NICREW Full Spectrum LED Aquarium Light, Timer

I bought this light to enhance the growth of my live plants in my Aqueon 10 Gallon tank.
I’ve only been using about 5 days, so I can’t comment on the difference it has had on my plants, but I really enjoy having more than one colour option. The timer is handy, too. My favourite thing is the adjustable brightness. This way, I can ensure my plants that require less lighting will be safe. The yellow setting is a nicer brightness than a typical white light.
I use the blue setting on the lowest brightness during the night. It creates a relaxing glow in my bedroom that isn’t bothersome.
I still haven’t figured out how to use the red light. I’ve tried all of the buttons and read the instructions. Maybe that feature is broken on my light?
Overall, it’s a fantastic product. Easy to use. Worth the money if you’re purchasing for a 10 gallon.

Works as expected

Bought this light in March and it gave my aquarium some awesome plant growth with the spectrum of light that it provides. I didn’t quite get the timer down but that’s okay for now. I just manually switched from white to blue when it was time. Great product for the price. The light itself went out on me exactly on the last day of the year, December 31st. Didn’t even make it a full year and it was done for.
I contacted the customer service about the issue and after some troubleshooting and 1 dead light, NICREW helped me remedy the problem.
I will definitely be purchasing more products from them. 👍👍

This just randomly stopped working almost a year to the day from purchase. I was never a fan of this light from the start. It would work normally for a while then even with resetting the timer, it started going on and off at random times. I’ve decided to purchase a light from a different brand that I have for all my other tanks that’s actually cheaper and much more reliable!

Edit to add: after writing my review, the company reached out to me. They requested a video showing what was going wrong and unfortunately I had already thrown the light out. They kindly refunded me for my purchase. I will give the product another try since they stood behind their product!

I have this on my 10-gallon aquarium. It’s a very nice, capable light. The dimmer/mode settings are terrific and the timer is such a helpful feature and it works flawlessly. I am very happy I chose this one. It has been in daily use for several months now with no issues.

Pros:
Slim size
Timer mode
Independent white and blue mode
Multiple brightness settings for white and blue lights
Amazing customer service!

Cons:
Blue light doesn’t work with timer mode
Timer appears to reset every time the unit loses power
Could be jarring for fish? See below on that.

Disclaimer: this is my first foray into an aquarium light specifically for growing plants. Prior to this light I was using two led tubes that fit into my hood. So I’m not the most experienced in these matters.

I chose this light in particular for two reasons. 1) the timer mode which will automatically ramp up and down the lights and 2) the slim size which allows me to sit this light over my existing hood.

I need to keep a cover on to keep my nerites safely inside and I didn’t want to invest in a new glass cover just now. This light sits directly on top of the acrylic portion of my existing hood with no light loss, which would have occurred with a wider light. This is working great for my set up without having to spend additional money on a glass cover.

In terms of the timer mode, it’s pretty good but not perfect. I have some glo fish and my kids use the tank as a sort of nightlight so I really like the blue light and use this feature every night. But the timer mode does not operate the blue light. So after the ramp down at night I have to change the mode to blue. Then in the morning when the light timer switches on, it’s the blue light again. As far as I can tell, I have to switch the mode again before the unit will ramp up the daylight. That somewhat defeats the purpose of the light timer and the timer mode on the unit. But this would be a non-issue if I didn’t want to run the blue light at night.

The timer mode also seems to fail if the unit loses power. The instructions are not exactly clear but I think what happens is the timer starts counting from the time the unit first receives power. It just happens that in the short time I’ve had this unit we’ve had some severe weather and power flickers. After that happened the tank would be dark every time and it seems like the timer was starting over from when I restarted the lights. So then I have to manually restart them and also shut them off at night. I could be wrong on this, and maybe it’s because my timer is a smart plug. Perhaps with an old school manual timer this wouldn’t happen.

Another thing to consider (and here’s where it was definitely a noobie error) but this light is BRIGHT! I don’t think it was a coincidence that shortly after setting it up I had two fish jump out while I was working in the tank. I saw one and scooped him up immediately but sadly I didn’t see the other jump and found him on the floor a couple days later. If I had to do it again I would definitely take advantage of the unit’s multiple brightness settings and introduce the light more slowly.

I can’t speak to how well this will grow my plants but I’ve just set up a c02 system and I’m hoping my low to medium light plants will really take off now.

One other thing to mention is nicrew’s amazing customer service. The first light I received was missing the power supply so I reached out directly to them. The communication with nicrew’s customer service was prompt, extremely courteous and helpful. I received a replacement power supply within a few days.

Overall I’m happy with this light. Even though it has a couple of weak points, it’s also an entry level light and priced accordingly. If I ever end up upgrading I would not hesitate to buy another nicrew!