Energy · 1879
Incandescent light bulb
A glowing carbon filament in vacuum gives safe indoor electric light.
Joseph Swan in England and Thomas Edison in the US produced practical vacuum bulbs in 1878 to 1880; Edison's carbonized-bamboo filament lasted over 1,200 hours. Lighting was the first mass market for electricity and paid for the first power stations.
What it built on 3
What it led to 3
Watch
Related measurements
The dashed line marks when it first worked.
Efficacy of selected lighting devices Latest: 303 lumens per watt (2014) Source: Nordhaus 1996, Do Real-Output and Real-Wage Measures Capture Reality? The History of Lighting Suggests Not, Table 1.3; Semiconductor Today, 26 Mar 2014: Cree breaks 300 lm/W
Price of light in the UK Latest: 2.15 £ (2000) per million lumen-hours (2023) Source: Our World in Data
US households with electric power Latest: 99 % of households (2005) Source: Our World in Data