REVIEW – Car headlights are bright these days. Websites disagree wildly about how bright headlights are, but there is a general consensus that 3,000 lumens (lm) is a good average for modern factory LED headlights. Let’s suppose that you need more than that. You want to illuminate a broad area, briefly, and make it look like daylight. You estimate that you need somewhere around 200,000lm to get the job done. It’s impractical to tote 65 to 70 car headlights along. What is an illuminator to do? The new MS32 flashlight from Imalent is the answer. It is capable of cranking out a blinding 200,00 lumens of light for brief periods, all in an under seven-pound package. Just to give you an idea, those photos above were taken at midday in the bright, Florida sunshine. The Imalent MS32 said, “Sunshine, ha! Hold my beer…” For the record, the sun, shining at midday, clocks in at around 100,000lm. The Imalent MS32 can crank out twice that. It’s almost like living on Tatooine.
What is it?
The Imalent MS32 is a flashlight. Well, it is more than that. It is capable of producing 200,000lm and 90,000lm for short bursts and 40,000lm for extended periods. It also has several other lower-intensity lighting modes, offering terrific lighting versatility.
What’s in the box?
And what a box it is!
The Imalent MS32 comes packaged in a sturdy box with a carry handle. Inside, everything is enclosed in protective foam.
Here is everything included (I didn’t include the flashlight in the photo for space).
- Imalent MS32 flashlight
- 100W USB-C Charger
- USB-C charging cord
- Extra O-rings
- Shoulder strap
- User manual
- Storage case
Hardware specs
- Dimensions: 242mm(length)*149mm(head diameter)*67.5mm(body diameter)
- Weight: 3096g/6.83lbs (battery included)
- LED Type: 32 pieces of American CREE XHP70 2nd LEDs
- Batteries Required: Battery pack (21700-4000mAh*12)
- Luminous Flux: Up To 200,000 Lumens
- Run Time: Up To 345h
- Intensity: 655000cd (Max)
- Max Beam Distance: 1618m
- Operating Modes: Turbo / High III / High II / High I / Middle II / Middle I / Middle Low / Low / Strobe
- Output and Runtime:
- Turbo output : 200,000~40,000 Lumens；Run-time : 45s+40min
- High III output: 90,000-40,000 Lumens； Run-time: 70s+42min
- High II output: 40,000 Lumens; Run-time:45min
- High I output: 18,000 lumens; Run-time: 1H35min
- Middle II output: 9,000 Lumens； Run-time: 3h30min
- Middle I output: 4,000 Lumens； Run-time: 7h30min
- Middle low output:2,000 Lumens； Run-time: 18h
- Low output: 80 Lumens； Run-time: 345h
- Strobe: No specs provided
- Impact Resistance: 0.5m
- Waterproof: IP-56 standard waterproof
Design and features
The Imalent MS32 is a huge light! My hand is included in the photo above to give you a sense of scale.
The design of the light is similar to the Imalent SR32 120,000-lumen flashlight that I reviewed in July 2023. The new MS32 (right) is even bigger!
The lens design is typical with 32 LEDs mounted in three concentric circles.
Again, it is similar to the SR32(left) but larger.
The unit is controlled with a pair of power buttons – one on the handle and one on the body. Both work the same. Press to turn on, hold to cycle through intensities, and press to turn off. A double press jumps to 200,000lm mode.
A triple press displays the current charge status on the small display.
That display also briefly shows the illumination level.
Here is a profile view.
The battery pack is contained in the extended tail. It is sealed with an o-ring for water protection.
The Imalent MS32 flashlight is cooled by a pair of integral, automatic fans, one on each side of the head.
The end is covered by a removable screw-on cap.
Setup
Unscrew the cap and plug in the USB-C charge cable to recharge the battery. The red LED changes to green when the unit is fully charged.
Performance
Let’s start with my typical run-time test. I cranked the Imalent MS32 up to 200,000 lumens and let it go. After 33 seconds, the overheating symbol appeared on the display even with the fans running. After 37 seconds, it stepped down to the 40,000-lumen level and continued to shine up until 37:35 when it gave up the ghost. The claimed runtime is 45 seconds at 200,000lm + 40 minutes at 40,000lm. It fell a few seconds and a few minutes short of those claims. Still, being able to crank out 40,000 lumens of blinding illumination for over 35 minutes is pretty impressive.
Before we get into photos and video of the MS32 in action, a story…
We had a golf tee time at a local executive course a couple of days after I received the MS32 for review. Generally speaking, we play nine holes in about 90 minutes. Our tee time was 4:56 pm so we should be wrapping up golf around 6:30 pm, give or take. The issue was that sunset was at 6:02 pm that day. It looked like we might only get in six or seven holes. That was until I decided to bring the MS32!
When we got to the eight tee, a 135-yard par 3, I cranked up the MS32 to 40,000lm and stood to the left of the person teeing off. With the sky all lit up, we could all easily follow the flight of the ball. We all finished the hole without issue. By the time we got to the ninth tee, it was dark. Not getting dark – fully dark. We couldn’t see the green on the 165-yard hole #9 at all. How do we know where to aim? A quick double-tap on the MS32 power button yielded 200,000lm of daylight that made the flag stand out in the dark. Once we had our aiming point, 40,000lm was plenty to follow the tee shots. We used the light to illuminate the green and all putt out. It was terrific fun finishing in the dark while still being able to see the ball in flight easily. This is not an intended use for this flashlight, but it certainly demonstrates the amazing flexibility that this light offers.
I want to discuss operation as there is one thing I’d like to see changed. There are two operating buttons and both work exactly the same.
- Light off
- Single press: turn on to the last-used intensity between Low and High III
- Double press: instant access to Turbo – press again to turn off
- Triple press: display current voltage status on the display
- Light on
- Single press: turn off
- Double press: instant access to Turbo – press again to turn off
- Triple press: display current voltage status on the display
- Press and hold – cycle through intensity levels from Low to High III
- Light on in Turbo
- Single press: turn off
- Double press: turn on Strobe mode
- Triple press: display current voltage status on the display
- Press and hold – cycle through intensity levels from Low to High III
- Light on in Strobe
- Single press: turn off
- Double press: turn on Turbo mode
- Triple press: display current voltage status on the display
- Press and hold – cycle through intensity levels from Low to High III
On smaller Imalent flashlights like the Imalent RS50 or Imalent MS08, a triple-press gets you to the lowest lighting mode directly. I like that. On the big Imalent lights, there is no direct access to Low mode, so you have to either cycle through all the intensity levels up to High III to then get to Low, or turn on room-blasting Turbo mode, albeit only for a couple of seconds, to then flip to Low. What it means is that if your last operating mode was a high-intensity mode, the next time you turn it on, it will still be in that high-intensity mode. I would prefer a quick-access method to be able to turn the light on in Low mode so I don’t blast everyone in the room.
On higher intensities, even with the dual-fan cooling system, this light gets hot. How hot, and how quickly? Here is a short video I made using the Teslong thermal imaging camera. I turned the light on in 200,000lm Turbo mode and watched the temperature rise.
You can see that in about 40 seconds, the bezel where the handle attaches climbed from 70F to 138F and then settled in at about 136F as the light stepped back from 200,000lm to 40,000lm. That’s a rise of 65F in 40 seconds.
To visualize the various intensity levels, I walked out back onto the golf course well after sunset and stepped through all of the intensity levels from 80lm to 200,000lm.
You can just start to make out the large oak tree on the far left in the video once I hit 9,000lm. As I continued to raise the illumination level, the tree became more visible. at 40,000lm, it was completely visible. at 90,000lm and 200,000lm, it looked like a spotlight is lighting it up. The front branches of that tree were roughly 250 feet from where I was standing. The back branches were around 300 feet away. Everything was lit up like the sun was shining.
The video doesn’t quite do justice to how well the MS32 lit up the fairway. At 40,000lm, it was nearly like daylight out there. The nice thing about this light is its versatility. Do you need a basic light to illuminate the floor in front of you at night, like when you need to walk to the bathroom when camping? The MS32 can do that. Do you need a low or min-power flashlight for task lighting? The MS32 you covered. Do you need a high-intensity area light? The MS32 fits the bill. How about super-intense wide and long lighting for search and rescue activities? The MS32 shines brightly.
What I like
- Unbelievably bright
- Outstanding selection of lighting levels
- Extremely sturdy
What I’d change
- It’s heavy
- It gets hot
- It’s expensive
- I wish there was a quick way to jump to the lowest lighting level like there is for the brightest level
Final thoughts
Simply put, the Imalent MS32 is an amazing light. Being able to crank out 200,000lm of intense light from a handheld device is incredible. The biggest thing to remember with this light is that the 90,000lm and 200,000lm levels are more of a novelty than a practical specification as they are only available for a maximum of 70 seconds and 45 seconds respectively. Granted, you can dump a ton of light on something, but only briefly. The maximum working level is 40,000lm which is still insanely bright. You can flood a large area with intense illumination for an extended period. That makes this an incredible light for search and rescue. It worked great for finishing a round of golf, but while fun, it isn’t practical.
Of course, all this comes at a price. That price is heat, weight, and, well, price. It gets hot, it’s heavy, and it tips the financial scales at a few cents under $750. But, if your needs meet any or all of the use cases that the MS32 can fill, you’ll be hard-pressed to find a better or more versatile handheld lighting solution. And, if you need to light up your world as if you live on the dual-sun planet of Tatooine, the MS32 says, “Luke, I am your flashlight.”
Price: $749.95
Where to buy: Imalent
Source: The sample of this product was provided by Imalent.
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That was a very enlightening article! Thank you for the review.
Garry’s a luminary around here.
A really bright guy.
But he did confuse lumens and lux in the first paragraph. The sun is 100-120k lux at mid-day, which means that many lumens per square meter. Per specs, the MS32 can do 655k lux at a distance of one meter (where its beam will therefore be covering rather less than a square meter since it is tightly focused) which is about 6 times as bright as sunlight.
Thanks for the clarification and correction.