Smart technology is a huge trend right now and more and more people are filling their homes with smart gadgets. They can help to make life easier for you, save you money, and also increase security, so the smart home trend isn’t likely to go anywhere anytime soon. The problem is, the technology has moved on a lot in the last couple of years and there are so many smart products on the market it can be hard to know which ones are actually worth spending the money on and which ones are useless novelty items. They can be pretty expensive so you don’t really want to waste money on things that won’t actually improve your home in any way, so you need to do a bit of research before you start buying any smart products.
If you think that your home could do with a bit of an update and you want to invest in smart technology but you don’t really know where to start, here is a list of the best smart home additions that are actually worthwhile.
Thermostats
Smart thermostats were one of the first smart products that really took off because they’re a great way to save money and be more environmentally friendly, two things that most people are concerned with these days. The best smart thermostats can be controlled from your phone or if you have a voice assistant like Google Home or Amazon Echo, they can be linked to that as well. It’s great because you don’t have to worry about whether you’ve left the heating on when you go out of the house and you can also switch it on when you’re on the way home so the house is nice and warm as soon as you arrive. Of course, you don’t really need to do any of that because you can just program it to come on and off automatically when you need it to. Having more control over your heating makes it easy to manage your use so you aren’t wasting energy and you’ll save a lot of money as well.
Some of the newer models have a great learning feature so they pick up on your usage patterns and then automatically regulate the heating for you without you having to do anything. They can also make suggestions and slight alterations to save on energy and some can even track the location of your phone and only heat areas of the house that you’re using.
CCTV Cameras
Smart CCTV cameras are a more recent innovation and they’re becoming very popular. People are always looking for ways to make their home more secure and this is one of the best ways to do it. Smart CCTV cameras can always be accessed from your phone so if you ever want to check up on the house, you can do it from anywhere. A lot of them also have motion detectors and they will alert you when somebody comes onto the property, you can then speak with them through a speaker using your phone. That means that you can easily warn off any potential burglars but you can also speak with neighbors and friends if they pop by when you’re not at home. Having instant access to the camera means that smart CCTV is a much better preventative tool than standard CCTV which is more useful for assisting the police after a burglary has already taken place. If you’re worried about security in your home, a smart CCTV camera is an absolute must.
Garage Door Openers
A lot of people don’t realize that a high percentage of burglars don’t intend to steal from the house once they get inside. Instead, they’re looking for garage and car keys so they can take the car instead. That’s why garage door keyless entry systems are a great security gadget to add to your home. Instead of a traditional key, you may sometimes get a remote that will be kept in the car but you can also get ones with a keypad or even a fingerprint scanner. It’s a lot harder for a burglar to get into your garage this way and it also gives you a lot more control over entry to the garage. On some models, you can set a separate code for a limited time so if a friend or neighbor needs to access the garage for some reason, they’ll be able to use the code but then it will stop working later so they can only gain access when you want them to. This is far safer than using an old style lock which can easily be broken and which uses keys that can be lost or stolen.
Light Bulbs
Lighting is very important in the home and it’s a very simple way to change the atmosphere and completely transform a room. With smart light bulbs, you have almost endless possibilities for lighting and it can all be controlled from your phone or by using a voice assistant. They come with a massive range of colours and you can easily change the brightness as well. If you want to install a dimmer switch in your home, you’d be better off just buying smart light bulbs instead because they can do more and they’re far cheaper, and you won’t have to bother changing light switches either. They’re all LED light bulbs as well so they’ll last decades without needing to change them and they’re so much cheaper to run so you’ll save money as well.
Smart Plugs
If you use smart plugs, you can control whatever you like using your phone or voice assistant. They’re just like a small adaptor that goes into the wall and then you can plug whatever you like into them. They can be switched on and off remotely from wherever you are and you can also set them on timers and schedules so you don’t have to do anything. Using these smart plugs is the best way to control any device or appliance without spending a lot of money.
These are the most useful smart home gadgets on the market right now but as the technology continues to progress, it’s likely that everything in your home will be a smart device eventually.
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