Best Flashlight Brand

BushcrafterAU

Newly Enlightened
Joined
May 9, 2018
Messages
45
Location
Australia
So far I have only experienced Olight, Nitecore, Maglite, and LED LENSER.
The quality of the first three I mentioned is amazing! The 4th is OK.
But there are other production brands out there, and I'd like to know which ones are the best for:
1. Overall Quality
2. High lumens to size ratio
3. Throw
4. EDC
5. Tactical
 

rayman

Flashlight Enthusiast
Joined
May 6, 2008
Messages
1,219
Location
Germany
Thats a good question but I also think a rather individual one. For my part (based on my current and past collection) I would say:
1. JETBeam (depends on the specific flashlight)
2. Klarus (Mini Ti)
3. Tiablo
4. FourSevens
5. Nitecore
 

ven

Flashaholic
Joined
Oct 17, 2013
Messages
22,533
Location
Manchester UK
Fenix are a good brand along with zebralight as well. Emisar a good budget brand yet competes(even surpasses ) some more expensive brands.

There is no best, also can boil down to how the manufacturers are ,come that day of failure. Be it shipping off to the other side of the world, or life time warranty of some brands.

Malkoff
HDS(not highest lumens, but after a while, other than fun, most can get by with a couple of 100 of them).
To name a couple of excellent brands that have your back for life! Yes cost more up front, years down the line, there are potential savings as well. Not to mention no inconvenience of weeks.....months without a light!

Just thoughts, best depends really on many factors. Reliability is one of the most important for me , along with choices of LED/colour temps as well, UI included. I don't want to look at washed out cold subjects , no matter what the brand. Nor do I want to click through SOS and strobes every time.
 

XR6Toggie

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Nov 4, 2017
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125
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Victoria, Australia
For me it's a toss up between Malkoff and Streamlight. I really like the durability, simplicity and versatility of both their product lines.
 

mortuus

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Joined
Mar 25, 2011
Messages
132
Olight for me in terms of quality and good looking flashlights in terms of size and edc also they win for me, the s1 baton was the reason i started getting interested in higher end flashlights and having one in copper doesnt hurt , i used ultrafire back then .. but yea have a few olights and they never failed me.
 

Lumen83

Enlightened
Joined
Sep 21, 2017
Messages
551
I think the highest quality lights in terms of durability, ruggedness, and reliability are Malkoff, Elzetta, and Surefire. They're probably a good fit for your "tactical" category as well.
 

Feahnor

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Joined
Jan 29, 2017
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11
I really like thrunite. They are solid, not expensive and well built.
 

seadial

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Oct 13, 2018
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7
"Quality fit for purpose" is a phrase that comes to mind. Hence "best flashlight brand" is a somewhat relative term and i have had some useful Dorcy brand flashlights that were good value for money such as their "Flashlight of the Future" 1 watt Luxeon Star model which pumped out more light than its specs suggested. I owned two of them, one was a spare unopened in its blister packaging which a burglar made off with about two years ago.
 

drexter

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Sep 30, 2018
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Fl
Based on my experience, Zebralight, Surefire and Fenix are the best.
 

Monocrom

Flashaholic
Joined
Aug 27, 2006
Messages
19,844
Location
NYC
Also from experience:
SureFire
Fenix

And.... I just realized those are the only two brands I have extensive experience with, with several models that all proved to be super reliable.

Other brands.... One or two models that have proven to be reliable on a normal day. While other brands I've had numerous lights that have had one or two models that failed miserably and completely. And then there's Nitecore. Handful of lights from that brand, and all have proven unreliable.

Special place in my heart for my Fenix L0D rebel 80. I lucked out and got one of the reliable ones. (Some of you might remember the controversy that went down with the Rebel 80 version of the L0D many years ago.) One night, when I absolutely needed my light to work, my Night-Ops Gladius completely failed on me! Thankfully I had my L0D to finish the job.

I'll sell my L0D when Hades freezes over, and the man in the red suit starts handing out free snowcones. (And no, I don't mean Santa. The other guy in a red suit.)
 
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