Can you believe it will be Christmas in just under one month? So now is the perfect time to add some much-needed sparkle to the front of your house. With the likes of Nanoleaf and Twinkly offering premium Christmas light solutions with premium price tags, you might be looking for something a little more budget-friendly.
Introducing Ollny who if you read our reviews will know this is not the first time, we have reviewed outdoor lighting from this brand with the Ollny Feston and Ollny solar string lights that we currently have in our garden.
In this review, we have been sent the Ollny fairy lights which are a perfect option to use either inside or outside the house. These lights are perfect for all kinds of Christmas events from wrapping around an outdoor Christmas tree or around the outside of your house to make it glow. You can even use them inside to illuminate the stair railings or around your Christmas garlands to make your decorations have that extra pop.
The Ollny fairy lights come in three colour options:
- Cool White
- Warm White
- Multi-Coloured
They are also available in three different lengths with the price points below:
20 meters – £18.99
40 meters – £26.99
80 meters – £38.99
In this review, we were sent the 40-meter warm white option but it’s nice to see Ollny give you various options in terms of colour and length.
Design
The 40-meter option we were sent offers an additional 3-meter lead length so if your plug is a bit of a distance away this won’t mean you’re eating into the cable with the lights on show.
You will also notice that the lamps are all LEDs, and the lamp spacing is 0.1m (0.33ft), so they are long enough and give the right distance to light up your house. The black cable will also help you blend them into most indoor or outdoor backdrops, leaving only the glittering lights on display.
Unboxing was a simple affair you are provided with the lights, controller and user manual.
If you’re considering using these outside, you will be pleased to know they are IP44 rated meaning they are completely waterproof and can handle anything the UK weather will hit us such as rain, wind or snow. Ollny even stated they would still work after a very cold frost and I have not been able to put that theory to the test yet.
Features
I was very impressed when it comes to the features of these lights especially when you consider the price point. The Ollny fairy lights come with 4 different brightness settings from 100% to 25% allowing you to set the mood for the room you have them or adjust the brightness at a certain time of night to prevent you from being that house with the super bright Christmas lights.
There are also 3 timers so you can set your lights to be on for 4, 6 & 8 hour periods. You can also set them to come on at the same time every day ideal if you are going away for a few days and still want your Christmas display to show you at home even if you’re not.
The Ollny fairy lights also come with a small controller which has power buttons, a timer and dim control and the star of the show the 8 lighting modes for these lights can only be controlled by this controller so make sure you do not lose it!
The modes allow you to change the light settings depending on your mood and also come with a memory function meaning it will save the last mode you set for your next use. The modes include:
- Steady on
- Sequential – Single lamps flickering
- Chasing/flash – double lamps chasing and flashing
- Twinkle/Flash– Starry Flashing
- In-Wave– Waving from bright to dim repeatedly
- Slo-glo– Single lamps fade slowly from bright to dim repeatedly
- Fade– Double lamps fade slowly from bright to dim repeatedly
- Combination – automatically convert every mode.
Installation/ Performance
As mentioned earlier in this review the lights are powered by the mains and they come with a 3-meter lead in addition to the 40-meter length of cable with the lights. This should give you plenty of lead before you start seeing the lights.
In terms of installation, if you’re running them outside the house, I used hooks that I already had drilled into the wall, so we just ran them through the hooks. If you’re just going to wrap around a Christmas tree just run the lights around it like you would do with any other set of lights.
I have also mentioned the fact they are IP44 rated and come with a durable commercial grade 20 AWG cable making it resistant to high temperature, ageing and the weather. We have had these set up outside our house for the last few days now as my wife has given the green light to turn the house into Christmas.
Outdoor Plug with IP44 rated with a button on the plug that allows you to cycle through the lighting modes.
I have to say in terms of brightness and the timer and light modes these are just as good as my twinkly lights but at a fraction of the price.
How could they improve?
I would allow the consumer to be able to switch from the bright white to the warm white and multi-colour in one set without having to pick the type at the point of purchase but I guess doing that would increase the price.
I would also include the use of an app as you could adjust the dim, set the timer, pick the modes and have the on/off buttons all via the app. This would remove the dependency on the controller as if you were to lose it you are then unable to use over half of the functions.
Verdict
As we approach Christmas and start looking to decorate the inside or outside of our homes. Adding some sparkle in the shape of Christmas lights is the done thing. You could in theory use these lights all year round if you wanted.
They are simple to set up and I was impressed with the features especially the adjustment of the brightness and timers. I also really liked the fact they come with 8 different modes so you can change things up whenever you wish.
At under £30 for the 40-meter option these are a fantastic alternative to the more premium brands on the market and do exactly the same thing when it comes to adding that extra sparkle to your house at the same time feeling like excellent value for money.
Product Rating
Overall ranking: 4.5 out of 5.0 stars – 4.5 stars
Ollny Fairy Lights Plug-in – 40m 400 LED Fairy Lights – Available from Amazon for £26.99
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