What are LED strips lights?

The LED (Light Emitting Diode) is an electronic device that emits light when current is passed through it. The package of an LED is made up of an inner chip (SMD, Surface Mount Device) that emits the light and small metallic legs from which the current flows. The external chip surface is covered by a phosphorus layer that is responsible for the colour temperature of the light emitted.
There are several kinds of LED chips and their names come from the chip size measured in mm (for example a 2835 LED chip measures 2,8 x 3,5 mm).

The LED strip is just a flexible printed circuit, called PCB, that can run on either 12V or 24V, in which are soldered an array of LED strips and resistors.

The picture shows the section of an LED strip

At first glance LED strips all look the same but when it comes to choose one it is better to take into account different aspects:

SMD chip: 2835, 3528, 2016, 2216, 5630, 5050, 3535, 3838, 335 (side LED), 3014.
Efficiency: expressed in Lumen/W, it is the ratio between the flux of light radiated and the power.
Colour rendering index: the ability of a light source to show the colours of the objects faithfully in comparison to the sunlight.
Temperature: the more powerful the LED strip is, the higher is the temperature achieved. That’s why it is necessary to use an aluminium profile to dissipate the heat produced.
Back adhesive tape to fix the LED strip to the surface.
IP ratings

LED tapes are now widely used in the lighting industry for their remarkable durability and for being a low energy consumption light source. Thanks to their flexibility they can be adapted to different applications allowing lighting effects that is not possible to create with standard lighting systems.