The history:

"White light" is commonly described by its color temperature. Measuring the hue of "white" light started in the late 1800s, when the British physicist William Kelvin heated a block of carbon. The block of carbon changed color as it heated up, going from a dim red, through various shades of yellow, all the way up to a bright bluish white at its highest temperature. The measurement scale for color temperatures, which was named after Kelvin as a result of his work, was based on Centigrade degrees.

If you want to buy LED lights or any type of light bulbs maybe the first thing comes to your mind is size or type of the bulb. Then you will consider the light temperature. Is it cool white or warm white?

Basically we can distinguish cool and warm colors but what is the meaning really?

Color temperature is a way to describe the light appearance provided by a light bulb. It is measured in degrees of Kelvin (K) on a scale from 1,000 to 10,000.

There are lots of sensors and tools that can measure color temperature the tools like color meter and some smart sensors that has color meter built in. But It is important to know do you want to use the light for which environment? Office environment or in the house for quiet area or maybe for manufacturing plant.