Both of you, thanks for the info. You are absolutely right about the "better to have and not need"-statement. The only downside with it is that it will be about twice as expensive as the one from AGIR
On the other hand, I'm willing to pay more if I get more. Better sell my left kidney
In order to see what you get for your money if you go UWLD, we have to figure out what this AGIR light actually is because very little of what they say on the website is direct, and much of it misleading or not possible.
They claim 4000 lumen. This is not possible at 28w draw. The implication there is 140 lumen/watt which is not possible with todays technology for a reasonable cost. 110 lumen/watt is normal, 120 lumen/watt is considered exceptionally good. If they're lucky, it's putting out 3000 lumen, which I don't believe is likely as efficiency goes down when they get driven that hard, but we'll call it 3000 lumen for good measure. Your OP said 2800 lumen, so we can stay with that which is reasonable at that watt draw.
They don't speak of watt hours of the battery pack, but the manual says voltage of 11.1v which is expected. That means a roughly 115wh battery pack and a ~4 hour burn on high. Your link says the 18ah pack, but it linked to the 10.4ah pack, so we'll go with that. It's 7 hours on high with the big battery pack btw
With this understood, to compare apples to apples, we have to compare that light to the UWLD 26-107 which is the medium light, with the medium sized battery and will give you 5hrs ish on the medium battery, and 7.5 hours on the big one.
Price of this light *26/medium battery* is $1545, vs AGIR at roughly $1000 USD, plus more minus $50 depending on which battery pack from AGIR you compare it to. Medium battery from UWLD and 10.4ah is the closest thing to apples to apples.
Beam angle is supposedly the same.
UWLD gets you a more efficient light. Roughly the same battery size, roughly the same light output, but UWLD is able to do it with 20w draw instead of 28, which means a 20% increase in burn time. This equates to saving weight, with the UWLD being .6kg lighter on land, important if you're flying.
You get no moving parts. Switch boots don't usually rip, but the UWLD doesn't have one to rip. On top of that, the switch is on the light head instead of on the canister which gives you some flexibility in canister position as well as ease of use if diving with thick gloves.
Custom optics. UWLD has a custom designed optic that is optimized for in water use vs most others that are using standard optics developed for land use. This gives them a more natural look in the water than many other lights.
Cable gland output choice. The ability to have a 90* cable gland is great if you're diving in sidemount, but even in backmount it is not a bad thing as it can help the cord cross over to your left hand lower on the body which makes it less inclined to get caught up in front of you. No charge option.
Modularity. Do you have a heated vest? If not, do you want one? With the AGIR you would have to send it back and get a new head with an extra EO output and if you did, you would only have on/off control of the vest and the heat would taper off with pack voltage, same if you added a Pitkin controller from LM. With the UWLD, the pack voltage is 18v nominal and the vest controller has a step down function to make sure that heat setting 1 is always the same regardless of pack voltage. This controller is in a stack cap that you can put in or take out whenever you want. Don't need the vest, but need the light? No EO cord dangling around from the end of the light cap.
Goodman handle. Little things, but the goodman handle on the UWLD is brilliant compared to the rigid goodmans, and on top of that, the quick release allows you to leave the handle on your wrist and clip the light head off separately which makes it less likely to catch on stuff. Not a huge benefit, but it's nice to have.
Head size looks to be roughly the same, so no benefit there, but both have a benefit over LM as they have some pretty massive light heads.
UN 38.3 certified. LM has two of their packs certified, AGIR makes no mention of theirs being compliant or certified, but all of UWLD's are, and are engraved on the canisters themselves. If you fly, this may be a nice thing to have to avoid questions or problems with airport security.
Multiple light output settings. Don't need the light output you have? Don't want the light output you have? With LM or AGIR you're stuck, with the UWLD you can turn it down. They all have the capability to have mulitple light output settings with the driver boards, but UWLD chose to give you the option. They have custom electronics that are made in the USA to ensure top quality where most of the others are using standard off the shelf parts from China/Taiwan.
Depth rating. UWLD is rated to 200m, and real world diving to at least 230m. One of them had a bad day at that depth after being beaten into a rock by a DPV, but it was still fixed under warranty. AGIR doesn't really certify them, but says they're tested to 100m. Not a huge thing since most people don't dive that deep, but if you ever get into full trimix, at least you know the light is rated much deeper than you'll ever likely go since 100m isn't all that deep when you're on full trimix on a ccr...
Latchless design. Not a huge thing either, but have no latches gives less snag points on the canister, as well as less failure modes
So it's all of the little things. No one big thing that says that a UWLD is a better light than the others on the market, but it's all of the little things added up. It's then up to you to decide if the price premium is worth it compared to some of the less expensive lights out there, but at least if something were to go wrong, there is a full factory trained service center in the Netherlands so you don't have to send anything back to the US. There is also another one in Australia for those that are curious.
You can get into a UWLD light for about the same price as the AGIR with the LD-15/mini which gives you 3.5 hours of burn time at a bit less light, but a tighter beam angle for ~$1100. This is an epic light and you won't be disappointed. If you're interested in a heated vest at some point, I would personally splurge on the bigger battery size now, but that's just me. If you are in sidemount especially, the extra length of the canisters is also quite nice for ease of attachment if you butt mount it. At 8" long, the baby canister is not exactly big... If you want the big light output, then the 35 is worth the $200 over the 26, and I would go with at least the medium sized canister. Not cheap, but a light that is truly in a league of its own
