These days, there is a lot of focus on connectivity and making our homes smarter. No longer are our homes a mere dwelling place for us, but with many of us starting to work and study from home, why not spruce the place up a bit? One of those ways would be to install smart lights, which are relatively inexpensive and are a fun and cool way of making your home smarter.
Lights are extremely important and having the right type of light and color can affect how we feel, and that’s one of the benefits of smart lights where they can change colors depending on your mood.
There are of course many models available in the market today, so you know what, we’re going to save you some time by listing what we think are some of the best LED smart lights of 2020, so do read on if you are interested in giving your home an inexpensive makeover.
Philips Hue White And Color Ambiance LED Bulbs
It probably goes without saying that Philips is pretty much the default when it comes to smart lights. This is because the company has been in the lighting game for many years now, and the Hue bulbs are some of the brightest in the market today. They also offer bulbs in various fitting sizes so you can pick and choose the one that fits your lamp.
The Hue series will also play nicely with multiple digital assistants, including Alexa, Google Assistant, and Siri, so you’ll be able to control it using your phone or through smart speakers.
If traditional bulbs aren’t something you are interested in, and you want something that will help create a better ambiance, Philips also offers smart lights in the form of LED lightstrips. These lightstrips can be controlled the same way as the Hue bulbs, but because they are lightstrips, they don’t need to be attached to a lamp and are more flexible in terms of placement.
You can put them behind your desk to create a glow, or put them underneath shelves or drawers, or on the back of your TV or monitor. They also rely on 3M adhesive which means that save for plugging it into a power outlet, installation is a no brainer. It can also be easily cut to whatever length you need, and you can also buy additional strips if you want to lengthen it.
We’ll be the first to admit that while Philips is more or less the default brand that many think of when it comes to smart LED lighting, it can also be quite expensive if you plan to buy multiple bubs. This is where Xiaomi comes in and plays to their strengths, where they not only create affordable smartphones, but also affordable smart home products too like the Yeelight series.
Priced at a mere $20 per bulb, it offers up pretty much standard smart lighting features like scheduling, the ability to change color, and the best part is that it does not require a hub, so if you just need one smart light, then all you need to do is spend $20.
In case the Yeelight’s $20 bulbs are still a little too expensive for your liking, then Wyze is definitely worth checking out. This is because the company has created smart bulbs that only cost $8 per bulb, and there is no hub required either, meaning that it will only cost you $8 just to get smart lighting setup in your home!
Users will be able to create schedules and adjust the brightness and color temperature from within the app itself, and they are also compatible with digital assistants like Amazon’s Alexa and Google’s Google Assistant. It also plays nicely with IFTTT so you can create events and scenarios to change the lights accordingly.
If you’ve ever browsed Reddit’s r/battlestations, there is a very good chance that you would have come across setups featuring Nanoleaf’s lights. Unlike traditional light bulbs, Nanoleaf uses light panels that are offered in a variety of shapes, where you can choose from squares, triangles, to hexagons, meaning that you can create various patterns across your wall.
These are more of ambient lights, but they are quite nice to look at and are a great way of spreading out the lighting in a room. The individual panels can also be changed manually so you can create environments with different colors all at once. They are also compatible with smart home platforms and digital assistants, so changing up the colors on the fly is quick and simple.
The problem with some smart lighting solutions is that they require a hub. This can be annoying as you start to gather more devices over time as it means more things you need to connect to a power outlet. The good news is that LIFX’s bulbs do not require a hub and are essentially plug and play. LIFX offers a variety of bulbs that can change color, with some even being able to emit infrared light at night which could be useful for home security cameras. As expected, LIFX’s bulbs will also play nicely with digital assistants like Alexa, Google Assistant, and Siri.
