Have you ever thought about turning your house into a smart one? It might be a pricey investment, but the results will be well worth it, making your life a little bit easier, providing you and your family with comfort and security. While it will not be an easy task, you can do a lot to prepare yourself and smoothen the process.
You can start below, where you will find a complete smart home guide. It will touch upon a few important things, such as what a smart home is and how smart devices can connect to one another through Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, Z-Wave, Zigbee, cellular backup, and landline backup. Next, we will go over a few smart home devices that you should consider purchasing, including smart assistants, light bulbs, plugs, security systems, smoke and carbon monoxide sensors, locks, and thermostats. Lastly, we will talk about the benefits of owning a smart home, ensuring you can make an informed decision.
What Is a Smart Home?
To put it simply, a smart home is a house that includes smart devices capable of communicating with one another and with your smartphone, letting you easily control different aspects of your living conditions, from temperature to lighting and security. There are plenty of smart home devices that you can make use of, ranging from automatic doors company solutions and smart plugs that measure how much electricity you are using up to thermostats that can adjust the temperature inside your house based on a detailed schedule or the weather forecast.
Interconnectedness
Now that you know what a smart home is, we dive into how different smart devices can work together. First off, there are a few types of communication technologies used in smart technology. One of the most popular is Wi-Fi.
What it allows smart devices to do is connect to your router so that they can send and receive data. However, while Wi-Fi is fantastic and all, it has its faults. For instance, if you live in a big house with thick walls, you might find that your Wi-Fi signal is not as strong as it should be to make smart devices all over the building work seamlessly.
Another type of communication technology used in smart devices is Bluetooth. It is, just like Wi-Fi, excellent at connecting your smart devices, but it connects them to your smartphone rather than a router. It means they may have problems communicating depending on where you are and how many devices you want to connect. Moreover, Bluetooth might not work very well through thick walls and large distances.
Next, there is Z-Wave. Z-Wave is quite popular in smart home devices, but it is not as commonly used as Wi-Fi and Bluetooth. In short, it is a wireless communications protocol that allows devices to connect with one other and a dedicated app using low-energy radio waves. However, it only works with Z-Wave compatible devices.
Yet another type of communication technology found in smart home devices is Zigbee. Like Z-Wave, it is a communications protocol that is not as widely utilised as Wi-Fi and Bluetooth. It creates networks through digital radios and is much cheaper than Wi-Fi and Bluetooth.
Smart Home Devices You Should Consider Purchasing
Smart Assistants
To put it simply, a smart assistant is a device that you can use to control all of your smart home devices from one location with just your voice or finger. Smart assistants can also manage your schedule, remind you about appointments, and play music. A few examples of smart assistants include Amazon Echo, Google Home, and Sonos One.
Smart Smoke and Carbon Monoxide Sensors
Smoke and carbon monoxide sensors will tell you when there is smoke or carbon monoxide inside your home and where it is coming from, allowing you to act quickly and prevent you or your family members from getting hurt.
Smart Light Bulbs
Smart light bulbs, such as Phillips Hue, are among the most popular smart solutions. These particular Phillips bulbs connect to your router and allow you to control them through your smartphone or a smart assistant.
You need to know that smart light bulbs are generally useful, as they can turn on and off as needed or on a schedule, change their brightness levels based on the time of day, and turn on automatically when you walk into the room.
Smart Plugs
Smart plugs let you control how much electricity you are using. You just need to plug one into a power outlet, plug another device into it, and you are done! Such plugs are pretty good for making sure that your energy bill stays low, saving you money and reducing your carbon footprint.
Smart Thermostats
Smart thermostats are a fantastic idea for anyone who wants to save money on their energy bill, keep their house comfortable and stay eco-friendly. Those thermostats connect to your Wi-Fi and allow you to control the temperature of your house; you can change it right away or program the device to adjust the temperature according to your schedule and the weather. They also let you see historical data on how much energy you are using.
Smart Security Systems
Smart security systems are a great thing to invest in if you look for ways to feel safer in your house. They can monitor your property and send you a notification if there is someone inside your house or at your door when there isn’t supposed to be. Other than that, they come with a set of cameras that give you a live feed from the inside and outside of your house. Such smart security solutions can provide you with peace of mind and let you keep track of what is going on inside your house at all times.
Smart Locks
Smart locks are excellent for keeping intruders out of your home. They usually work by communicating with a hub, which can be either your smart assistant or Wi-Fi router. Once installed, they will let you know when someone tries to break in through a door or a window. Some smart locks can show you if the door or window is open or closed at any given time, but that is not always the case.
The Benefits of Owning a Smart Home
Remote Control
One of the best things about owning a smart home is the possibility to control it from anywhere. If you want all the lights in the house to go off when you go to bed, you can easily do it from the comfort of your bedroom or from your office. Or, if you want to cool down your house before anyone else gets home, you can do that on your way from work. And so on.
Notifications
Another important benefit of owning a smart home is the notifications. For example, if someone enters your house without permission, or your smoke or carbon monoxide detector goes off, you will receive a notification about it even if you’re not home. This will keep you and your family members safe.
Voice Commands
Yet another benefit of owning a smart home is voice commands. You can use voice commands to tell your smart assistant to turn off the lights, play music, or tell you what is on your schedule for the day, letting you control your home with just your voice. It might be especially useful to people with vision problems.
Energy Monitoring
Last but not least, energy monitoring is an important benefit of owning a smart home. As smart thermostats track how much energy you are using, or smart plugs keep track of electricity use, you can easily see where you are wasting money and where you need to be more careful when it comes to your energy bill.
In Conclusion
To sum up, turning your home into a smart one is definitely worth it. Not only will you be able to control the devices inside your house when you’re not there, but also to turn the lights on and off from another room, change the temperature based on a schedule or the weather outside, and receive notifications when something is going on inside or outside your house. Not to mention that these solutions can make life much easier for children, the elderly as well as people with disabilities.
There are plenty of smart home devices that you can invest in, ranging from smart assistants and security systems to light bulbs. So, as long as you buy several smart home devices and connect them to one another, you can confidently start calling yourself a smart home owner!
