In this video we will go over the Best Smart Home Automation Ideas.
Ones that are actually helpful and avoid the ones you will pay a bunch of money for and
never really use!
There are 5 basic parts of Home Automation.
1) A device acts as a Trigger (Like a motion detector) 2) A device that completes an action
when triggered (Like a Smart Vacuum Cleaner) 3) A device that can do both (Like a Door
Lock.
It can be locked by something triggering it or Locking it can trigger something else).
4) Apps that get everything and all the devices to work together and do a sequence of actions.
I only use devices that work with three apps the Stringify app, the IFTTT app, and the
SmartThings App.
And 5) A hub for the all the devices to communicate with, so it can then communicate with the
three smart Apps.
In my home I mostly use the Smartthings Hub.
Lets start with my Door Sensors because they are consistent triggers.
They work almost 100% of the time which makes them very reliable and really effective.
My favorite use for them is in my balcony sliding door.
I have it set to turn on my Outdoor strip lights to a blue color every time someone
opens the door but I preset stringify to do this only at nighttime . Now, you don't just
have to use the door sensor to control them, you can also use the smartthings app or any
trigger device that works with any of the three smart apps.
Now these same type of door sensors can also turn on my pantry light every time I open
the pantry door.
It is really helpful as this is one of the lights people forget to turn off all the time
and I know I want my pantry light to turn on every time I am in the Pantry.
The pantry lights turn on by triggering my smart light switch.
So I can still also use the light switch to toggle them on and off too.
As another idea you can use your door sensors on your window for security and hook them
up to a alarm siren.
This helps keep intruders out and can in some cases keep sneaky teenagers in.
This works because the siren is also a smart device.
The siren works as a good deterrent because it has a strobe effect as well as the siren
that goes off.
IF you don't want the siren going off every time you open the window, in stringify just
set them to go off only during certain hours or when your house is set in away mode.
And I'll explain that in a little bit.
Now this is my favorite smart home device and this might surprise a lot of people.
It is a smart outlet with a power button on the front.
It really takes your smart home to the next level.
The beauty of this device is that you can turn most dumb things into smart things.
For example, if you plug this normal Humidifier into a smart outlet you can now turn it on
and off a variety of ways: from the smartthings app, your voice, on a schedule or use whatever
other trigger you want to turn it on with.
But you can also just turn it on and off from the power button on the outlet and this is
really important if you have people that won't be comfortable with smart appliances.
This is one of the 2 important reasons for the power button on the outlet.
Take this space heater for example you can start heating a room up in the morning before
you even get out of bed by telling google home, or scheduling it in stringify, pressing
on in the smartthings app or just press the physical button on itself.
In fact you can smart control the on and off to any device that can turn on and off by
just plugging it in.
Let me explain.
This fan is turned on.
I unplug it, then I plug it back in and it is still turned on.
Therefore this smart outlet can make this fan smart.
Contrarily this second fan I have is turned on but when I unplug it then plug it in again
it doesn't automatically turn back on so this device won't become smart with the smart outlet.
I have found this to be particularly useful with curling irons in the house.
For example, you can have them on a timer in stringify that once you turn them on they
will automatically turn off in 30 minutes.
You could still make sure you didn't leave it on and turn it off from where ever you
are in the world so you don't have to worry about always leaving a curling iron on.
As you can see you can take almost any of your electric devices and make them somewhat
smart.
I even plug my washer and dryer into the outlet.
Lets say I want to turn on the washer an hour before I come home so my clothes don't sit
wet all day.
Or let's say I want a hot blanket ready when I get home on a cold night.
I don't know.
Do whatever you want... that's the point.
And here is something crazy.
You can even turn a normal TV into a smart with just this outlet.
I did this with my old TV in my Garage Gym.
Then I hooked up a chromecast to it and it pretty much is a fully smart tv now.
More to come on that in just a bit.
Now like I said once a device is hooked into my smartthings network any device can trigger
another.
So I can literally just use this Smart outlet button as a smart switch for anything else.
Look this outlet has no device plugged into it.
Yet I use stringify so I can turn on this other light that is plugged into a different
smart outlet by pressing the button of the outlet with nothing plugged into it.
So this means in the morning from my bed I can just press a button near my bed to start
up my coffee maker.
In fact this coffee maker wasn't even a smart coffee maker until I hooked it into an outlet
as well.
If you want to get really fancy look how nothing is plugged into this smart outlet.
Yet I can literally turn on and off all these lights and devices including my fireplace
by just tapping a button.
It can do this because this is a preset I made in the stringify app.
The more you become familiar with Smartthings, IFTTT and Stringify the more stuff like this
you can do.
And it is not that hard.
Now here I just did that by pressing a button, but actually in my house this is my light
setting preset for when guests come over.
I turn them on, not with a button, but with my voice sensor!
You probably don't call them a voice sensor though.
You probably call them Alexa or Google home, but when it comes to home automation, to me,
these are just sensors that use your voice to trigger actions.
Most of my house is set up to do certain action sequences in response to my voice command.
My fireplace is something I always use to turn on and off with my voice.
In fact it is one of the only devices I use that doesn't have a physical switch or toggle
on and off.
To be honest I had to rig it that way because my fireplace could only use a special device
to plug it into the system to make it smart.
Your fireplace may be different.
I will link to this device along with every device I talk about in this video below in
the description.
And since it works with the three smart apps anything can control it.
I also use my voice sensor to turn on and off my whole Garage Gym by simply saying it's
workout time.
It turns on my garage lights, TV, Fan, and my Garage door.
This is the beauty of having everything set up with the big 3 smart apps: Smartthings,
IFTTT, and Stringify.
And, I normally don't get any devices that don't connect to at least one of those three
apps.
Because If I do I cannot plug them into a string of events like I did here with my garage
gym setup.
I do have 2 devices that are exceptions that I don't use with those 3 apps.
The first is my dog feeder.
I have it feed my dogs twice a day and I never worry about feeding my dogs besides that.
It even informs me if there happens to be an error or doesn't feed them for some reason.
You can also control the smart feeder with your voice, it's app, or a button on it.
I like my smart feeder cause its the best one on the market but I don't love it because
it doesn't connect to any of the 3 smart apps.
In Fact, Post below if you know one that does.
The next thing I control on a time schedule is my smart vacuum.
Its nice to have a freshly vacuumed house every morning.
Especially with shedding pets.
Now when we have guests coming outside of the schedule I can still control it with it's
own app or Alexa.
I love this vacuum because it both vacuums and mops.
Okay if you are ready I am going to show you something that changed my life.
I now control everything on my TV with my voice through Google Home.
To do this I subscribed to YouTube TV to replace our Cable, I then connected my TV to Chromecast
and also set up the Logitech Hub (This hub controls my TV better than my Smartthings
Hub).
Using Google Home I am then able to completely replace the need for the remote and I just
tell the tv what show or channel I want to watch.
Or How long to rewind or what time or second in the show I want to skip to.
All other smart TV combinations at this point are not as good as this setup.
I have another video that gives you more specifics on this.
I will post that video at the end of this one.
And don't worry you can still use your phone app too to control and surf the TV as well
you don't have to use your voice.
The biggest expense I have for my smart home automation are my smart light dimmer switches.
I literally switched out every light switch in my house with a smart dimmer switch.
Here you can see I control my chandelier with my dimmer switch to turn them on off and to
increase or decrease the brightness.
In case, you aren't already getting the pattern in this video I can also use my voice or any
other trigger to turn them or control them.
People ask why I use smart dimmer switches instead of buying smart light bulbs.
First, expensive Smart Light Bulbs you have to replace when they die or break.
Second people always turn the light switches off that control smart light bulbs and they
don't work if the light switch is off.
Third: people that are smartthings illiterate can still turn on and off the lights without
even knowing the difference if you use smart dimmer switches.
Like the outlet button, what is cool about these switches is that you can have them turn
on any device or string of actions you have preset.
Here you can see I can turn 2 separate lights on with one switch.
That entry lamp is controlled with a smart outlet so now one switch turns on all my lights
in my entryway.
Or if I want to that switch can control something completely else as well.
I could even unscrew that light bulb and control just the entry lamp with the switch or really
any other device I wanted.
For example that light switch can now control my space heater or turn on all my gym lights
if I wanted to control it that way.
I do have some smart light bulbs in my home but those are in areas mostly where I want
to switch the color and tone of the light and not just the brightness.
So with smart white light bulbs you can switch the tone of the white light.
I can make the lights more yellow and subdued and romantic or more bluish which makes things
feel more clean and bright.
If all you want to do is change the white tone I recommend these bulbs.
They are less expensive and I will link to them like everything else in this video, below.
Then there are smart colored light bulbs.
If you go with colored lights I recommend going with Philips Hue light bulbs.
Their lighting apps are far superior and make the lights do all sorts of tricks.
Like I can set them as pulsing Christmas lights, or a fiery lava ambiance, or even give them
a lightning bolt effect or I can have them match the colors that are on my TV.
But there are tons of 3rd party apps that can do much more impressive stuff than even
these ideas.
Osram bulbs are like Phillips Hue but they are cheaper and have some different type of
bulbs that Philips Hue doesn't.
But once again both work with Smartthings to simply change the color of light.
Arrival or Presence Sensors are the next smartthing that I use.
First off they can work as a beeper to find your keys... very helpful to me.
But they are meant to detect whether you are present or away from your home.
I used them in the past when I have to leave town I attach them to my dogs collar and they
notify me in case my dog gets out.
Stringify sends me a notification the dog is missing if they pass outside the certain
present area.
Then I can let the dog sitter know right away if my dog escapes.
I also use my arrival sensors to turn on my outside lights as soon as I get home.
And some people use them as a way to make sure their garage is closed by getting a notification
of the garage door's status when your sensor is detected that you are away from home.
I use them mostly as a conditional device in stringify.
Let me explain what that is.
In Stringify you can have lights turn on lets say... on the condition that it is nighttime.
But with these presence detectors you can have things only happen on the condition that
you are home or away, whichever you desire.
Here is an Example: my front door locks at 10:30 every night if all my presence detectors
are in present mode or in other words if everyone is home in my house.
Or my windows being opened only triggers an alarm if all my sensors are set to away.
Meaning my sensors are outside of the detectable presence.
Like a presence or arrival sensor I can use my phones GPS to detect when I have entered
or left a larger area than just my home.
I use this to trigger my smart thermostat.
When my phone enters or leaves a radius from my home I can have the thermostat turn on
or off.
This is good cause my thermostat can start cooling my house a few miles before I get
home from work instead of right as I arrive or being turned on all day.
I set this up in the IFTTT app.
I recommend other smart thermostats than my own but this was the only smart one that worked
with my house's warranty.
BUT since it works with Smartthings I can still use my voice, phone, schedules or other
devices to control my thermostat.
But back to my point you can sort of use your phones GPS much like an arrival sensor.
Both have a few different advantages and disadvantages.
My Smart Doorbells are another life changing device.
I can see who is at my door anywhere in the world to decide if I want to answer or not.
This is awesome!!
We don't even have to leave the bed to see if we want to answer the door.
Also this device has both a doorbell and motion detector on it that work as triggers because
this works with smartthings as well.
So this records any time there is motion or the door bell is pressed.
BUT because this also hooks up to smartthings you can use it to turn on the lights at when
motion is detected at night.
Or you can be fancy and have it change the light color when the doorbell is pressed.
I like this one better than Ring Doorbells even though ring is more popular.
I think it looks better and it doesn't require a monthly fee like Ring does.
And a link to that doorbell is found below this video.
Despite what these doorbell companies claim they are not that good at catching thieves
or for security purposes.
I don't really use it as my security camera.
Watch my video on security camera setups if you want to know the best way to do setup
for cheap, without a monthly bill, and find the best camera and and position for security
purposes.
But also, while I love my security cameras I don't really use them for smart home reasons
which is why the smart doorbell camera is so useful.
My Smart Door lock is another life changer.
I don't even know where the keys to my front door are at anymore because I don't ever use
them.
I just plug my code in and it locks and unlocks my front door.
Also, on my phone I can unlock the door from anywhere I want in the world as well.
However my door lock is also a smart triggering device.
I have my entry lights come on whenever I unlock the front door at nighttime.
Also I have a routine when I tell google home that I am leaving it waits 20 seconds enough
time for me to leave and it turns everything off, it sets my thermostat and it locks my
front doors.
Ok.
Now we move on to motion sensors... though we did already sort of just talked about the
one on my doorbell.
Most people want to use motion sensors to turn things on and I do use them to turn on
my closet lights.
I also use them to turn on the night lights in my kitchen if they sense movement but only
after the hour of 12 AM.
However, I find Motion Detectors more useful in turning off devices.
For example turning off my closet light if no motion is detected for 10 minutes.
Or closing my garage door if there is no motion in the garage for 20 minutes and so forth.
These can really cut the electricity bill if used right.
I found them also to be useful in areas and times you want to be notified if there is
movement.
You can have it trigger your siren alarm when you are on vacation and there is movement
in your bedroom or somewhere in your house.
Or receive an alert if someone enters your room when you are gone to work.
You can put one wherever you hide the Christmas presents or on the stairs if you have a crawling
baby and you want to be warned in those moments.
Next is the wet sensor.
People use this to put under their sinks or near their washer so they can catch a leak
before it gets bad.
I have found a more frequent use though.
Now, I have tested this out and found that you can use it to catch the person peeing
on the toilet seat.
I put mine on the toilet seat and it can notify me whenever it senses the wetness of urine
but also when the pee is no longer detected... hopefully meaning they cleaned it up.
Okay back on a serious note.
These multipurpose sensors that I will link to below not only work as open door sensors
and temperature sensors but also Vibration and Tilting sensors.
They are really good.
They sense the slightest movement both when I hit the counter or just tap it.
Attach this to the baby crib and you will be alerted when they are awake and start moving,
for me I have it set to trigger and turn on a red light when the baby is awake.
Also, you can attach them to trash cans so you know when animals are getting into the
trash as the trash cans will start to vibrate or tilt.
You can then either have it turn on a light to scare them away or send you a notification
to catch them in the act.
Let me now show you my favorite cascade of events that I have my smart home do.
After I give google the command �time for bed� all my lights turn off, my front door
locks, my thermostat changes and the garage door closes if I forgot to close it before.
This footage comes from my video Showing Google Home Automation in Real time.
If you want to see how fast this all can happen give it a watch.
Once again every device I use is found in the description below this video.
If this video helped you out give it a like and subscribe to the channel.
In the comments let me know of any better devices you find, questions you have about
smart home automation, or helpful smart home videos you want to see made.