly-lit event space.  We went back and forth with some ideas to try to keep the lighting "in character' for her booth, but in the short-term, she just took along a couple of USB power banks and two Onite lights.  

One of the lights was good enough for her table, but as it got later and the event space got darker, she noticed that the author across from her didn't have any lighting and his table was completely dark.  She asked if he had a USB power bank and when he said yes, she loaned him the 2nd light.  He was so happy with it that he got the Amazon link from her so that he could buy his own!

[NT2C]

Last year, right after buying one, a friend had a power outage and posted a picture on Facebook showing her cooking dinner (gas stove) by the light of it and thanked me for the recommendation.

I ran into this friend today and we got to talking about... lights!

She's a self-published author (steampunk / fantasy) and frequently goes to events where she has a table set up to sell her books.  Earlier this year she asked for recommendations on how to light up her table in a poorly-lit event space.  We went back and forth with some ideas to try to keep the lighting "in character' for her booth, but in the short-term, she just took along a couple of USB power banks and two Onite lights. 

One of the lights was good enough for her table, but as it got later and the event space got darker, she noticed that the author across from her didn't have any lighting and his table was completely dark.  She asked if he had a USB power bank and when he said yes, she loaned him the 2nd light.  He was so happy with it that he got the Amazon link from her so that he could buy his own!

Maybe something like this to keep with the vibe?

https://www.olightstore.com/haloop-rechargeable-metal-light

or this:

https://www.olightstore.com/olantern-classic-mini-rechargeable-led-camping-lantern