A study of resonant cavity-enhanced light-emitting diodes based on a columnar liquid crystal was presented in this article. An organic layer made of the electroluminescent liquid crystal was sandwiched between a Bragg mirror deposited on a silicon substrate and a semitransparent top electrode. The fabrication of the substrates was complementary metal oxide semiconductor compatible, the maximum electroluminescence intensity was enhanced by a factor of 3-4, and the spectral width of the emission could be reduced down to 18 nm, thereby improving the chromaticity coordinates, considerably. Copyright (c) 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.