I have been using some of the old Philips Hue bulbs for a while now and have loved them. But being an older model, they rely on having the bridge plugged into my router. WiZ, owned by the same parent company, has come in with their more wallet-friendly range, and so I got to take them along with the dial Switch for a spin.
The bulbs themselves
WiZ Colour Smartbulbs are shockingly easy to use. Plug them in and install the app, then they are good to go. Seriously, the setup took minutes, with the longest bit being the process of setting up an account on the app. Unlike old Hue bulbs, there is no additional hardware required.
Then you can easily create and add bulbs to rooms. This means you can change the colours or turn off the lights in a room in an instant. Again, super easy.
The lights themselves put out[some seriously strong light, which you can dim or change to softer tones in a heartbeat.
The other cool feature that is built into them is motion sensing. You can have them turn on and off as you walk under them. I couldn’t test these features well because the light fixtures in my house…well suck and point up towards the ceiling. But in the testing I could do it seemed responsive. You can also set that on individual lights so maybe you only want one to turn on automatically reducing the bright blast to the eyes as your whole hallway lights up.
Integrating with assistants
Now that my home has gone full Alexa, I was keen to see how easily these would set up. It took a few taps in the Wiz and Alexa app to move all my settings, like the rooms, across. Yet again, it took all of a few minutes for this to be up and running. Next minute I was telling Alexa to turn the Lounge Red, or to turn off the lounge lights as I walked out, and it was done and dusted.
With the assistant, getting nuanced colours was a lot more difficult. If I wanted the lights to be red, blue, or dimmed, there were no issues. But when I wanted a darker red, it wasn’t always that useful. But for these nuances, your best bet is to use the WiZ app, which you can use at any time with no issues. There were heaps of colour shades you can play with and a handful of settings for varying colours. Note these options aren’t anywhere near as in-depth as the settings you can get from Hue with the bridge, where you can do all kinds of awesome, but also, you’re paying a fraction of the cost.
My kids had a blast asking Alexa to change the colours of the lights in different rooms. And it has certainly made movie night way better. Just be careful, if you leave the lights green for too long, then normal lights look red for a bit. It’s not an issue, but you get excited that there is a red sunset… before realising it’s 10:30 at night and it’s just the bathroom light.
WiZ Dial Switch
What if you like dining your lights the old-fashioned way? Nothing like a dial thingy on the wall. Well WiZ, has a solution for you!
The Dial Switch is super easy to set up and use. In the WiZ app, you choose the option, it guides you through the process of tapping the switch a few times, and boom, it’s done. You can set it up in a room, and in seconds I was turning my lights off, turning them on, and adjusting their brightness. There are even touch buttons on the bottom that can be set to your favourite colours in case you want to change the vibes without the app.
It has a simple, elegant style and a USB-C port for charging it. It comes with a couple of screws to attach it to the wall or some 3M strips. Out of the box it comes with the mounting plate attached which uses magnets. This makes it easy to remove so that you can take it off and charge the Dial Switch.
There was a slight delay between pressing the button and the lights responding, but this is both not surprising and not a big deal.
Should you get the WiZ Dial Switch and Colour Smartbulbs?
This is an easy recommendation. My old Phillips Hue lightbulbs were amazing, but the simplicity and price here make it super easy to justify the purchase. At $70 for the Dial Switch, and Around $40 for each lightbulb, this is a very reasonably priced solution.
Want some colour in your life and an easy way to control it? These two are great purchase choices!
Given the low price, the WiZ lightbulbs and Dial Switch are bloody awesome!
