IKEA Has Collaborated With Designer Sabine Marcelis (Again) to Give Its Viral 'Donut Lamp' a Cool Color-Shifting Rebrand

It's 2026, and the idea of the 'smart' home is becoming increasingly attainable (even my uncle uses Alexa). Late last year, IKEA announced its plans to roll out 20 "aesthetically pleasing" smart home products over the coming years, and now, the brand has revealed its viral VARMBLIXT 'donut lamp' has undergone a techy, color-shifting rebrand (again, at the hands of designer Sabine Marcelis).

The updated design lets you adjust the color, brightness, and even light temperature of the iconic round lamp (arguably one of IKEA's best product releases of all time). Designer Sabine Marcelis has carefully curated 12 new preset colors, which softly transition between white through to a glowing amber, warm red, soft pink, cool lavender, and turquoise, before eventually returning back to white.

“We spent a lot of time fine-tuning the transitions between the curated colors," the Dutch designer shares. "What makes this lamp unique is that switching between colors is not a sudden change, but a very smooth journey through all the hues to get to the next color. The light slowly moves through color to, in turn, transform the color of a space."

And yes, it's a smart light — controlled via the BILRESA remote, which comes included. Feel compelled towards a specific shade? (Perhaps green come Halloween?) Well, you're in luck, as the updated VARMBLIXT lamp can also be controlled with the IKEA Home Smart app and other Matter-compatible systems, giving you access to over 40 shades from the full color spectrum.

But its cool color-shifting qualities aren't the only update. While the VARMBLIXT smart 'donut lamp' has retained its iconic curvaceous silhouette (that arguably led to the thousands of videos shared across social media since its release three years ago), its glossy orange finish has been replaced with a more modern, matte white glass that lets the light softly diffuse from within.

"The focus this time was on what more we could explore within the iconic form of the donut lamp," Sabine explains. "Color variation is one part of it, but at its core VARMBLIXT has always been about how you experience light. In the original donut lamp, external light played on the glossy surface and bounced beautifully off it. With this version, the matte finish lets the light glow softly from within. It’s a very natural, technical evolution of how light can be experienced."

Image credit: IKEA

Image credit: IKEA

IKEA's updated VARMBLIXT smart 'donut lamp' is set to land in-store and online in early April 2026 and will cost £55 (the same as the original VARMBLIXT lamp, which will remain for sale). It will launch alongside an updated smart version of Sabine Marcelis' VARMBLIXT pendant lamp, too, which focuses more on the "nuances of white light," and transitions between crisp, cool daylight tones to warmer yellows.

The launch is also, apparently, just the beginning of Sabine Marcelis' latest collaboration with IKEA, with another joint collection exploring "new interpretations of light, and the emotional value it brings to everyday spaces," teased for a 2027 release.

Can't wait until then? You can shop these IKEA VARMBLIXT lamp alternatives below.

Safe to say, there are some seriously cool collaborations coming out of IKEA right now. While we wait for this one to drop, it's worth checking out the kalidescopic IKEA x Tekla Evelina Bluetooth speaker/lamp collaboration.