LED Lanterns are perhaps the most useful portable lights — they can be used as camp lights, work lights, or emergency lights. The LEDs inside aren’t susceptible to shocks, and they burn for decades.
The Brightest LED Lantern: Rayovac Sportsman Lantern
The Rayovac Sportsman Lantern shines with 300 lumens of light, which makes one of the brightest LED camping lantern available. It is enough to illuminate your tent or cooking area with plenty of light.
The lantern runs on three D-size batteries. I recommend using “low-self discharge” NiMH batteries like Imedion D-size batteries (see our review of these batteries here).
The Rayovac Sportsman Lantern is available from Amazon for about $26.
The Most Versatile: Coleman LED Lantern
The Coleman LED lantern produces a total of 190 lumens of light. It’s not as bright as the 300 lumen Rayovac Sportsman Lantern, but it does have a few compelling features. First, it has four detachable panels, allowing you split the lantern into four independent LED lights, each powered by their own AA batteries. These lights are intended to be used as portable lights for trips to the bathroom or tent.
The base unit itself is powered by eight D-size batteries, providing a total of 75 hours of illumination.
I recommend using rechargeable Imedion D-size batteries for the base unit, and Eneloop AAs for the individual panels.
The Coleman LED Quad lantern is available from Amazon for about $40.
Average Amazon rating: 4.7 out of 5 stars from 774+ reviewers
The Best Budget Mini-Lantern: Coleman Mini Lantern
Average Amazon rating: 4.4 out of 5 stars from 119+ reviewers
This LED lantern from Coleman is the highest rated AA-batery powered LED Lantern on Amazon. It shines with 85 lumens of light for 6 hours using just three AA batteries.
The Coleman 3AA High-Tech LED Mini Lantern is available at Amazon for around $20.
The Best Overall Mini Lantern: Black Diamond Apollo LED Lantern
Average Amazon rating: 4.7 out of 5 stars from 97+ reviewers
The Black Diamond Apollo lantern runs on 4 AA batteries. Reviewers like the even light of this lantern, which can shine at maximum of 80 lumens for 15 hours, or at (up to 60 hours at 10 lumens). The Apollo also features a dimmer switch and battery-life indicator.
The Black Diamond Apollo LED Lantern is available at Amazon for about $34.
Can anyone suggest Lanterns that work safely and effectively on Rechargeable Ni-MH AA Batteries.
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One good lantern is roadeavouer also! Must try!
How far have we come from the large 2 mantle kerosene and white gas burning lanterns that needed to pumped incessantly to maintain gas pressure? I haven’t camped in a while but I certainly like the look of the illumination products on the market today. Less is more and long live the LED. Do moths still fly into them?