Best Dorm Room Lighting Ideas for 2024

Back-to-school season is fast approaching, and college-bound students likely have one thing on their mind: dorm room essentials. While picking out the perfect bedding, storage solutions, and desk accessories are often top priorities, lighting is a crucial element that should not be forgotten. The right lighting can transform a drab dorm room into a cozy space perfect for studying, relaxing, and socializing. We’ve listed our top dorm room lighting ideas below to help you prepare for the upcoming school year.

Purpose: Most dorm rooms have a single, bright overhead light. However, this light may be overpowering in the early mornings or late evenings. Choosing an ambient light source ensures you have enough practical light for times when you do not want to use the overhead light. Lighting is also a great option to decorate and personalize your room. Our favorite multifunctional lighting listed below serves both a practical and decorative purpose.

Location: Think about spaces in your dorm room that can benefit from supplemental lighting. You will most likely need lighting around your desk to get ready early in the morning or study late at night. If your bed can be lofted, the area underneath can be illuminated with colorful lighting for hangouts. Choose lighting that can effectively light up the areas you need to be lit.

Mounting: You should choose temporary, dorm room-safe mounting techniques to not damage the walls or furniture when you move out at the end of the year. We suggest using removable hanging hooks or thumbtacks as miniature hooks (if your dorm allows them) to hang your lighting. Double-check with your housing office’s preferred mounting solutions before installing any lighting.

Limited Wall Outlets: Be aware that your dorm room may have limited wall outlets, so you will most likely need to use extension cords or surge protectors. All of the lights listed below use LEDs, which are incredibly energy efficient and use less energy than traditional lighting solutions. This means you can plug these lights into surge protectors and extension cords without the fear of overloading the circuit.

Room Size: Dorm rooms are often small and have limited desk and dresser space. Bulky desk lamps and floor lamps could take away precious surface areas better suited for other items. The recommended lighting options on this list can be hung from walls to help free up surface space.

Color Coordinate: For a seamless blend of all the elements in your room, coordinate your light’s output colors with your room's decor. This will help create an appealing, cohesive look.

LED strip lights are one of the most popular options for dorm room lighting. These compact lights are perfect for saving space while providing bright illumination. Available in single-color, single CCT, tunable white, RGB, RGB+W, dim-to-warm, and color-changing outputs, they offer endless possibilities for personalizing your room's ambiance. Using a variety of remote controls or smartphone apps, program traditional white lighting for studying or relaxing and switch to colorful, fun lighting perfect for parties and get-togethers. 

LED strip lights are most commonly mounted to the corner of the wall near the ceiling or around desks and entertainment centers for colorful backlighting. To make your move-in process that much smoother, we recommend opting for complete strip kits that include everything necessary for installation.

Tip: Dorm room paint is often cheap and flakey. To avoid potentially ripping off paint during move-out, stick your strip lights to painter's tape to secure your lighting.

Christmas string lights are another great option for decorative yet practical dorm room lighting. Their soft, festive light creates a relaxing environment perfect for studying, resting, or enjoying a cozy evening with friends.

Drape Christmas lights over bulletin boards, mirrors, windows, bed frames, and around your room perimeter to save space on your side tables and desks. These flexible, lightweight lights can be easily secured with temporary hooks or thumbtacks as miniature hooks and painlessly taken down when the school year is over. Battery-operated options are available so you can free up your surge protector and outlet plug-ins.

Our most economical choice for dorm room lighting is LED fairy lights. These lights are extremely versatile and can be easily hung from hooks or draped on furniture around your room. Their compact size and flexible nature make them ideal for DIY projects as well.

Twinkly lights provides the most advanced level of customization for your dorm room lighting. Twinkly offers a variety of strips, strings, clusters, dots, and curtains that are fully addressable, meaning you can program individual LEDs for a personalized light display. When paired with the music dongle, your lights can flash in sync with ambient music to create the perfect party atmosphere. Install Twinkly light around your TV, entertainment setups, tapestries, and shelves.