SmartScene

Smart home news, reviews, and guides — making your home smarter.

SmartScene

Smart home news, reviews, and guides — making your home smarter.

Deals

Best Smart Home Deals Today: Thermostats, Security Cameras & More (Up to 50% Off)

Today’s smart home deals (October 21): save on the Google Nest Thermostat, Arlo Essential 2025 security cameras, and Matter-ready Linkind smart bulbs — discounts of up to 50% off at Walmart.com. Every price was verified on the retailer’s product page this morning. Whether you’re cutting your heating bill, adding indoor or outdoor cameras, or upgrading to tunable smart lighting, these are the smart home deals worth grabbing today.

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Home AutomationSmart Home News

Aqara Outdoor Plug H2 EU: Thread, Zigbee, Energy Monitoring

Aqara has launched the Outdoor Plug H2 EU, a weather-resistant IP44 smart plug that runs Matter over Thread or Zigbee on one device, with real-time energy monitoring, overload and overheat cutoffs, and a 16A/3680W rating for outdoor appliances. Priced from 32.99 euros in Europe, it brings power metering and dual-protocol flexibility to gardens, patios, and holiday lighting setups.

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Smart Home NewsSmart Lighting

SwitchBot Launches 30m Permanent Outdoor Lights with Matter

SwitchBot has launched Permanent Outdoor Lights, a 30-meter Matter-over-Wi-Fi lighting system for eaves and patios. The RGBIC+WW design combines 16 million colors with dedicated 2700K–6500K white light, delivers up to 2,600 lumens, and carries an IP67 rating. Priced at $239.99 and available now on Amazon, the lights work with Apple Home, Alexa, Google Home, and Home Assistant with no SwitchBot hub required.

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Home AutomationSmart Home News

Google Home Update: Gemini ‘Stop’ Fix, Faster Controls

Google’s October 14 update for Google Home brings more than a dozen fixes across Gemini for Home and the Home app: saying ‘stop’ now actually stops media and closes the mic, weather forecasts respect your temperature units, third-party device controls are rebuilt and faster, and Philips Hue bridges move to local Matter control. Here’s what changed and why reliability is the new feature race.

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Smart Home NewsSmart Speakers

New Google Home Speaker Downloads Hundreds of GB of Data

Google has acknowledged that the new Google Home Speaker is downloading hundreds of gigabytes of background data for some owners, with one unit consuming 132GB in 30 days. The 3 a.m. downloads point to stuck firmware updates. Google says a fix is already rolling out. Here’s what happened, how to check your own speaker’s data usage, and what it means for capped internet plans.

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