Room-by-Room Guide to Home Automation

07 Jul Room-by-Room Guide to Home Automation

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ow that smart home devices are more affordable and easier to install than ever before, you might want to expand your home’s collection of smarter technology. It helps that smart home products can control just about everything in your home . . . except your kids.

With this in mind, we put together a room-by-room guide to home automation and recommend the best smart home devices to help you make your life easier, safer, and more energy efficient.

Entryway

Forgetting your keys is a huge hassle, and that nagging worry about whether or not you locked the door when you left on vacation can ruin an otherwise relaxing trip. A smart door lock, like the Schlage Encode, not only keeps your home safe—it gives you quick access and lets you rest easy.

Some smart locks look like regular deadbolt locks but with Bluetooth or Wi-Fi capability. Other locks have touchscreen keypads to give you a high-tech look and the convenience of a backup code. You can set your lock to sense your smartphone so it automatically locks the door when you leave and unlocks it when you get home.

You can also set rules for your lock, like programming it to arm your security system whenever the door locks. And you can control your lock remotely so you can lock or unlock the door for a neighbor, whether you’re across the world or snug in your own bed.

Living room

Turning lights on and off isn’t exactly a major inconvenience, but smartbulbs offer quite a few surprising benefits for your home and your wallet. Smart lightbulbs last 10 times longer than regular bulbs, and they only consume 8.5 watts of electricity as opposed to the 60 watts eaten up by conventional bulbs.

Smart lights like Philips Hue lightbulbs are easy to install—it’s as simple as changing out a lightbulb. Once your new light is in, you can use your smartphone to change the color, dim it to your desired brightness, or have it turn on and off at certain times of day.

The scheduling option puts your lighting to work as a safety feature as well because having lights turn on and off throughout the evening can trick potential burglars into thinking someone is home even when the house is empty.

You can also switch on your front porch light and the path lighting before you leave the office so you’re not fumbling around in the dark when you get home.

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