Home Automation Without Rewiring Anything

The marketing for smart homes is aimed at people who want to control everything from a phone. Most of the genuine value is narrower and duller: a few devices that solve one problem each, plug into existing sockets, and then need no attention.

Here is what is actually worth having, what it costs in complication, and what to skip.

The ones that earn their place

Smart plugs. A plug that goes into a socket, with the lamp or appliance plugged into it. Controlled by voice, by phone, or on a schedule.

Genuinely useful for: a lamp that comes on before dusk so nobody comes home to a dark house; turning something off from another room or from bed; making a house look occupied while away. Cheap, and installation is putting it in a socket.

Motion-activated lights. Battery powered, stuck to a wall with adhesive. In a hallway, on stairs, or in a bathroom at night they remove the need to find a switch in the dark.

Video doorbells. You can see who is at the door before opening it, from anywhere. Useful, and worth reading the section on privacy below.

Smart speakers. A voice assistant for timers, reminders, music, the weather and calling someone hands-free. The hands-free calling is the underrated part.

Water leak sensors. A small device under a sink or behind a washing machine that alerts you at the first drop. Costs very little and prevents the most expensive domestic accident there is.

Smart thermostats. Real savings if the heating currently runs on a fixed schedule or is left on. Installation is more involved than the rest of this list.

The ones worth being sceptical about

Smart light bulbs throughout the house. Each one needs setting up, they occasionally lose connection, and if the wall switch is off the bulb is unreachable. A smart plug on a lamp achieves most of the benefit with none of the annoyance.

Smart locks. Genuinely convenient and a larger decision than the rest of this list. If you fit one, keep a physical key as a fallback and understand what happens when the battery dies.

Smart appliances. A refrigerator with a screen is a refrigerator with a screen that will stop being supported before the refrigerator wears out.

Anything requiring its own hub unless you are building a larger system. Each hub is another thing to maintain.

Whole-house systems sold as a package. Expensive, and they tie you to one company's continued existence.

Choosing so it still works in five years

Buy from established companies. The main risk in this category is not the device failing but the company closing its service — at which point the device stops working entirely. This has happened repeatedly.

Check whether it works without the internet. Devices that only function via a company's servers stop functioning when those servers do.

Prefer devices that work with more than one system, so you are not locked in.

Check what happens when the battery dies on anything with a lock or a door.

Buy few, deliberately. Two devices that solve a real problem beat twelve that need managing.

The safety case

This is where the category is most useful and least marketed.

Lights that come on by themselves remove a common cause of trips and falls at night. A motion light on the stairs or the route to the bathroom is a small, cheap change with a real effect.

Leak sensors catch a problem while it is still a towel rather than a floor.

A video doorbell means the door does not have to be opened to find out who is there — which also removes the pressure of an unexpected caller at the door.

Smart plugs on the appliances people worry about — an iron, a heater — allow checking and switching off from another room.

Voice-activated calling matters if a phone is not always to hand.

Fall detection and emergency calling live on watches and phones rather than in the house, and are worth setting up. See smartwatches and trackers.

Privacy, plainly

Devices with microphones are listening for a wake word. Reputable ones process that locally and only send audio after the wake word. They do also misfire.

Recordings are usually kept. Both Amazon and Google let you review and delete what has been recorded, and turn off the setting that keeps it. Worth finding once.

Cameras record. A doorbell records callers, and possibly a public pavement. Some jurisdictions have rules about this; more practically, it is worth thinking about what it points at and telling household members it exists.

Do not put a camera inside the house without everyone living there knowing and agreeing. This is a common source of genuine conflict when it is set up by a family member remotely.

A microphone in a bedroom is a choice worth making deliberately rather than by default.

Setting it up for someone else

If you are arranging this for a parent:

Ask what would actually help, rather than deciding. The answer is usually about lights, doors or the phone.

Set it up with them, not for them. A system only they cannot operate is a system that gets unplugged.

Do not install cameras or microphones without an explicit conversation. Monitoring someone in their own home is a different proposition from helping them, however well meant, and it is felt as such.

Keep the manual controls working. Every light should still have a switch that works.

See helping a parent with technology.

Where to start

One smart plug and one motion light. Under an hour, no installation, and between them they cover the two most common real problems: coming home to darkness and finding the way at night.

Add more only when something specific annoys you enough to solve.

For additional public information on everyday cybersecurity, see Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency.