The cheapest of these: the GE Basic 65-watt Equivalent Floodlight LED, available now at Lowe's in a six-pack that costs $17. That comes out to less than $3 per bulb.

Most folks think of 60-watt light bulbs as the basic standard for common household lighting. If you want something brighter, you upgrade to, say, a 100-watt bulb.

Whether you’re after a basic replacement bulb or a color-capable light bulb with smart features, you’re in the right place.

This new A19 smart bulb plays nice with Ring doorbells, security cameras, and motion-sensing lights, but it lacks the advanced features that some other smart lighting systems offer.

However, for this article, we're going to accept the basic benefits of the technology and look at examples from two leading retailers, Costco and Home Depot, to assess who sells the better LED bulb.

Left-to-right: Teardown of GE 7,500 hour “Basic”, GE 15,000 hour “Classic”, and 25,000-hour Cree A19 LED bulbs. There’s more to an LED bulb than just the LEDs.

These smart devices can transform the ambiance and comfort levels of any space in the time it takes to open an app and screw in a light bulb.

Early adopters of LED lighting will remember 50,000 hour or even 100,000 hour lifetime ratings printed on the box. But during a recent trip to the hardware store the longest advertised lifetime I f… ...