Candela

What is candela?

Candela is the unit of light output and is indicated by the letters "cd". The word comes from Latin and literally means candle. Hence, one candela roughly corresponds to the light output of a normal candle. But what exactly is light output? Light output indicates how much light there is in each piece of the beam. Candela is also one of the seven basic units of the SI system. The other basic units are: time in seconds, length in metres, mass in kilograms, electronic current in amperes, absolute temperature in kelvins and amount of substance in mol.

Relation between candela, lumen and lux

When talking about candela, the terms lumen and lux are also often mentioned. This is because the three terms are closely related to each other. This is because lumens indicate the total luminous flux of a beam. So this is slightly different compared to total light output. The number of lux indicates how much light reaches the desired area. So this helps to determine the light image. Lux and lumen are directly connected.

When a beam with a strength of one lumen falls on an area of exactly one square metre, you are dealing with one lux. So the three terms all have different meanings, but they are related. The three terms indicate how much light a light emits and how much light it produces.

Different units

As there are many different types of lighting, each with its own strength, there are also different units for candela. There are only two, one larger unit and one smaller unit. With a factor of ^10-3, one speaks of a Mill candela. The letters mcd stand for Mill candela. With a factor of¹⁰³, one speaks of a kilocandela. The letters kcd stand for kilocandela.