Seven Clever Ways You Should Be Using Your Smart Lights

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Smart lights were there at the beginning of the smart home tech revolution, and over the years, these clever bulbs and LED strips have gradually evolved to offer more by way of both features and form factors—so much so that you might not be aware of everything you can do with smart lights, even if you've been using them for years.

If your own smart light setup is mostly limited to switching your bedside lamp off with a voice command, controlling them remotely from your phone, or perhaps changing up the colors or adding an automation or two, then you're not taking advantage of everything these lights can do for you. These are some of the best smart light tricks you can try.

Sync your lights with your TV

Having your smart lights change color and flash in time to action happening on your television can really add to the experience of watching movies and shows—and a number of smart light manufacturers now offer the necessary kit and apps to easily make this happen.

For Philips Hue lights, for example, you need either a syncing box or a native app, depending on your TV model. It's also something you can do with Nanoleaf lights, via a system called Screen Mirror that uses a small camera to see what's on your television.

Nanoleaf Essentials Smart Multicolor HD Lightstrip

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Set up random schedules

One of the ways that smart lights can be useful when you're away from home is giving potential robbers the idea that you haven't gone away at all. You can almost always control your smart lights remotely, as long as your home wifi is still running.

If you don't want to have to remember to turn your lights on at home every evening while you're at the beach or in the mountains, Philips Hue has a randomize timings setting available when you set up an automation, which will automatically vary when the lights turn on each day.

You can randomize timings in the Philips Hue app. Credit: Lifehacker

Get notifications via your lights

Add some third-party services to the mix and the list of possibilities grows even more. IFTTT (If This Then That), for example, can set up routines based on specific triggers that lead to specific actions—and smart light brands including Philips Hue and Lifx support the protocol.

Because IFTTT can plug into a variety of social media, mobile, and app systems, you can have events on these platforms trigger a flash or a change in color for your lights. One idea would be to turn a desk lamp blue when the weather forecast is predicting rain.

Group your lights into scenes

You can do even more with your smart lights by grouping them together and setting specific scenes you can switch between. Most platforms let you do this fairly easily, so all the lights in a certain room can be managed together, and changed over time.

You could set up scenes for early morning or late at night, for example, or for movie nights or for studying—the Nanoleaf app can even creates scenes for you based on a keyword or two. Check inside your smart light companion app to see what you've got available, or explore your customization options.

Wake up with a "sunrise"

Ease yourself more gently into the day by having your smart lights turn on gradually in the mornings, mimicking an actual sunrise. You could even use this trick to replace your alarm clock.

This works for a wide variety of smart lights, and some can even sync the feature to your local sunrise times. You can use this with any smart light connected to Google Home, for example, by saying "hey Google, wake my lights at..." and adding a time to Google Assistant.

The Nanoleaf app can create Magic Scenes for you. Credit: Nanoleaf

Add a motion sensor

Combine a compatible smart motion sensor with your smart lights and you don't even need to go to the trouble of tapping on your phone or speaking out a voice command to activate your smart lights—they'll come on as soon as there's movement in a room.

A few smart light platforms offer this functionality, including Philips Hue. You're able to set the brightness of the lights—so you're not suddenly dazzled as you stumble to the bathroom, for example—and you can have the lights turn off after a certain time as well.

Philips Hue Motion Sensor

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Set up automated routines

Your smart lights are even more useful when you combine them with other devices. For example, you can set the lights to dim as a chill out mix begins to play on your smart speaker at a certain time of night. Or you can set your lights and smart thermostat to all turn off together when you leave the house.

These tricks are known as routines or automations, and you can set them up in Google Home (via the Automations tab), in the Amazon Alexa app (via More > Routines), and in other smart home hub platforms (including Samsung SmartThings and Apple Homekit).

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