Note: This story was published in the newsletter on October 22, but never made it to the site. So we updated the headline and published it here two weeks later.
Slightly more than a year ago, I shared what was in my smart home. I started out by saying, “Wow, what a difference three years makes in the smart home world. The last time I shared what connected devices were in my house was October 2017, and as I review that article, it seems like nearly everything has changed.”
Here we are, just 14 months later and I could essentially say the same thing: My entire smart home has transformed from what it was as Apple HomeKit is now the brains of my house.
I do still have some devices outside of the HomeKit world. I keep an Amazon Echo Dot around for testing although my mesh Wi-Fi network is powered by a trio of Eero 6 Pro units. Eero is owned by Amazon so I still have a toe in that water. The Eero 6 Pro system replaced a Samsung SmartThings WiFi setup, which offered both WiFi 5 mesh networking and an integrated SmartThings hub.
I was mostly all-in on Google home last August and my smart home still has some remnants of that time. We still have the old Lenovo Smart Display in our kitchen as well as a Google Nest (first-generation) Hub in the bedroom. They don’t get as much use these days but still function nicely to voice-control some of our lights, change the thermostat, and the occasional YouTube TV or Netflix program. And I often use one of these to stream Apple Music while working.
Our Nest x Yale lock, another Google Home-supported product is still guarding the front door for us. It works just as well as it always did although I may consider replacing it with a HomeKit lock once we see some with Thread support arrive.
Gone is the companion Nest Hello doorbell outside the front door. My review experience with the HomeKit-compatible Logitech Circle View Doorbell was so positive that I bought my own. I also replaced a Wyze Cam with the Logitech Circle View camera. Both of these take advantage of Apple’s HomeKit Secure Video so I’m less concerned that my video feeds can be seen outside of my family members.
We still have a cornucopia of smart lighting brands in the home. I’ve added a half-dozen Wyze bulbs, for example, and some additional Philips Hue and CbyGE (now called Cync) lights. Over time, I’ve been replacing older Cree and Osram bulbs with newer products. However, some lights are controlled by Apple while others are handled by Google. My plan is to standardize to HomeKit-compatible lights only in the coming months.
Speaking of HomeKit, the $99 Apple HomePod mini is what allows us to remotely control or access our smart devices away from home. And it’s a Thread Border Router, so any Thread devices can access, or be accessed, from the internet.
I also recently added a HomeKit remote garage door sensor, which is still working perfectly. And, in a nod to Stacey’s love for the product line, I just bought and setup a Lutron Bridge along with a few smart switches. Since we were in the middle of a kitchen remodel these past few months, I decided to go with smart switches over smart bulbs.
So why the switch to HomeKit? Frankly, having used all of the major mainstream smart home platforms, it is the easiest to set up and use. We’ve also had fewer problems with our smart devices although HomeKit isn’t infallible either. And it’s super handy to have all of our Home controls right on my wrist with the Apple Watch.
That doesn’t mean you should make the switch, of course. Your home is your home and as we always recommend, buy and use what works best for you!
Smart switches rather than smart bulbs! This year at Halloween my wife went to turn on the front porch lights, but it didn’t work. Why? Because they are Wyze wi-fi bulbs activated by the Ring doorbell via IFTTT. I explained it and she responded with “That’s stupid, I can’t turn on the front lights because I don’t know the secret handshake.” I am now deciding what smart switch ecosystem to move to, then I’ll swap out the Hue and Wyze bulbs that I have, she’s right.
I’m looking to be less dependent on voice assistants as well, they are great for some things, but not for everything. I’ll keep the Google speakers, but make sure that there’s a physical way to do the same thing as well.
Smart bulbs are good if you want the color changing features or want to divide a room into different lighting zones. Or if you’re renting and aren’t allowed to change out the switches. Other than that, smart switches with dumb bulbs are usually a better choice.
That said, there are several different ways to add a wall switch or button to control smart bulbs, but the exact methods and models depend on the platforms you are using.
Right now, the Hue bridge offers the most choices in this regard.
SMART SWITCHES FOR THE HUE BRIDGE, NO OTHER HUB REQUIRED
For example Lutron offers a dimmer switch that fits over your existing dumb switch and looks and works just like a traditional dumb “spin the circle” dimmer switch. Runs on battery, no wiring required. Very intuitive for guests and kids, works well, but only works with bulbs connected to a Hue bridge. We use these at our house and really like them.
Hue also offers a line of batteryfree “friends of Hue” switches which look like a traditional rocker switch but are powered by the kinetic energy of a push. These can be placed anywhere, but you might have to put a child lock on the original switch to keep people from using that.
And Hue makes their own battery operated button. Instead of fitting over the existing dumb switch, this one is used to replace the existing dumb switch, but again uses battery power, not mains. This prevents the problem of the bulb not responding to voice commands if the switch is off and also avoids damaging the bulb with the inrush current that occurs each time power is restored. This one is also about $15 cheaper than the other two.
They also offer an odd “Hue switch module” that is battery operated but fits inside the switchbox behind the existing dumb switch. So the bulbs are always connected and there’s no inrush current issue. But the wiring can be a little tricky. And it will only work with bulbs connected to the Hue bridge.
Because none of these are wired into the mains, no neutral wire is required.
SMART SWITCHES FOR WYZE BULBS
WYZE just recently released their own wall switch. $32 for a 3 pack. This replaces the existing dumb switch. It does require a neutral at the switch box to power the WiFi. Like more and more smart switches these days, this offers a smart bulb mode which will NOT cut the power to the bulbs. Instead, it just sends a command. So the bulbs never lose connection and there’s no risk of inrush current damage. But the smart bulb protection feature only works with WYZE bulbs.
IF YOU WANT ONE BUTTON TO WORK WITH HUE AND WYZE
Another option if you want something battery powered is to use a Flic button to trigger an Alexa routine. This lets you mix and match any bulbs that can work with Alexa. It’s a small button, about the size of a stack of 3 US quarters. You need an Amazon account, but not an Echo device, just the free Alexa app to create your routines. But it’s the most expensive option since you also have to get the Flic mini hub to get the integrations.
Depending on the exact devices used, IFTTT might also be a possibility, but unlike Alexa routines, you can’t mix and match brands, so you’d need a separate applet for each brand of bulb. The Flic buttons CAN be used as the IF in an IFTTT applet, but Wyze’s own light switch cannot. So you’d need to do some research before selecting the devices for this one. And again you might need to put a child lock on the existing dumb switch.
CONCLUSION
So there are some choices if you want to add a switch/button to control Hue or WYZE smart bulbs, and some of the options won’t require wiring. But the details and prices vary quite a bit, so different things will work for different people. Choice is good. 😎
Very helpful suggestions, JD, including use of the Flic button:
“Another option if you want something battery powered is to use a Flic button to trigger an Alexa routine. This lets you mix and match any bulbs that can work with Alexa. It’s a small button, about the size of a stack of 3 US quarters. You need an Amazon account, but not an Echo device, just the free Alexa app to create your routines. But it’s the most expensive option since you also have to get the Flic mini hub to get the integrations.”
But I would add that I bought and am using a Flic 2 button (not the 3rd version just introduced on KickStarter) without the need to have purchased the hub, which is the expensive part. I have an Echo Dot on my nightstand to control the lights, but once I have masked up with my running CPAP machine, voice command is no longer an option if I need to turn lights back on.
I originally hesitated to purchase the button because their advertising implies you need that expensive hub too, but thereafter I read that it is unnecessary if your cell phone with the Flic app is nearby.
Since I also keep my cell phone on the nightstand, the Flic 2 works fine without its hub. So I have it set up as: 1 click to turn the light back on; 2 clicks to turn it back off; and one long click to have Alexa remind my spouse that I am unable to engage in middle of the night conversations without time to de-mask, turn off the machine, and put my hearing aids back in. Works great!
I have not experimented to learn what the maximum distance might be to have this work without the Flic Hub. I assume it is using bluetooth.
Nice write up! I am also one of those that has a huge mix of different devices and some different platforms in my home, because psychologically I don’t mind having to use a couple of different apps and it’s just made sense from a budget standpoint. And occasionally it was because of a feature that just wasn’t available on the platform I preferred. I’m sure it would drive some people crazy, but it works well for us.
By the way, it’s possible that if you can wait until Matter arrives that a number of your currently incompatible devices will end up working together in the Apple home app. But no telling exactly when that date will be.
I have a lot of smart devices in my house, well over a hundred. My ACs, Fans, Pool, Doors, Lights, cameras, etc. Not to mention my TVs, Fridge, washer and dryer. I have smart bulbs, where I wanted to separate the functions of a wall switch, or allow me to change the color. Other places I have smart switches to control groups of lights. While I have numerous Apps (18) since I use devices from many manufacturers (though most Chinese stuff use Smart Life), I centralize control with Google. I could have used Echo, but when I started, my music service was Google. I stayed away from Apple, because of the limited devices it could control. Not to mention expense. Echo/Google devices are routinely on sale for $25 so putting a speaker in every room of the house was substantially cheaper than Apple. My whole house is controlled and the average price I paid for a device was under $25 (again, Chinese IoT devices are dirt cheap). While I focus on voice control in my house, IFTTT provides me with the automation to do things like turn on cameras when I leave the house, or anything repetitive.
You don’t control what you don’t truly own. All these products leverage the cloud in some way which means they’re scraping data constantly and shoving it to those company’s servers. God only knows what they collect and do with the data. I hate to burst your bubble, but your advice on smart home devices is poor. Any experience in Internet security, device or hardware design, and the general junk that’s on the market? They’re not secure at all, they can be bricked at any time by the company that made them, and you have no control over most of those devices in terms of where they store the data as most are cloud enabled by default with no other options for detaching them from said cloud providers or storing data locally.
Here’s a great example. Feit electric makes a smart plug. It’s Amazon and Google compatible. Just connecting it to your Wi-Fi, it automatically creates SSL and/or TLS tunnels to set cloud providers with zero configuration on your part. They scan your home network and find other active IP addresses and then try to use them to anchor additional tunnels to. You’ve essentially poked two holes into your home network that now allow those companies to get inside your home network whenever they wish… And all you did is buy a smart home device and connect it to your network. Third awful discovery. With no additional configuration, it talks to a company in China called Tuya and scrapes and sends data to them as well. And this is just how one company’s devices work if you dare to dig around and look.
Do your homework on how this stuff actually works before writing stupid articles like this. You do not come across as knowledgeable at all, but someone turned out weak content to make a few cents.