Design Vogue

Showers tend to be dimly lit spaces. General bathroom lighting is usually adequate for minimal shower needs, but adding shower lights can immensely brighten the shower and let you see exactly what you're doing: shaving, scrubbing, or soaping up. But safety, cleanliness, and design are also benefits of shower lighting. A well-lit shower provides safety by increasing visibility when moving in and out of the enclosure, preventing slips and falls. It’s easier to keep a shower clean when you can see all of the surfaces. Shower lighting also enhances the design of your bathroom by highlighting the aesthetics and different zones in this multi-purpose room.

When installing a light inside a shower, you’ll need to decide what kind of wet-rated fixture will work best for your space. Plus, there are a few methods of increasing the intensity of general bathroom lighting to help shine into the shower enclosure. Read on the learn more about shower lights and how to choose the right one.

Qualities of Good Shower Lighting

• Properly Located: The best type of shower lighting is located within the shower enclosure itself. General room lighting is a good supplement, but it can't shine on all areas of the shower enclosure. Most shower lights are located on the ceiling of the shower enclosure, which keeps the light away from most of the water. The ceiling is also easier to tap into for power than the shower surround. Place the fixture in the center of the ceiling over the shower, but you may need two to three lights in larger showers.
• Wet-Rated Fixtures: Any light fixture in a shower enclosure must be damp- or wet-rated. The National Electrical Code (NEC) 2020 410.10 (D) states that lights located within the shower to a height of eight vertical feet "shall be marked suitable for damp locations or marked suitable for wet locations."
• Brightness: Shower light fixtures should create a well-lit space so you can bathe and shave, safely move about, see all of your toiletries, and keep the enclosure clean without being too harsh or jarring. 
• Style: Although recessed and surface mount are the most practical fixture types for shower lights, sconces, spotlights, shower heads with integrated lights, and strip lighting mounted within niche shelving could be included in a shower’s light design plan.
  

Types of Shower Lights

Fixed Wet-Rated Recessed Shower Light

Sealed recessed lights have long been a feature in many showers, providing safe, dependable light to this dark area. The connected units—junction box and light housing—fit up into a hole in the ceiling plenum. A special trim package renders everything watertight.

Wet-rated recessed lights are inexpensive, simple to install, and come in plenty of style and size options. But the units do take up a lot of room in the ceiling plenum, and they aren't always insulation-contact–rated.

Low-Profile Wet-Rated Recessed Shower Light

Thin, low-profile recessed shower lights, sometimes called can-less shower lights, are newer on the market than the traditional, deep ceiling recessed lights.

Can-less shower lights hug the ceiling at less than 1/4-inch thick. The top portion of the light does extend into the ceiling plenum, but usually at less than 1/2 inch, allowing for insulation contact.

Low-profile wet-rated shower lights make it easy to group several lights in a small ceiling since they have no true housing and the junction boxes sit loosely on top of the ceiling drywall.

But low-profile shower lights are always LED. While LED lights draw less power than halogen or incandescent bulbs, the stark white light isn't for everyone. Many can-less LED fixtures have adjustable switches that allow you to change the light color to be more similar to incandescent or halogen lights, though.

Gimbal Wet-Rated Recessed Shower Light

A gimbal light swivels 360 degrees and tilts up and down between 0 and 35-40 degrees. In a wet-rated recessed shower light, the bulb is no longer sealed behind a watertight lens. Instead, the entire light unit is waterproof.

Gimbal recessed shower lights give the user the flexibility to turn the light in nearly any direction. You can even turn the light toward the shower wall for a soft, washed-wall glow. They're especially useful if the shower ceiling happens to be sloped.

Yet gimbal shower lights are up to three times more expensive than fixed lights. And when fully tilted, gimbal units can lose some of their light.

Wet-Rated Ceiling Surface-Mount Shower Light

A recess is usually desired with shower lights due to the low height of most shower ceilings. But some users may want surface-mount shower lights, especially if the ceiling is high enough to afford the extra protrusion.

Surface-mount shower lights illuminate all of the shower instead of just part of it. But choices are few. Styles are limited to plain, white units that are either circle- or square-shaped.

Things to Consider When Choosing a Shower Light

Size

The size of your shower light will depend on the size of the shower. Too big or too small will look unbalanced. The most common recessed light sizes are 4-inch, 5-inch, 6-inch, and 7-inch.

Wattage

For bathrooms in general, 60-watt incandescent bulbs or 7 to 9-watt LED bulbs provide the most brightness while still being flattering, though you can use 75-watts for larger or even brighter spaces. If 60 watts is too bright for a shower, choose a lower wattage or use dimmers to adjust the light level. Watts indicate how much energy you’ll use to power your lights, not the actual light level, but we often think of brightness in terms of the number of incandescent watts. LED light packaging often shows incandescent watt equivalents on packaging as a guide.

Color Temperature

Determine if you want the color temperature of your shower to be cool or warm. Cool, bright light works well in bathrooms, especially for tasks like applying makeup and shaving, but warm, yellow light can be more relaxing for bathing and less harsh for late-night bathroom trips. If opting for cool light—with bulbs labeled as daylight, cool white, or bright white—consider adding dimmer switches for the shower fixture to temper some of the brightness.

Style

Since most shower lights are located on the ceiling, to minimize water exposure, recessed lights and surface-mount lights are the most typical styles, but sconces or recessed lighting in shower niches are other creative options.

Trim

Shower light fixtures use shower trim that is water-resistant. Shower trim comes in a range of finishes—from white to bronze, from nickel to black—that can match the other light fixtures in the bathroom.

Water Resistance

Shower light fixtures need to be water-resistant for safety. Make sure the fixture is either damp-rated, which can withstand moist environments, or wet-rated, which can be directly exposed to water. Since showers tend to be enclosed spaces with a lot of water splashing around, wet-rated fixtures are the more common option.

How to Increase Light in a Shower

Instead of installing a light in the shower, another option is to increase the intensity of your bathroom's general area lighting. Even if you do install a wet-rated shower light, you might still want to improve the quality of the room's general lighting.

• For shower/tub combinations, install a glass shower enclosure instead of a shower curtain.
• Install frameless glass shower enclosures, which let more light pass through than glass framed shower enclosures.
• You can replace dark shower surrounds with lighter colors.
• Rotate gimbal recessed lights in the main bathroom area toward the shower.
• Paint the bathroom a lighter color.
• Replace the main bathroom area ceiling light dome with a clear dome.
• Or clean the existing dome so that more light passes through.