How Smart Homes Work

Home automation has a long and fitful history. For many years, tech trends have come and gone, but one of the first companies to find success is still around.

The genesis of many smart home products was 1975, when a company in Scotland developed X10. X10 allows compatible products to talk to each other over the already existing electrical wires of a home. All the appliances and devices are receivers, and the means of controlling the system, such as remote controls or keypads, are transmitters. If you want to turn off a lamp in another room, the transmitter will issue a message in numerical code that includes the following:

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An alert to the system that it's issuing a command,

An identifying unit number for the device that should receive the command and

A code that contains the actual command, such as "turn off."

All of this is designed to happen in less than a second, but X10 does have some limitations. Communicating over electrical lines is not always reliable because the lines get "noisy" from powering other devices. An X10 device could interpret electronic interference as a command and react, or it might not receive the command at all.

While X10 devices are still around, other technologies have emerged to compete for your home networking dollar. Instead of going through the power lines, many new systems use radio waves to communicate. That's how BlueTooth, WiFi and cell phone signals operate.

Two of the most prominent radio networks in home automation are ZigBee and Z-Wave. Both of these technologies are mesh networks, meaning there's more than one way for the message to get to its destination.

Z-Wave uses a Source Routing Algorithm to determine the fastest route for messages. Each Z-Wave device is embedded with a code, and when the device is plugged into the system, the network controller recognizes the code, determines its location and adds it to the network. When a command comes through, the controller uses the algorithm to determine how the message should be sent. Because this routing can take up a lot of memory on a network, Z-Wave has developed a hierarchy between devices: Some controllers initiate messages, and some are "slaves," which means they can only carry and respond to messages.

ZigBee's name illustrates the mesh networking concept because messages from the transmitter zigzag like bees, looking for the best path to the receiver. While Z-Wave uses a proprietary technology for operating its system, ZigBee's platform is based on the standard set by the Institute for Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) for wireless personal networks. This means any company can build a ZigBee-compatible product without paying licensing fees for the technology behind it, which may eventually give ZigBee an advantage in the marketplace. Like Z-Wave, ZigBee has fully functional devices (or those that route the message) and reduced function devices (or those that don't).

Using a wireless network provides more flexibility for placing devices, but like electrical lines, they might have interference. Insteon offers a way for your home network to communicate over both electrical wires and radio waves, making it a dual-mesh network. If the message isn't getting through on one platform, it will try the other. Instead of routing the message, an Insteon device will broadcast the message, and all devices pick up the message and broadcast it until the command is performed. The devices act like peers, as opposed to one serving as an instigator and another as a receptor. This means that the more Insteon devices that are installed on a network, the stronger the message will be.

On the next page, we'll take a look at the products you'll need to get your smart home running.

Inside Bill Gates' Home Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates' home just outside of Seattle, Wash., might be the most famous smart home to date. Everyone in the home is pinned with an electronic tracking chip. As you move through the rooms, lights come on ahead of you and fade behind you. Your favorite songs will follow you throughout the house, as will whatever you're watching on television. You can entertain yourself by looking at Gates' extensive electronic collection of still images, all available on demand. The chip keeps track of all that you do and makes adjustments as it learns your preferences. When two different chips enter the same room, the system tries to compromise on something that both people will like.

Smart home for beginners: How to lay a foundation you can build on

One way to build out a smart home is to buy lots of components—sensors, smart bulbs, security cameras, speakers, and whatnot—and connect them all to a hub that helps them communicate with each other and with you, via your smartphone. But let’s be real: That can involve spending a lot of money and investing a lot of time. And for some people, it’s just overkill. If your wants and needs are simpler, just a few relatively inexpensive products will deliver most of the conveniences a high-end smart home can deliver, and on a much more modest budget.

And if you make sure those smart home products are compatible with each other, you’ll build a solid foundation that you can expand over time. The key is knowing which smart home products don’t depend on a smart home hub to operate. While hubs offer advantages—the most important of which is having a single user interface to control everything—they’re not always essential. One thing you must have, however, is a good wireless router—ideally one that can reach all corners of your home.

Here some a few common ways you can build a hub-free smart home system.

Smart lighting

For most people interested in living in a smart home, lighting is the entry point. Many smart lighting systems work perfectly well without a central hub and are still capable of interacting with other smart home elements–including smart speakers and displays, such as the Amazon Echo and Google Nest. Smart bulbs from Cree, LIFX, and TP-Link, for example, communicate over Wi-Fi, while some others—including the newest Philips Hue bulbs—communicate via the Bluetooth radio in your smartphone.

The latest generation of Philips Hue smart bulbs can be controlled via Bluetooth, eliminating the need for a Philips Hue Bridge.

Some other smart bulbs rely on Zigbee or Z-Wave radios and therefore depend on a bridge to connect to your home network. You can control any of these smart bulbs with an app on your smartphone or tablet, which you can also use to program lighting scenes and schedules, but you’ll do so via the hub versus a direct connection to the bulbs.

Mentioned in this article Philips Hue White and Color Ambiance A19 (Bluetooth + Zigbee) Read our review Best Prices Today:

If most of your home’s lighting is in the ceiling and controlled by a switch on the wall, you might be better served by replacing those dumb switches with smart switches and dimmers, instead. That’s because a smart bulb becomes dumb the instant you turn off the switch controlling it. Leviton, Lutron, TP-Link, Ecobee, and other manufacturers make smart light switches that operate on your Wi-Fi network and don’t require a central hub.

If you use lamps for most of your lighting, a smart plug such as the Lutron Caséta or Wemo Mini will enable you to turn the lamp on and off—and dim its dumb light bulb—with a smartphone app and according to a schedule.

Smart speakers and displays

What’s more convenient than pulling out your smartphone to dim the lights on movie night? Saying “dim the lights” and having a smart speaker linked to your smart lighting do it for you. The Amazon Echo series and Google Home series are the market leaders in this space. And while Amazon has held the lead for the past few years—it has a much larger installed base, has enjoyed much broader support, and had the only smart speakers with displays for a time—Google is coming on very strong.

The plant in this photo is right at the edge of the perimeter the Echo Show 10 needs to rotate its display nearly 360 degrees.

You’ll increasingly find the two companies’ digital assistants—Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant—in unique third-party products. Ecobee puts the guts of an Echo in its excellent Ecobee SmartThermostat with voice control, while Lenovo was first to market with Google Home devices outfitted with displays (the Lenovo Smart Display series).

Mentioned in this article Lenovo Smart Display (10-inch model) Read our review Best Prices Today:

And because these smart speakers have been so widely embraced by other smart home device manufacturers, they have become de facto hubs in their own right, serving as a central interaction point for everything from smart lights to home security cameras, displaying video feeds from the latter on connected TVs or their own displays, if equipped.

Don’t count Apple out of the smart home game. The company becoming a contender in this space thanks to its HomeKit ecosystem, and the company’s HomePod mini smart speaker—powered by Siri—can act as a smart home hub. Apple touts its commitment to privacy in its smart home pitch.

Smart thermostats

Few smart home devices can match a smart thermostat’s ability to deliver both comfort and cost/energy savings. These devices go far beyond establishing a heating and cooling schedule based on when you anticipate being home to enjoy those benefits. They can detect when you’re home and when you’re away, so that your HVAC system operates only when it’s needed.

The latest trend on this front is to equip thermostats with sensors that you can put in the rooms you occupy most frequently, so that the thermostat operates on the basis of where you are in the house, instead of triggering heating and cooling cycles based on the thermostat’s location, which is typically in a hallway you only ever pass through.

The Ecobee SmartThermostat with voice control has a built-in Amazon Echo speaker and can respond to voice commands. It also has remote room sensors that help to eliminate hot and cold spots in your home. This high-end device can even serve as the hub for a broader smart-home or home-security system.

Nest also has some great thermostats, including the $129 Nest Thermostat, and Wyze Labs recently jumped into the market with a very inexpensive smart thermostat that deserves your consideration if those other models are outside your budget.

Left to right: Ecobee’s smart thermostat, room SmartSensor, smart camera, and door/window SmartSensor.

Home security cameras & video doorbells

A quality home security camera will enable you to keep a watchful eye on your home, especially while you’re away. Indoor models can help you monitor your children and pets, while outdoor models can catch prowlers in the act—and hopefully discourage them from coming around in the first place.

Some models—from Ring, Arlo, Netatmo, and Maximus—incorporate lights that can illuminate your way. Cameras incorporated into doorbells can monitor your porch and let you interact with visitors without needing to approach the door—or even be home at the time. The best models can discern between people and pets and recognize the presence of a package left at your door.

Ring Video Doorbell 4 Read our review Best Prices Today:

Multi-room audio systems

Sophisticated multi-room speaker systems from the likes of Sonos, Yamaha (MusicCast), and Denon (HEOS) are largely self-contained, enabling you to drop speakers in multiple rooms in your home so you can stream music from your own collection or from online services such as Spotify to all of them in sync, or to send different tracks to each one. Amazon Echo and Google Nest smart speakers can pull off the same tricks.

Using the soundbar in front of your TV to control the lights in your home theater? It’s easy with a speaker like the Sonos Beam that has both Amazon’s Alexa and Google’s Google Assistant onboard.

Several companies have soundbars in their collections, so you can improve your TV- and movie-watching experiences when you’re not listening to music. In each case, a smartphone or tablet is all you need to control everything. Some Sonos models even include Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant onboard, rendering them capable of controlling other smart home devices (although only one or the other can be activated—you can’t use both at the same time).

Smart smoke and carbon monoxide detectors

Conventional smoke and carbon monoxide detectors are inherently dumb devices. Their alarms might be loud, but if no one’s home to hear them, what good do they accomplish? A smart smoke detector will sound a local alarm, too, but it will also send an alert to your smartphone—and to anyone else you authorize as a contact—if danger is detected.

Nest Labs makes our favorite smart smoke and carbon monoxide detector. If you also have a Nest Smart Thermostat, the smoke detector can instruct the thermostat to shut down your HVAC system if there’s a fire, so smoke isn’t circulated to every room in your home.

Some smart smoke alarms, such as the Nest Protect, incorporate emergency lights that can help you find your way out of a smoke-filled home; others, such as the First Alert Onelink Safe & Sound, include advanced features such as an integrated smart speaker. If money is an issue, consider a semi-smart smoke and CO detector such as the X-Sense XP01-W. This device doesn’t connect to your Wi-Fi network, so it can’t send alerts to your smartphone, but each one you deploy interconnects to the rest, so that if an alarm sounds in one room, all the other sensors will also fire off to enhance your family’s safety.

Smart Irrigation

Water is our most precious resource. A smart irrigation system can help ensure your lawn and garden get enough moisture to be healthy and vibrant without wasting any of it. And of all the smart home subsystems you can invest in, this might be the one that will benefit the least from being incorporated into a hub. Smart irrigation systems can also be complex, so using a purpose-built app is usually better anyway. Rachio builds our favorite products in this category, but Wyze Labs recently jumped in with a budget-priced competitor. If you don’t have an in-ground irrigation system, the Orbit B-Hyve hose-tap timer is just the ticket for drip irrigation systems and other types of hose-based watering.

A word about IFTTT

IFTTT (If This Then That) is like having a smart home hub in the cloud. It can enable thousands of smart home devices to interact with thousands of other smart home devices.

One of the most powerful ways of making disparate smart home devices work together is to open an IFTTT account. The acronym stands for “If This Then That,” a service in which an action by one device (or service) can trigger an asction on one or more other devices or services.

IFTTT is very much like having a smart home hub in the cloud, and it’s widely supported—and not just by smart home products and services.

IFTTT was once a free service, but it is no longer—at least, not exactly. With a no-cost IFTTT Standard account, you can use as many pre-existing IFTTT applets as you’d like—and there are thousands to choose from.

One, for example, will trigger your Philips Hue smart bulbs to flash when a timer you set on an Amazon Echo runs out. Expressed as an applet, this would be “When the timer on my Amazon Echo runs out” (the if this half of the applet), then flash my Philips Hue smart bulbs (the then that half of the applet).

A Standard account will, however, limit you to creating just three IFTTT applets from scratch. If you can’t find an applet that fits your needs, and you want to create more than three new ones, you’ll need to sign up for an IFTTT Pro account, which costs $5 per month. That allows you to create up to 20 applets, while a $10-per-month Pro+ expands that to an unlimited number of applets.

IFTTT is super simple to use: To create an applet, just go to the IFTTT website and then point and click on the service or device you wish to use as a trigger (the this in If This Then That), link them to your IFTTT account, and then point and click on the service or device you wish to act when that trigger is activated.

Are you ready to start?

We’ve listed smart home components roughly in the order we think most people will go about installing them, but there is no hard and fast rule. If you think installing a smart smoke detector is a higher priority than smart lighting, go for it!

If you think you might want to invest in a smart home hub that will pull all these components together under a single user interface, just make sure all the bits and pieces you buy will work with one of the most common hubs: Aeotec’s smart home hub is based on the Samsung SmartThings platform, one of the most diverse smart home ecosystems out there. Other powerful systems, such as Ring Alarm and Ring Alarm Pro (which has a built-in mesh router), are more focused on the security aspect of the smart home and have more limited third-party support. When in doubt, check the hub manufacturers’ websites to verify which devices each one works with.

Including such compatibility in your buying criteria today will maximize the value of your initial smart home investments down the road.

What Is Smart Home Technology? A Guide for Absolute Beginners

If you're new to the world of a smart home, we're taking a closer look at the technology.

If you’re curious about a smart home and the technology behind it, you have come to the right place.

Smart home gadgets and services are booming with steady growth. You can connect every appliance in your home to the network and monitor each one remotely. Smart home tech essentially brings automation to the home.

We will help you understand smart home technology in detail so you can convert your home into a smart one without investing much time and money.

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What Is Smart Home Technology?

Smart home technology involves gadgets, devices, and home appliances with wireless connectivity. When connected to the home Wi-Fi internet network, they communicate with each other, a smart bridge, or a mobile phone app.

You can effortlessly control these devices from anywhere using a connected smartphone or mobile app. A few premium smart devices go the extra mile to offer energy savings and personalized services.

At the center of any smart home ecosystem, you’ll find a smart speaker. You can ask it to adjust the home lighting, heating, and so on. These are essentially small, voice-controlled computers that can search the web or manage your schedules.

How Does It Work?

Some smart home technology relies on mesh networking. Zigbee and Z-Wave are the most popular mesh networking smart home protocols. A mesh network protocol enables all the smart home devices to connect with each other dynamically through a nested networking system that doesn’t depend on any hierarchy. Other smart home protocols include familiar names like Wi-Fi and Bluetooth.

At the center of most smart homes is a smart hub. A smart hub could be a Zigbee/Z-Wave-based smart bridge, a smart speaker, or a mobile phone app. You need to connect any of these hubs to your home Wi-Fi. Home appliances like smart lights, smart coffee machines, smart thermostats, video doorbells, smart security cameras, smart door locks, and more will either connect directly to the home Wi-Fi or a central hub.

You’ll get a mobile app for the smart bridge where all of the compatible smart home appliances will show up. You can set a schedule for these devices or simply operate them with one-time commands.

Some of the smart devices will communicate with each other and analyze your daily routine to automatically match your likes and dislikes. Most smart devices send push or email notifications if something goes wrong.

Most affordable and DIY-friendly smart home systems operate in the cloud through the home internet. However, high-tech business premises and premium households get standalone smart home systems.

Top Smart Home Ecosystems

A big choice to make when creating a smart home is what smart home ecosystem to select. These are currently the three big names.

1. Amazon Alexa

The e-commerce giant developed the virtual assistant Alexa for its Amazon Echo devices. But Alexa has grown to a wide variety of other devices.

Alexa speakers support various smart skills like voice calls, online news, entertainment, scheduling, multi-room audio, and many more. If you want to build a smart home set up with Alexa, you need to buy smart devices that show the Works With Alexa tag.

Related: Amazon Alexa vs. Google Home vs. Apple HomeKit: What's the Best Smart Home System?

2. Apple HomeKit

HomeKit is Apple's own smart home system. You can control devices through a HomePod, HomePod mini, iPhone, iPad, Apple TV, Apple Watch, and Mac. Instead of relying on individual apps, you'll control everything through Apple's Home app or with a voice command to Siri. Make sure to look for smart home devices that are compatible with HomeKit.

3. Google Assistant

Most Android smartphones, tablets, and Chrome OS computers support Google Assistant, Google's own smart home system. It is also available on iOS devices.

To build a Google Assistant smart home, you need a Google Home or Google Nest smart speaker and compatible devices.

Related: What Is the Google Home App and What Is It Used For?

The central controlling app of this ecosystem is the Google Home app.

Common Devices for a Smart Home

Here are some great smart home devices to get started with.

1. Smart Security Camera

You can install smart cameras for home security in and around the house. They usually connect to cloud storage to store footage. You can also view the live feed on a mobile app or a smart speaker with a screen like Google Nest Hub or Amazon Echo Show.

Many smart security cameras also offer motion sensing and high-intensity LED floodlights for added security. They often send push notifications when any stranger is loitering in the backyard.

2. Smart Thermostat

Smart thermostats are the most popular smart devices. They control the heating system for automatic temperature adjustment.

Some advanced ones like the Google Nest Learning Thermostat even study your routine and set a heating and cooling profile on its own to help you save money.

Related: The Best Smart Thermostats for Your Home

3. Smart Door Lock and Video Doorbells

Smart door locks let you enter the home without a key and automatically lock the door behind you. You can share access codes with friends and family to let them enter the home when you’re not around.

With a video doorbell, you can easily safeguard your property against home invasion, unwanted solicitors, and porch pirates without opening the door. These devices send video feeds, notifications, and even voice alerts to smart speakers.

4. Smart Lights

Smart lights save you time and money. These are highly energy-efficient LED lights that consume less energy than old incandescent bulbs. Also, you can control their activity from mobile apps, wearables, or using simple voice commands.

You can even turn smart lights on and off remotely if your home is empty for extra added security.

Smart Home Technology Privacy and Security

You can follow these basic steps to secure your public cloud-based smart home from threats:

Don’t share your home Wi-Fi password with anyone.

Use strong passwords, memorize them, and change frequently.

Inform the service provider if you see any unusual wires connecting to your line.

Update the firmware or app of the smart devices like the smart bridge, Amazon Echo, or Google Home.

A Smart Home Made Simple

Smart home technology continues to grow in popularity because of its ease of use and convenience.

If you have a home Wi-Fi network that can handle a couple of devices, then you’re good to go in setting up a beginner-level smart home. Just connect your smartphone and the smart appliance to the network. And with a few taps on the mobile app, you can begin building a smart home.