You’ll have to compare light output in lumens or some other metric.
LED’s are going to be the most efficient which is something to consider when using a flashlight.
To give you some idea of brightness, I carry a Stanley 3 in 1 flashlight in my car. It consists of 3 separate 20 lumen flashlights that combine to form one 60 lumen flashlight. This is a serious amount of light for average use. It comes with a tripod mount and when all 3 are together they turn on/off as a single unit. You’re looking at $30.
Probably the brightest bulb is HID - but they are very expensive.
You can get a 1600 Lumen LED flashlight here, which should be bright enough for anyone.
For example, an LED might put out more light per watt than an incandescent bulb, but the incandescent might put out more overall light at a cost of energy efficiency.
And even among the same bulb type, one flashlight might put out more overall light, but another might give you a brighter center that reaches further and then gradually tapers out towards the edges. At the extremes, compare a laser to a candle.
Etc.
And to say one “brightest possible bulb” is kind of misleading because many flashlights (especially LED ones) are composed of several individual bulbs – up to 10 or more in some cases.
No easy answer, unfortunately. You can always get brighter lights by simply using more bulbs and more batteries, from keychain lights to full-size police flashlights to bike lights with their own external battery pack to headlamps with battery packs you wear in backpacks, etc…
wow, this has really changed. I recall a few years ago that the mag halogen was a huge step above the old fashion flashlights. Now there’s a half dozen options.
The brightest one I ever heard of used a high-intensity discharge (HID) bulb, similar to those blue-white headlights in cars, as beowulff mentioned. There are three mentioned at the LED Museum.
Unless you’ve got the world’s largest, darkest basement, a 3 watt Maglite LED should be just fine for your purposes. You can get ridiculously bright “tactical” flashlights, but those are overkill for your purposes – those are designed to temporarily blind evildoers (and also let you whack them upside the head with machine-tooled aluminum as well).
Seriously, if you need more light than a maglite (or equivalent) will throw, it’s time to call an electrician.
I must of worded this thread badly. I wasn’t looking for exact lumen comparisons.
I just wanted some general ranking. It’s assumed the old fashioned flashlights are the weakest. I remember when halagon made them obsolete.
If I’m in the store pricing flashlights under $20. I have no idea if Xenon, halogen, Krypton are equivalent or not. Seems like it’s easier to just reach in the bin and grab whatever I touch first.
It doesn’t work that way. That’s just marketing. Bulb type (or gas used in the bulb) gives you no clear indication of brightness.
If you want the brightest light, you need to measure the light output, not the method of light generation. Some LED flashlights will be brighter than some incandescents – and vice versa.
For a “bright enough” flashlight, just go with a high-quality LED one. Expect to spend $40-$50 for a usable one that would let you see into the basement just fine; the batteries should last a good few hours. The benefit of LEDs isn’t necessarily brightness (though they are comparable to other technologies if you’re willing to pay more); they typically last a lot longer and they’re a lot more power-efficient, meaning you won’t have to swap out batteries as much.
Car analogy time: It’s a bit like asking “Which car is the fastest?”, but instead of measuring their actual speed, you’re only told whether they’re diesel, electric, or gasoline-powered. That won’t give you the answer you need.