Glass recycling
How to Recycle Light Bulbs (Incandescent)
Tungsten filament and halogen bulbs. The one lighting product where the trash is genuinely the right destination, and the one most often confused with mercury-bearing CFLs.
Special handlingUpdated Jul 2026
Quick answer
Trash, and that is the correct answer rather than a failure. Incandescent and halogen bulbs hold too little glass and metal to be worth recovering, and they contain no mercury. Wrap a dead bulb and bin it. The bulbs that must not go in the trash are CFLs and fluorescent tubes, which contain mercury and are illegal to landfill in several states.
- Recyclable
- Not curbside
How to Prepare
- 1Let the bulb cool fully before touching it
- 2Check what kind it is, since CFLs and tubes must not go in the trash
- 3Wrap the bulb in paper or slip it into its replacement's packaging
- 4
