LED encapsulation is the most important in LED display. Good LED encapsulation can make the LED display have better luminous efficiency and heat dissipation environment, thereby improving the life time. DIP and SMD are most common in LED encapsulation. Right now, COB packaging has also been applied to LED displays. This article does not introduce and compare COB packaging technology.

DIP (Dual In-line Package) LED adopts potting form. The potting process is to first inject liquid epoxy resin into the LED molding cavity, then insert the pressure-welded LED bracket, put it in an oven to allow the epoxy resin to cure, and then separate the LED from the cavity and form it. 3 colors (Red, Green and Blue) are individual package.

SMD (Surface Mounted Devices) LED is attached to the surface of the circuit board, suitable for SMT processing and reflow soldering. SMD 3IN1 LED refers to the SMT lamp packaged with three different colors of RGB LED chip packaged in the same gel at a certain interval.

6 main differences between DIP LED display and SMD LED display

1. Usage

DIP LED is used for outdoor and SMD LED is used for both indoor and outdoor.

Due to the production technique of DIP LED, we can’t produce small pixel pitch DIP LED screen. Normally, DIP LED display is P20, P16, P10 and P8.

SMD LED display can be smaller pixel pitch. Right now, SMD LED screen can reach to 1mm pixel pitch.

2. Brightness

DIP LED screen has higher brightness than SMD LED screen.

Each R, G, B lamps in DIP LED has independent circuit. Each lamps can reach the maximum brightness current easily.

3. Color Performance

SMD LED has better color performance than DIP LED.

The distance between RGB is closer in SMD LED display. The SMD LED surface can be treated with diffuse reflection, resulting in no granular effect and good color uniformity. In terms of color, SMD LED light separation is easier than DIP LED, and the color saturation is high. SMD LED uses the entire surface to emit light, so the overall color of the SMD LED is more uniform. The color in SMD LED display is better coloration. SMD LED overall flatness is easier to control.

4. Viewing Angle

SMD LED has bigger viewing angle than DIP LED.

DIP LED is 3 colors separated, so the viewing angle is difficult to accurately fix. SMD LED is 3 colors inside 1 package. It is easy to control the viewing angle. 

Normally, DIP LED has 100 degree viewing angle and SMD LED has 120~160 degree viewing angle.

5. Protection

DIP LED has better protection than SMD LED.

Due to the production technique of DIP LED, it is much easy to do protection in waterproof, shockproof etc. But SMD LED is doing better than before in these protection.

6. Maintenance Cost

DIP LED has lower maintenance cost than SMD LED.

Each color in DIP LED is separated. It can easy and cheap to change the single color LED. But the whole SMD LED need to be changed while it is broken.

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