LED Headlight Bulbs: Bases, Bezels, and Bikes

Picking the right LED headlight bulb comes down to two things: the bulb type of your stock bulb and whether the new bulb's fan and driver will clear the back of your headlight housing. Match the bulb type and you have the right electrical plug. Confirm there is room behind the housing for the corded fan and driver, and you have a bulb that actually fits. Most fit problems people run into are the second part, not the first.

Below is how to read the bulb type codes, why the right type does not always guarantee a clean install, and what the specs on our bulbs actually mean.

How do I know which bulb type my bike uses?

Your headlight bulb type is a letter-and-number code stamped on the bulb or printed in the housing. The catch is that one bulb type often has several names, because the U.S. trade name and the European (ECE) name differ for the same bulb. If you know the name on your stock bulb, find it in the group below and order the matching bulb type.

The 9005 bulb type is the same bulb as HB3 and shares its fitting with H10, so a bulb listed as any of those three uses the 9005 fitting. The 9006 bulb type is also called HB4. The H11 bulb type belongs to a family that also covers H8, H9, and H16JP, which share the same fitting and differ mainly in wattage. The 9005 family and the H11 family look similar at a glance but are not interchangeable with each other, so read the code rather than eyeballing it.

The H7 bulb type stands on its own and is one of the most common single-beam types on motorcycles. The H4 bulb type, also called 9003 or HB2, is a dual-beam bulb: one bulb produces both your high and low beam. We also stock 9007 (HB5), H13 (9008), and 9004 (HB1), which are dual-beam bulbs that handle both beams in a single unit.

Each bulb is sold individually. Most motorcycles run one headlight, so one is usually all you need. If your bike or car has two headlights, order a pair.

Why does the right bulb type not always mean it will fit?

This is the part that surprises people. The mounting base on our bulbs is identical to the halogen bulb you are replacing, so the plug and the locking tabs are correct. What is different is the back of the bulb. To make room for the active cooling fan and the driver electronics, the electrical connection is on a cord rather than built straight into the base. The fan takes up roughly the same room behind the housing that your old bulb connection did, but the housing, the dust cap, or the area right behind the headlight needs enough clearance for the cord and the fan.

That is why a bulb of the correct type can still be a tight fit. The fan or heat sink may be too large for the bezel or the pocket behind the lens, the dust cap may not seat, or an OEM running-light setup can use adapters that complicate the swap. These are clearance problems, not wrong-type problems, and you only catch them by checking the actual space behind your headlight before you commit.

In practice: match the bulb type first, then confirm there is room behind your headlight for the cord and fan before you button everything up.

Fan-cooled vs passive cooling, and what the wattage means

Our bulbs use an active cooling fan rather than a passive heat sink with fins. The fan pulls heat off the LED chips so the bulb can run at full brightness without throttling down. We use a ball-bearing fan specifically because it outlasts a sleeve-bearing fan and handles heat and any mounting orientation better, which matters in a headlight that can sit at any angle and runs hot. The bulb itself is rated for a 50,000 hour lifespan and carries a 1 year warranty.

The wattage numbers are worth a look. The 9005 and 9006 draw 35 watts, down from the roughly 55 to 65 watts a halogen in those sizes pulls, while producing 4800 lumens. The H11 and H7 draw 25 watts and produce 2000 lumens, and the dual-beam H4 draws under 25 watts. All run a 6000K color and are IP67 waterproof on an 11 to 30 volt input.

Real output vs peak marketing numbers

Lumen numbers on aftermarket bulbs are not all measured the same way, which is why two bulbs claiming similar brightness can look very different on the road. On our H7, H11, and H4 pages we state the lumen figure as real output, not peak. The difference matters because peak numbers describe the most light a chip can briefly produce in a lab, not the steady, usable light coming out of the bulb. Chip placement matters just as much. If the chips are placed off the focal point, most of the light scatters instead of forming a clean beam, so a high lumen number on paper turns into a poorly focused beam in practice. We place the chips to match the focal point of the halogen bulb they replace so the light goes where the reflector aims it.

The dash says a bulb is out after the swap

On some vehicles, the dash throws a bulb-out warning after an LED conversion even though the new bulb is working fine. This is a headlight monitoring issue, and it is a different circuit from the turn-signal hyperflash problem that flasher relays and load equalizers solve. Do not mix the two up. The headlight monitor expects to see a halogen-level power draw, roughly 55 to 65 watts. Our LED bulbs draw far less (25 to 35 watts), so the monitor reads that lower draw as a burned-out bulb.

Most motorcycles have no headlamp bulb monitoring, so this never comes up. It is mainly automobiles that watch the headlight circuit, and even then it is fairly rare. If your vehicle does flag it, there are two fixes, one per bulb. The cleaner option is the LED Headlight Decoder/CanBus Module. Instead of wasting power as heat the way a resistor does, it signals the monitoring system to read a higher power draw than the bulb actually uses, without generating heat. The other option is the LED Headlight Resistor Kit, which is the resistor-based approach that dissipates the extra power as heat. The Decoder is what we recommend first because it does the same job without the added heat.

Installing the bulb

Installation is close to a stock bulb swap with one extra step. Remove the dust cap or cover behind the headlight and unplug your halogen bulb. There will be a retaining clip holding the bulb to the headlight housing.  Unfasten the clip and remove the bulb.  The LED bulb's base collar drops into the same socket and locks the same way, so seating it is familiar. However, it is important to note that the base collar should be removed from the LED bulb first, and fastened to the headlight housing with the retaining clip.  This is because the fan on the back of the bulb would interfere otherwise.  To remove the collar, simply twist the collar approximately 1/8 of a turn and then pull the collar straight off the tip of the LED bulb.  Then once fastened, the LED bulb can be re-installed into the collar.

Before you reinstall the dust cap, route the cord that connects to the driver and confirm the fan and cord have clearance behind the housing. This is exactly the clearance check described above. If the dust cap will not seat over the cord, you may need an extended cap or a small grommet so the cap closes around the cord. Plug it in, check your beam, and close everything up.

And very importantly, you must not restrict air flow around the fan in any way.  The fan must be able to exchange heat from the LED lamp with the environment.  If the air is trapped by a dust cover, there is no way for the fan to dissipate that heat properly and this WILL cause a premature failure of an LED headlight bulb.  Free airflow is critical.  If you can modify the dust cover to fit over the fan, so the fan is exposed, that is a good solution.  If it's a rigid dust cover, you may need to leave it off entirely.

The lineup

9005 LED Headlight Bulb (also HB3/H10). Single-beam, 4800 lumens at 35 watts, 6000K, with an active ball-bearing cooling fan and a 50,000 hour rating.

9006 LED Headlight Bulb (also HB4). Single-beam, 4800 lumens at 35 watts, 6000K, ball-bearing fan, 50,000 hour rating.

H11 LED Headlight Bulb (also H8/H9/H16JP). 2000 lumens of real output at 25 watts, 6000K, ball-bearing fan, 50,000 hour rating.

H7 LED Headlight Bulb. One of the most common single-beam types on motorcycles. 2000 lumens of real output at 25 watts, 6000K, ball-bearing fan, 50,000 hour rating.

H4 LED Headlight Bulb (also 9003/HB2). Dual-beam, so one bulb runs both high and low beam, rated at 1250/2000 lumens of real output per high/low beam, under 25 watts, 6000K, ball-bearing fan.

Not sure which bulb type your bike uses, or whether a bulb will clear your housing? Tell us your bike and what you are working with on our contact page and we will help you sort it out.