You’ve got presents to wrap, meals to prepare, and family squabbles to settle — you don’t have time to dig under pine trees to turn on the lights. Here are some key strategies for controlling your Christmas lights with just your voice.
Play with smart lights right from the start
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If you are starting your collection of Christmas decorations from scratch, you can turn to the most suitable option: smart holiday lights. These lights connect to your phone for remote access via a dedicated app. They often connect directly to Apple HomeKit and Google Home, so they are also available through any voice assistant. You’ll have to double check which lights support which assistants, but you should be able to find some lights that suit your preferences.
While you can get special holiday smart lights, there are more traditional smart bulbs that you can upgrade in your home and use the appropriate app to apply holiday colors and animations. These bulbs are great because they are useful all year round. If you have smart bulbs like these installed, you’re all set!
To activate your lights with your Google Assistant voice on your smartphone, you’ll need:
- Press and hold Power button on your phone.
- Wait for a beep or visual notification to indicate that the device is listening.
- Say the command to control the light out loud.
- Wait for the confirmation beep and answer.
The process for activating the light using Siri is similar. On your iPhone or iPad:
- Press and hold Power button.
- Wait for a beep or visual notification to indicate that the device is listening.
- Say the command to control the light out loud.
- Wait for the confirmation beep and answer.
Alexa and smart speakers connected to Google Assistant and Siri work a little differently.
- Say the command word near the smart speaker. This is either “Alexa”, “Hey Google” or “Siri”.
- There is no need to wait for the command line after issuing the command word. Immediately after that, say the command to control the light. So you’d say “Alexa, turn off all my lights” or “Hey Google, turn on the lights in my living room.”
Upgrade with a smart plug
If you already have some perfectly good (but admittedly stupid) Christmas lights, you’ll need to add connectivity. Smart plugs will allow you to turn lights and other devices on and off remotely via your phone and various voice assistants such as Alexa and Siri. The only real catch is making sure the plugs are within range of your home wireless network.
Which smart plugs you go with depends on your budget and your desired voice assistant. Although in general, you will find wide support in all three main options, so check carefully before you decide on a smart plug. Having multiple smart plugs that use the same brand will help you light them all simultaneously from the same app or in a desired grouping.
An added bonus of using smart plugs is that you can monitor the energy consumption of your lights. This advantage is more of a problem for old incandescent bulbs than for LEDs. By turning on the lights on an automated schedule, such as every day at sunset, and being able to turn them off remotely when no one is home, you can save a few dollars on your electricity bill. These savings are quite important during the month when your budget is almost spent on gifts.
Automation can be beneficial beyond just saving energy. Getting the trigger set right can eliminate the need to activate Christmas lights by voice altogether. Just take a look at some of the things you can do with smart light automation. Generally, these automations are built into the smart plug’s dedicated companion app, but you can also set them up in existing apps on your phone if it supports Apple HomeKit or Google Home.
Finally, you’ll need to consider additional options if you want to control exterior lights. These types of lights are good for voice control as it can otherwise be quite awkward to access manual controls in the dark. Outdoor smart plugs are made especially for weather conditions. These products are a whole other family of smart plugs to explore. Wireless signal becomes a bit more of a challenge when you start reaching outside, so be sure to check your phone’s signal strength at your target location before getting an outdoor smart plug.
Connect your smart speakers
Now that your lights are on smart, issuing commands to them through your phone should be easy. However, we can pull this relief train even closer to your station. Smart speakers have an always-on microphone for hands-free commands. Apple, Google and Amazon have smart speakers that support their voice assistants. Plenty of third-party speakers can also give you something to command.
If you don’t have smart speakers, they are very cheap and can save you the hassle of searching for your phone to turn on the lights in or outside of your home. With entry-level smart speakers starting at around $50, you can afford a few around the house for easy access anywhere.
Bridging the gap
Sometimes the combination of smart plugs, lights, and voice assistants isn’t perfectly aligned. Fortunately, IFTTT has a long tradition of connecting different services. While the basic service is free, you may want to spend on a subscription to access more complicated automation and faster responsiveness.
That’s all! We hope you’re armed enough with all the instructions you need to control your Christmas lights with your voice while juggling all the other chaos the holidays have in store.
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Source: newstars.edu.vn