New Build: LED Recessed Lights or Incandescent with LED bulb

Just curious of the pro's and con's of going with incandescent recessed lights and installing the LED bulbs instead.
Price per watt for those that have installed them in a new build?
Would you install the same amount of recessed lights if you went with the LED bulb?
Most builders I talk to dont include LED as a standard and charge a hefty upgrade.
Phillips and Cree seem to be improving technology and getting better output.
Plus I like the option to put in a smart bulb at a later date that has smart features.

We have all new LED lights in the office and some are starting to fail (maybe 2%). A bulb would be easier to swap instead of trying to find a matching recessed light.

What do you mean by incandescent with an LED bulb? An incandescent light is a type of bulb, so your question is confusing me. And when you say recessed, do you mean downlights or actual recessed (canister) housings with traditional-looking LED bulbs in them. Some pictures might explain what I need:

Downlight:



There are many different styles of downlights.

Recessed light:



There is seperate bulb in that housing.

Incandescent bulb:



LED bulb:

Sorry let me clarify
For downlights am I better off to install LED down lights or standard recessed lights made for an incandescent bulb. I can install an LED bulb of my liking (colour and wattage).

The recessed canister (my second picture above) is not just made for an incandescent bulb, so I'm not entirely sure why you are describing it that way; however, be that as it may, you have figured out that you can use LED lightbulbs in the canister, so that is fine...and yes, those bulbs could be smart bulbs like Hue or LIFX. Some LED down lights (my first picture above) are an integrated unit with both the housing (fixed or gimbal type) and bulb as one, but many are seperate so the bulbs can be changed over, including for smart light bulbs - Philips Hue GU10 comes to mind.

IMHO the main issue with these is the size of the hole in your ceiling and the affect it has on your insulation - the bigger the hole the more heat escapes out and in. In terms of cost, it pretty much depends on what you want to pay. You can get downlights as cheap as a few dollars and also costing hundreds. Maybe the expensive ones are more efficient and so there is a trade off. In the end, if they are all LEDs the running costs should be roughly the same, so whether you go for a downlight or a canister with an LED bulb fitted is a matter of choice.

A well designed LED downlight with a constant current LED driver will outlast and outperform an LED globe in a traditional fitting in every metric by a substantial margin. That being said, most of the LED downlights at the cheaper end of the market are so woeful in terms of beam and glare control that a traditional downlight with an LED globe may not be a bad solution.

The downlight that arcadelt has shared is a pretty good one. Also the Trend Lighting Econoled is great for the price.

Downlights aren't the be-all end-all of lighting though. The flexibility of LED has opened up so many possibilities for creative lighting, such as the use of concealed LED strip and so on.