Headlamps

GearScore blends published specs into a single 0 to 100 number: a brightness check so a lamp is actually useful, then weight, beam distance, and price. A lamp first has to clear a sensible brightness target so it cannot win by being tiny and dim, then it competes on the numbers you carry and rely on. Runtime, battery, and water rating are shown for context but not scored, and you can re-weight any factor.

Brightness is the lamp's max output in lumens. It is treated as good-enough: clear an output that does your job and the lamp is set, because past that point more lumens mostly cost weight, battery, and money. That gate keeps a dim novelty light from topping the list purely because it weighs nothing, without over-rewarding a heavy spotlight nobody runs at full.

For most camp and trail use, 300 to 500 lumens is plenty, run on lower settings to save battery. Trail running and route-finding favor a longer beam and up to 700 lumens; search and fast night travel want 1,000-plus. Use the presets or sort by lumens to match output to your use, then compare weight and throw.

Because makers publish runtime at different brightness levels, so the big number on one box is not comparable to the big number on another. A lamp quoting 200 hours on its lowest setting is not twice as good as one quoting 100. We show max runtime on every row for context, but we score on the specs that are measured the same way: lumens, weight, beam distance, and price.

It shows as "n/s" and the lamp is scored only on the specs it does publish. A blank field is never treated as a zero and never counted as a strength, so missing data can only lower a score, never inflate it. Beam distance and water rating are the specs most often unpublished.