when the weather turns cold outside, the leaves, they they start to fall. You feel
this crisp breeze brush across your flannel sweater. You know what time it is...
It's time for that warm hot cup of whatever it is you like to drink and you
know what's really disappointing? When that warm hot cup of whatever it is you
like to drink goes cold. Now surely somebody has figured out a way to keep a
hot drink hot, and no I'm not talking about an insulated thermos, or an
insulated mug, I'm talking about a freakin smart mug. Actually I'm talking
about the Ember smart mug which is the thing that this review is about. Now the
Ember smart mug is a mug so smart that you can set a precise temperature
through the phone app and the mug will to keep your hot drink at that precise
temperature. Now in this review I'm going to take you through all the main
features of the ember smart mug, how its held up over the past six months, and
whether or not I recommend that you should buy it. Let's dive in. I've had my
Ember smart mug for over six months now and in that time I have to say it's
become quite an enjoyable mug to use. The main features with this device all
happened within the smartphone app though if you don't have a smart phone
around and still want to use the mug you can it defaults to warming the beverage
to 135 degrees Fahrenheit or 57.2 degrees Celsius. When a phone isn't in
use, Ember has several temperature and liquid detection sensors embedded within
the mug so it knows when to turn itself on when it senses liquid has been poured
into the mug and to turn itself off when it knows there's nothing in the mug. Now
the battery will last you about an hour so but that depends if you're pouring
something into the ember smart mug that is warm or if you're pouring something
into it that is cold. If it's cold that's going to shorten the battery life
because the heaters within the mug have to work harder to get that drink up to
the desired temperature that you set. Now if you're planning to sip on your warm
drink all afternoon, what Ember recommends
for those situations is just place the smart mug back in its saucer that will
charge the smart mug as well as allow it to continue to keep your drink at that
consistent temperature all day long. I found the mug to have a very simple,
modern aesthetic. The LED indicator is pretty useful as well it'll show red
when it has a flat battery, it'll flash orange when it's charging, green when
it's fully charged, it'll blink blue when it's in bluetooth pairing mode, it'll
blink white when it's warming / cooling your drink to the desired temperature,
and then it'll turn solid white when your ideal temperature has been reached.
The app is pretty slick you can download it from both the iOS and Android app
stores and the app allows you to select preset temperatures that Ember
recommends for specific drinks and it also includes a tea timer as well as
recipes to try. Setting up the device is pretty simple after opening the app you
select which mug you have and then hold down the bottom button of the Ember mug
to start the pairing process. Once paired you'll be asked to pick a color for the
LED located towards the bottom of the mug as a personalization touch and in
case you have multiple mugs around in your house you'll be able to tell them
apart. You'll then be asked to log in to an existing account or create a new one
after that it'll usually download the latest firmware to your ember smart mug
and then you're all set. So far the only issue I've run into with my Ember smart
mug is that it will occasionally lose connection to my phone I wish the
Bluetooth range on this smart mug was just a little bit better so I didn't
always have to have my phone right around the smart mug
now the smart mug is smart enough to know that if it loses connection with my
phone it will keep warming whatever drink I have in it to the last set
temperature that I had in the smartphone app. So what are some downsides to owning
this mug? There are two then I've run into with owning my amber smart mug the
first being the mug itself it's a 10 ounce mug and for me that's just not
large enough for most of the lattes I make. Now thankfully
Ember sells a 14-ounce version, though it's a little bit pricey. The second
downside is you have to be careful when hand-washing the mug not to get the
bottom wet, you don't want water near the baseplate. The other potential downside
is the battery life of the Ember smart mug. It's only rated for about 500 charge
cycles so depending on how much you use it, you may be looking at having to
replace it only after a couple of years and I haven't found any information
about whether or not the battery in the Ember smart mug is replaceable. Alright,
now on to recommendations. So far I've really enjoyed using my amber smart mug
over the past six months. As someone who enjoys sipping on lattes and hot
chocolate and having their drinks be consistently warm it's perfect
but that perfection comes at a cost. Ember mugs start at around 80 dollars and
$130 for the larger size. They also carry a mug perfect for
keeping hot drinks for up to three hours so if you're going to a game out in the
cold that'll be the device that keeps your drink warm the longest. While pricey,
if you're willing to pay to keep your drinks warm, I don't think you're going
to be disappointed. You can get the Ember smart mug at various retailers including
Amazon and I'll leave links below in the video description in case you're
interested in purchasing one. If you liked this video, make sure to hit that
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like this one. For 6 Months Later, I'm Josh Teder, thanks for watching.