It may surprise many of our readers to learn that the first true iteration of the ‘smart home’ appeared in the UK around 1998, in Watford… of all places. Known as the INTEGER Millennium House, it was a demo suite of all the smartest, cutting-edge domestic tech available, open to the public to tour at leisure and stare at agog in wonder of the witchcraft.
Of course, these were the savagely early days of the idea of home automation, back when smart tech was as rare as high-definition hen’s teeth, incredibly expensive and – in all brutal honesty – not overly reliable. The Millennium House also came into existence before we even had WAP (Wireless Application Protocol, that is, not Cardi B’s more recent redefinition of the acronym) phones, the precursor to internet-able phones, and a long way from the arrival of the original iPhone and the golden age of the smartphones that followed.
Which was why the smart home, outside of both Watford and the realms of the very rich, failed to flourish. However, as unreliable internet connections gave way to always-on broadband in the home, 3- then 4- then 5G phones appeared in the pocket, and the wonders of Wi-Fi burst forth everywhere, smart tech has rapidly become a more distinct reality for all. As such, in the bright, brilliant future that is 2022, there are now smart devices available for every room of the home, linking together over Wi-Fi networks to bring entertainment, and a sense of the easy life to what were formerly, I supposed, ‘dumb homes’ across the whole county and not just in a small corner of Hertfordshire.
So, to help you slip into smart, here, I have assembled a selection of such devices, each a veritable electronic Einstein in its own right, but which, when combined, can create a whole even greater than the sum of its parts.
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eufy Security 2K HD Smart Doorbell
Best for: defending your door and detecting DPD deliveries alike
It’s no secret that I love new gadgets; hell, I even managed to spend the last couple of decades or so earning varying sized chunks of ‘a crust’ writing about them. So, naturally, I embrace fresh smart stuff with all the vigour of some kind of terrifying early-adopter tech-bear. However, when it comes to the stratospheric rise of the video doorbell, one question must be asked: how did it become normal so quickly to accept the police requesting ‘doorbell footage’ to solve crime?
Rhetorical questions aside, when it comes to doorbells that do much more than ‘ding-dong’, Amazon may have initially stolen a march on all those options not tied into much more complicated home automation installations with its Ring, but other contenders have soon caught up. Most noticeably the eufy.
This option, the 2K HD model ticks all the smart boxes for me. Firstly, it is simplicity itself to set-up. Download the free app, pair with your phone and the Wi-Fi chime, affix the IP65 weatherproof bell to your front door (using built-in battery or existing doorbell wiring) and adjust the activity zone to suit. And that’s it. The eufy does it all. There’s night vision built-in and 2K resolution video as well as stills recorded without the need for a monthly subscription thanks to free 4K of local storage (included). Plus, you’ll get two-way audio to alert any against-the-clock courier that you are on your way to the door, so they don’t disappear in a puff of missed delivery calling cards.
Offering instant notifications when someone triggers its advanced AI human detection system or simply presses the bell button, the eufy can be accessed by multiple users and plays nice with both Apple and Google products. I’m currently keeping an eye out for potential enemies lurking just outside my abode smugly via an Amazon Echo Show 8 on my study desk. This is how it feels to be Lord Alan Sugar!
Shop more video doorbells here
Buy now £150.00, Amazon
Philips Hue Starter Kit
Best for: bringing 21st century illumination into your life
Security is obviously a hugely defining factor of the smart home and while the all-seeing eye of a video doorbell or the full-on burglar-beating force of an intelligent alarm system can protect your property in ways even The Mob can’t, you should never overlook the element of lighting control when it comes to deterring criminals.
What attracts a Raffles-alike to your home in the first place? Simple: a perceived lack of activity. If you’ve left your gaff (imagine a gravel-like East End accent here) looking like nobody is at home, then you’ve made some whey-faced goon’s larceny list, you mug. Yep, it’s an easy enough system for potential property pilferers to use in order to judge whether your place is ripe for the pillaging or not, so keep them clueless.
Smart lighting, particularly in the form of the eminently affordable Philips Hue Starter Kit, can be programmed to turn the lights on in your home in random patterns to give the impression of occupation. Also, you can have them activate automatically when you return home, throwing illumination all around and keeping those who lurk in the shadows at bay.
But the Philips Hue kit can also be used to create ambiance and set the scene, transforming the feel of a room in an instant from, say, dazzlingly bright den of intense work-based concentration to low-lit lounge of lasciviousness at the touch of an app or with a whispered word to any compatible digital assistant.
Infinitely expandable, the Starter Kits are available with GU10, B22 or E27 bulbs, with white and/or coloured light capabilities, so they slot into your existing fixtures. Then, once connected to the included Hub system and with your free smartphone app downloaded, you can control the lights anyway you want, from any room, brightening or dimming, picking scenes or creating your own ambiance from the whole colour spectrum as you see suitable.
What’s more, completely programmable – as mentioned – you can even utilise bedside lamps to nudge you gently into the waking world each day by acting as a simulated sunrise and, indeed, lead you back into the Land of Nod at the end of the day by slowly dimming down.
The £90 Philips Hue Starter Kit tested here came with two smart bulbs, the Hub and a very handy Hue dimmer switch which can be wirelessly attached to walls to be used as a remote control anywhere in your home. But, be warned, smart lighting control is – as I have discovered – highly addictive and with more bulbs on order, soon the whole house will be tripping the light fantastic.
Buy now £89.99, Philips
Amazon Echo Show 15
Best for: reactions from guests and accessing other smart devices
“What on earth is that thing?!” These words, in varying form, are the ones that seem to spring forth most frequently when friends and family step foot in my kitchen of late. “That…” I’ve learnt to reply, “…is the soon-to-be object of all your envy.” Welcome to the initially dividing world of the Amazon Echo Show 15, a whoppingly sized (15.6-inch) Full-HD touchscreen smart display designed to bring full-on Alexa-controlled functionality to the more spacious areas of your home.
Capable of being displayed in landscape or portrait format on the wall or safely propped up on a work surface stand, this slim-line slice of smart sex appeal allows you to watch the likes of Prime Video, Netflix and YouTube, stream radio stations and music from Spotify and Amazon Music plus podcasts and audiobooks, monitor your smart video doorbell, keep track of calendars, add To Do lists and sticky notes and, of course, display all your photos.
For families, you can even set up personal profiles accessible by both visual and voice ID, and for those a bit paranoid about privacy, you can close the 5MP camera and turn off the microphones at the prod of a button to completely cut off contact.
As the household chef/food manipulator, I confined the review model to the kitchen where it allows me to – in conjunction with the other smart devices on test for the purposes off this piece – both see who is pestering at the front door and control the lighting in other rooms of the house, the latter being mostly to annoy the occupants of those areas who are not mired down in culinary drudgery.
Good looking to boot, the sleek, minimalist black and white lines of the Echo Show 15 work to make it seem almost unobtrusive despite its size, and with access to the entire internet an Alexa command away, the old cliché about people always ending up in the kitchen at parties has now taken on fresh life.
With an endless sea of widgets available to add to its abilities, plus an absolute embarrassment of additional smart device riches that come compatible, such as smart thermostats, smart plugs (coming up), etc., the Amazon Echo Show 15 is, quite literally, your window into the smart world.
Buy now £240.00, Amazon
Philips Hue Smart Plug
Best for: smartifying the little things
Sometimes you don’t need to over-complicate things, you just need make otherwise inanimate objects around your home to do stuff while you tap on an app or bark an order at your digital assistant of choice. When I was a kid, the height of sophistication was to have clap on/off lights. You’d see them on TV shows, normally located in the boudoir of some overly hirsute “ladies’ man”. But this is 2022 and clapping is something we only use sarcastically now or to pay NHS workers, so when it comes to the automated control of your illumination (or, indeed, any other smart plug-compatible appliance), you only need to tell it what you want.
Set-up using either using Wi-Fi with your existing Philips Hue Hub or by Bluetooth, just download the free app to your phone, stick the smart plug in the power socket and attach your appliance – in my case, a lamp. Next, just pair-up and you’re ready to switch anything on or off using the app or voice control. It really is that painfully simple.
That being the case, I opted to add an additional layer of complication, so hooked-up the Hue Smart Plug to the double-whammy of both the Google Assistant and Amazon Alexa devices I already have installed in my home study. All of which means that I can now just walk in at the end of a long day of putting words in order and say: “Alexa/Hey Google, turn on lamp,” and have subtle, hands-free light instantly on, ready for me to settle down in the lap of absolute sophistication with my ornate Meerschaum e-pipe, a small glass of sherry and the latest copy of Viz.
Buy now £24.99, Amazon
Sonos Move
Best for: a movable feast of music and smart control
I like to Move it, Move it. I like to Move it, Move it. I like to Move it, Move it, Ya like to… enjoy quality audio as well as indulge in all that virtual assistant stuff. Yes, when it comes to intelligent home devices, a smart speaker is as day one as it gets. The majority of people looking for a balance of price and sound quality generally plump for the likes of the Google Nest Audio or the Amazon Echo (4th Gen), both coming in at under £100 and delivering a reasonably decent digital din. But if you’ve a real ear for audio and a bit more in the bank, then say hello to my not-so-little-friend, the Move from Sonos.
Designed first and foremost with sound quality in mind, the Move comes packing 2x Class-D digital amplifiers tuned to the speaker’s unique acoustic architecture, teamed up with 1x downward-firing tweeter that creates a crisp, high-frequency and ultra-wide soundstage, 1x midwoofer for faithful playback of mid-range frequencies and low-end output, an adjustable EQ, plus something called Automatic Truplay which continuously adjusts the Move’s sound to account for it environment and the audio content you’re pumping out. So, yeah, sound quality is pretty damn good.
Also, a built-in 11-hour battery means that it’s portable, so unlike others of its ilk, if you want to take your smart party into the garden or onto the terrace, you absolutely can. It’s IP65-rated waterproof too, so even if the heavens open without so much as a polite forewarning, the Sonos Move can bare the watery weight without going horribly awry.
But, you’re thinking, this is supposed to be a review round-up of smart devices… you’ve lost the thread of your remit, Pritchard. Well, worry not, because the Move isn’t slacking in the smart department either – connecting via both Wi-Fi and Bluetooth, it’s also compatible with Apple AirPlay 2 and converses fully with both Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant. So, spend a bit more to get some Sonos in your smartlife, and you can enjoy the most finely tuned sounds around, both in and out of the house, and still exercise intelligent home control too!
Buy now £400.00, Sonos
Withings Body+
Best for: staying in some form of smart shape
Smart tech doesn’t have to be all fun and games. In fact, there can be a very serious side to some smart devices, a side that can be instrumental in ensuring that you remain in the rudest of health and at peak physical condition. And while we would never for one moment even contemplate fat-shaming anyone, if you are still struggling to shift any additional excess you may have gained over the festive season or, indeed, are simply keen to firm up further than you already have into superhuman shape, then the Withings Body+ scales will be right up your smart street.
Whilst most sets of scales are merely indiscrete about your weight, the Body+ takes things to the nth degree via the use of its Health Mate app. Step aboard and welcome to a world of intense weight analysis that involves full body composition monitoring measuring your ultra-precise weight (in kg, lb or st), your BMI, your body’s water percentage, and the triple-treat of your fat, muscle and bone masses, before delivering all that info automatically over Bluetooth or Wi-Fi to your phone.
Capable of coping with the individual measurements of up to eight people, the Withings Body+ smart scales come compatible with Apple Watch, plus over 100 other health and fitness apps such as Fitbit, Google Fit and Apple Health, thus removing any tech-based excuses for not staying in shape you may have been toying with.
Buy now £89.99, Amazon
Google Nest Learning Thermostat
Best for: beating the bills, protecting the planet
With the world in something of a state due to global warming and power provider bills about to rocket in the UK up to where the ozone layer used to be, there’s probably never been a better time to take control of your energy expenditure with the assistance of something more than a bit smart.
Behold the Nest Learning Thermostat from Google. Now in its third generation, the Nest Thermo has been helping people save both the planet and their pockets since 2011 and can now be found in millions of homes across the world continuing to do just that. So, why not yours too?
As the name would suggest, the intelligent Nest learns your home heating routine, noting the times you turn your heating up and down and what temperatures you favour, then mimics your routine, even turning itself down when you’re out.
And it’s not just your heating, as the Nest looks after you hot water too, controlling your boiler so that you’re only heating water when you need it and not wasting it when you don’t.
But wait, what’s this unlikely scenario? You’ve left for work, as usual, and your smart Nest Learning Thermostat has therefore automatically turned down the heating to conserve precious energy. It’s a bitterly cold February day and, suddenly, there’s a call from your dear old dad – he’s only gone and locked himself out of the house, but miraculously has a key to yours on him! But how will he keep sufficiently warm in your place now? Easy, open the Nest Thermo app on your phone and alter any and all settings remotely from there, ensuring your place is parent-temperature toasty warm by the time he gets there.
Unlike the other smart wotnots I’ve covered here, the Nest does require professional installation and so will initially cost a bit more that the purchase price alone, but as the app also lets you see just how much money you’re saving on those potentially bank-account-breaking fuel bills, the decision to invest in a Nest will quickly come to look like the ‘smartest’ (ahem) choice you’ve made.
Shop more smart thermostats here
Buy now £219.00, Currys
