New Smart Home Technology: When Smart House aired on Disney Channel in 1999, it was a massive stretch of the imagination; while smart home technology has thankfully not tried to take over as anyone’s mother, it has come a long way.
10 NEW SMART HOME TRENDS THIS YEAR
These are some of the biggest smart home tech trends happening right now. Automating devices and appliances for seamless and scheduled functioning is not just for high-end homes. Enhance every aspect of your lifestyle with innovative security solutions, customized home entertainment, super connectivity, and top-notch health management.
From a pure integration standpoint, more smart home devices are starting to communicate. A Philips Hue lighting system can control the lights in your entire home and can follow specific routines that you create to turn the lights on or off across the household according to your schedule and needs. Technological advancements have resulted in affordable apps and smart gadgets that can do much more. Read ahead for detailed information about the top New smart Home Technology trends you can integrate into your life.
Integration
One of the top smart home trends for 2021 is just how fully integrated smart home tech is becoming. As mentioned above, it has almost become an expectation instead of a luxury. Connection is key when it comes to expanding the smart home system. Ease of use continues to improve, too. You don’t need to be tech-savvy to set up many smart tech devices.
Artificial Intelligence and the Internet of Things
Thanks to voice assistants like Amazon Alexa and Siri, most people are familiar with at least some aspects of AI functionality. Artificial intelligence continues to improve, understanding commands better and responding in more relevant ways. AI in smart homes helps residents play music, update their to-do lists, turn lights off and on, and much more.
The Internet of Things (essentially taking all the things in the world and connecting them to the Internet) is still a more complicated process to understand. Still, the progress made in the smart home world in regards to IoT will have a lot of implications for making life easier, particularly in the smart kitchen and smart bathroom space.
Touchless Tech
This trend had already started to permeate the smart home arena and the Covid-19 pandemic accelerated it in 2020 and 2021. You’ve likely seen touchless hand sanitizer dispensers in retail environments, and while they’re likely, not smart-enabled, the potential is there and the touchless concept is expanding. For example, touchless doorbells are an innovation for guests to announce their arrival without touching a shared surface that could potentially spread germs.
Smart Thermostats
Following smart speakers, smart thermostats have been one of the most widely adopted smart home tech devices. They are generally easy to install and can be completely customized to your preferred temperature. Nest claims to save U.S. customers an average of 10% to 12% annually on their heating bills and about 15% on their cooling bills.
Health Tech
As mentioned, smart thermostats have been one of the most popular smart tech devices for a while, but now some are integrating features like humidity sensors to help with air quality; stand-alone humidity sensors are a growth area, too. Smart air and air conditioners are also on the rise to assist in elevating and maintaining air quality during this global health crisis. Some smart doorbells are integrating temperature-taking functionality so that people can screen their guests for one of the most basic COVID-19 indicators before allowing them inside. In smart home tech that is less Covid-inspired, smart water filtration systems are helping with overall health.
At-Home Exercise
A health-related trend that was also stimulated further during the pandemic, because of the closing of gyms and fitness studios and the increase in time spent at home, tech-based at-home exercise is continuing to grow in 2021.
Home Office Smart Home Technology
With the widespread pivot to working from home, smart home innovations, specifically for home offices, garnered attention last year and continue to evolve as companies extend office closures and even switch to hybrid or permanent work-from-home policies. Tech from noise-canceling windows to drown out the neighbor mowing their lawn to AI filters to hide the messy living room when you jump on a video call with your boss are just the beginning of the potential for growth in this space.
High-Speed Connection
One of the premises for smart homes of the future is a high-speed internet connection via mesh Wi-Fi. Slow connections and dead zones that occur when you walk away from your router will be a problem of the past when mesh Wi-Fi connects. The whole house will have a high-speed connection for the rest of the smart home devices you install.
High-Tech Security Smart Home Technology
These devices will get more interconnected, allowing you to check on your home from anywhere and access the controls from afar (like opening the door for a delivery person or turning lights on if you see a suspicious person on the sidewalk).
Privacy Features Smart Home Technology
Smart home tech has faced issues with data breaches and security hacks. To remain relevant to savvy consumers today, companies are advancing features to ensure users of these devices that their info and their private lives inside their homes are safe.