Olight Baton 3 Orange Limited Edition Flashlight Review
The Olight Baton 3 Premium Edition in limited edition orange is dropping! This is an updated Baton, still using 16340 but with an output bump, and a charging case! It retains much of the look of previous Batons but so much is updated. Read on!
Official Specs and Features
Here’s a link to the Olight Baton 3 Premium Edition product page. Many links in this post are shareasale links.
Versions
There are a number of versions. First the packages – there’s the Premium package, which you’ll see in this review. That includes the charging/carry case. It’s available in black or red as standard colors, or blue, which is a limited color. And also now in Orange, which is another limited color.
Price
Flash sale date: 8:00 PM April 15th – 11:59 PM April 16th EDT
Here are the details of our flash sale about the reviewing products for your reference.
Baton 3 Premium Edition Orange (Limited Edition), 30%OFF, $76.97 (MSRP: $109.95)
Baton 3 Premium Edition Orange Bundle $100.03 $142.90 (SAVE: $42.87)
M2R Pro Ocean Camouflage Bundle $160.93 $229.90 (SAVE: $68.97)
There are even more deals to be had, too. Hit that OlightStore.com link to see the other stuff.
Olight even gave me an exclusive code: ZEROAIR10 into your article. The coupon code will work during sales on non-sale listings ONLY and except for X9R.
Short Review
You may be saying to yourself “but Zero, didn’t you review a Baton 3?” Yes I did! Here’s my previous Olight Baton 3 Premium Edition in red review. This light is literally no different except in the body color. But since orange is the fastest color, I thought another round of testing was reasonable. Also, Olight offered to send it, so I said yes. Much of the text from that review will be seen here; nothing has changed from the previous Baton 3 to this Baton 3.
There’s a lot to really like about the new Baton 3. There’s even a bunch to like about the Premium package with the charge case. Output is fantastic. The user interface is still good and reliable. Charging works very well. The charge case works well. I don’t love the emitter temperature (6000K-7000K) but that’s kind of a known entity at this point. Overall, and particularly at the flash sale price, this seems like a good deal to me.
Oh, and it’s orange.
Long Review
The Big Table
| Olight Baton 3 | |
|---|---|
| Emitter: | Luminus SST-40 (CW (6000K-7000K)) |
| Price in USD at publication time: | $76.97 |
| Cell: | 1×16340 |
| Turbo Runtime Graph | High Runtime Graph |
| LVP? | Yes |
| Switch Type: | E-Switch |
| Quiescent Current (mA): | |
| On-Board Charging? | Yes |
| Charge Port Type: | Proprietary Magnetic |
| Charge Graph | |
| Power off Charge Port | “With cell: all modes Without cell: no modes” |
| Claimed Lumens (lm) | 1200 |
| Measured Lumens (at 30s) | 1274 (106.2% of claim)^ |
| Candela per Lumen | 5.7 |
| Claimed Throw (m) | 166 |
| Candela (Calculated) in cd (at 30s) | 437lux @ 4.169m = 7595cd |
| Throw (Calculated) (m) | 174.3 (105% of claim)^ |
| Claimed CCT | 6000-7000 |
| Measured CCT Range (K) | 5400-6200 Kelvin |
| Item provided for review by: | Olight |
| All my Olight reviews! | |
^ Measurement disclaimer: Testing flashlights is my hobby. I use hobbyist-level equipment for testing, including some I made myself. Try not to get buried in the details of manufacturer specifications versus measurements recorded here; A certain amount of difference (say, 10 or 15%) is perfectly reasonable.
What’s Included
- Olight Baton 3 Premium Edition Orange Limited Edition Flashlight
- Cell (customized 16340)
- Charge case
- Charge cable (USB to USB-C)
- Cleaning cloth
- Manual and papers
Package and Manual
Build Quality and Disassembly
You may have seen the photo on reddit: I have a bunch of Olight Batons. I have some reviewed, sure, but I have so many that I haven’t even reviewed. And a few of those batons are just about my most used lights – stock emitter and all.
I have a previous Baton in orange, and by look, it’s practically the same as this one.
The previous orange baton doesn’t have the charge case, though!
On the outside, not much has changed on the build. It’s still a small 16340 flashlight, with a two-way clip, a TIR optic, and an e-switch. All of these are good things. The old Batons were, by and large, very solid lights.
The threads here are anodized, short, square-cut, and very smooth.
Inside is where we begin to see differences. There’s still “a lot going on” in there but it’s different from previous Batons.
Size and Comps
Weight (g / oz) 53 / 1.87
Length (mm / in) 63 / 2.48
Head Diameter (mm / in) 21 / 0.83
Body Diameter (mm / in) 21 / 0.83
If the flashlight will headstand, I’ll show it here (usually the third photo). If the flashlight will tailstand, I’ll show that here, too (usually the fourth photo).
Here’s the test light with the venerable Convoy S2+. Mine’s a custom “baked” edition Nichia 219b triple. A very nice 18650 light.
And here’s the light beside my custom engraved TorchLAB BOSS 35, an 18350 light. I reviewed the aluminum version of that light in both 35 and 70 formats.
Here’s the Baton 3 with a my other Baton 3.
Retention and Carry
We can speak about the Baton 3 having two carry methods. First is the pocket clip, which is mostly the same as previous generations, but with small tweaks.
It’s a two-way clip, which I don’t often love, but this is a reasonable implementation – being two-way doesn’t cause too much extra size.
There’s also a lanyard hole in the pocket clip, but there is no lanyard included.
Secondly, and possible as a carry mechanism, is the wireless charge case. This case will hold the light safely and is great for throwing in a bag.
The light sits down inside the case but is easy enough to grab out. I don’t think you’d leave the light in the case and for use but if you need a top-up, you can throw the light in there for a little while. Basically, you’ll probably end up carrying the light and carrying the case too. Separately…. Even more ideally, you’d have two Baton 3 flashlights and one case, and you could swap through them as needed, always having a charged light.
The tailcap has the standard magnetic charging base, which can still be used as a means to secure the light.
Power and Runtime
The Olight Baton 3 Premium Edition (and also the not premium edition) is powered by a single lithium-ion cell.
This is a customized 16340, with both positive and negative terminals on the positive end. A “normal” (or “non-customized”) 16340 will not work in this light.
Not only that but the positive terminal is recessed into a plastic shroud. This shroud will prevent charging of the cell in most if not all bay chargers.
Here are a few runtime tests. Note that I’m seeing well over the rated 1200 lumens out of this Luminus SST-40. Pretty incredible for a 16340 light! And this is held for around a minute, which is also nice to see. At around that point, the temperature starts to increase enough that you really shouldn’t want that level of output to continue out of a light this small. The stepdown is to High level. Low voltage protection is observed, with a switch warning (red) and the light finally turning off.
Has low voltage protection.
Charging
Also a feature of the Baton 3 is the Wireless Charge case.
As I said in the other review, this charge case will also charge the previous generation Batons which use the MCC charger.
Above you can see the second charging indicator – it too can indicate red, orange, and green. Though (again) the manual doesn’t state this, my experience says that the indication here is similar to that of the indicating switch of the light itself (which I covered above). When the light is dropped into the case, this indicator lights
Here’s a view into the case. As you can see, the charge base down there is the usual MCC charger.
This case claims a capacity of 3500mAh, and that’s feasible since the case contains a single 18650 cell (and 3500mAh 18650 cells exist.)
Below is the cell. I can’t get any further info on it, unfortunately, and I didn’t desolder it for removal. In my heart of hearts, I wish a few things about this case and specifically the cell. First of all, I wish the case had a spot for my AirPods. There’s no good spot for it, and I’m sure licensing would be ridiculous, but…. these seem to fit a theme, and why not just go ahead and marry the two.
Secondly, I really wish (and this is more of a “real wish”) – I really wish that this 18650 was [easily] removable, and was the same type that is used in the Warrior Mini (et al, really). That really opens a world of intercompatibility that I like to see, and softens the blow of a customized cell in the Warrior Mini. Barring that cell, then I’d rather have seen a high capacity 21700. Possibly 5100mAh for probably no increase in size whatsoever…. That’d be a huge win.
The case itself is charged by USB-C – a nice concession by Olight here. The case has two indicator LEDs. The one seen below is for the charge state of the case. I don’t see this information in the manual, but mostly I think it mimics the charge state indication of the Baton 3. So below, you see it as orange – it can be red or green, too.
For charging of the actual case, Olight provides an appropriate cable, which is USB to USB-C.
Do you notice that the accents of this cable match the light color! I didn’t notice it on the red, but the red Baton 3 has a red trim cable. Orange has an orange trim able. Very nice!!
With the Premium Edition, you do not get the standard MCC charger. I have no doubt that if you get the non-Premium (ie just the light), then you’ll get an MCC charger. However, and you’re probably not going to like this suggestion…. If you’re buying this light, I think you should actually buy two. Buy a Premium Edition to get the case. And buy a regular edition, not for the MCC charger, but so you can rotate out your Baton 3 lights in the case!
I couldn’t really find a great way of testing the Wireless Charger, so I tested with one of my other MCC charge bases, in the normal way.
Charging looks good, and happens at around 1A. I also show the cell to take around 600mAh and when accounting for conversions (since I’m recording the 5V output and not recording at 4.2V), it’s probably more like a 650mAh cell or something around that.
Modes and Currents
| Mode | Mode Claimed Output (lm) | Claimed Runtime | Measured Lumens | Tailcap Amps |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Turbo | 1200/300 | 1.5m/75m | 1274 | 2.51 |
| High | 300 | 95m | 309 | 0.40 |
| Medium | 60 | 7.5h | 66 | 0.07 |
| Low | 12 | 33h | 10 | 0.01 |
| Moon | 0.5 | 20d | 0.36 | 0.00 |
Pulse Width Modulation
There’s some sawtooth going on on the lower 3 modes, but I’m hesitant to call this PWM directly.
For reference, here’s a baseline shot, with all the room lights off and almost nothing hitting the sensor. Also, here’s the light with the worst PWM I could find. I’m adding multiple timescales, so it’ll be easier to compare to the test light. Unfortunately, the PWM on this light is so bad that it doesn’t even work with my normal scale, which is 50 microseconds (50us). 10ms. 5ms. 2ms. 1ms. 0.5ms. 0.2ms. In a display faster than 0.2ms or so, the on/off cycle is more than one screen, so it’d just (very incorrectly) look like a flat line. I wrote more about this Ultrafire WF-602C flashlight and explained a little about PWM too.
User Interface and Operation
The Olight Baton 3 has an indicating e-switch on the head end of the side of the body. The switch cover has a bit of texture and is proud enough that it’s easy to find. It’s also not so proud or soft that it will easily activate accidentally, at least in my experience.
However, the switch isn’t all that different from the switch on the Warrior Mini (read: it’s exactly the same), so if you had a problem with that switch (I didn’t), you can take note here.
Here’s a UI table! You’ll know this user interface for years. The S1R Baton II uses the same UI.
| State | Action | Result |
|---|---|---|
| Off | Click | On (mode memory)^ |
| On | Hold (release at desired mode) | Mode cycle (Moon, L, M, H) (no Turbo) |
| Off | Hold | Moonlight |
| Any | Double click | Turbo |
| Any | Triple click | Strobe |
| Strobe | Click | Off |
| Strobe | Hold | Previous Mode |
| Off | Long hold (past Moonlight) | Lockout |
| Lockout | Hold | Unlock to Moonlight |
| On | Click and Hold (quickly)^^ | Timer (Single blink: 3 minutes, Double blink: 9 minutes) |
| Timer | Click and Hold (quickly)^^ | Switch between 3 and 9 minute timers. |
^ Moon, Low, Medium, and High are memorized. Turbo is memorized as High.
^^ The manual states this as “Double click and hold” but I think it should be “click and hold” quickly. Any form of double click ends in Turbo or Strobe. The manual hasn’t been corrected yet, after all these years of this model.
LED and Beam
The new edition, the Olight Baton 3 Premium Edition, boasts a new Luminus SST-40 emitter. And yeah it’s cool (6000-7000K) (seven thousand Kelvin what)… But it really pumps out the lumens.
Olight has gone with the usual setup for the Baton 3: A press-fit bezel, a TIR optic, and a cool white CCT (“6000K-7000K”).
What is new here is the emitter. It’s a Luminus SST-40, which was also used in lights such as the Warrior Mini. My records indicate the S2R Baton II also has this emitter, so the Baton has seen the emitter before, anyway. Also, in that case, the CRI was specified: 70 CRI. Probably also the same in the Baton 3.
While this emitter is great for overall output, the cool white nature isn’t something I’d pick. However I don’t think this light will be any harder to emitter swap than previous Batons, and that’s a known entity (ie, it’s possible.)
LED Color Report (CRI and CCT)
Beamshots
These beamshots are always with the following settings: f8, ISO100, 0.3s shutter, and manual 5000K exposure.
Tint vs BLF-348 (KillzoneFlashlights.com 219b version) (affiliate link)
I keep the test flashlight on the left, and the BLF-348 reference flashlight on the right.
I compare everything to the KillzoneFlashlights.com 219b BLF-348 because it’s inexpensive and has the best tint!
Conclusion
What I like
- Build quality is quite good, as usual
- Red colorway is the Iron Man colorway – I’m a big fan
- Full package includes charging and cell
- The UI retains neat features from previous models, like the 3 or 9 minute timer
- Output does hit the claimed specification
- Wireless Case works suitably
What I don’t like
- Proprietary cells don’t work in bay chargers
- Very cool tint
Notes
- This light was provided by Olight for review. I was not paid to write this review.
- This content originally appeared at zeroair.org. Please visit there for the best experience!
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