What is a smart thermostat?
Smart heating is a thermostat that allows you to control and customise your heating remotely from your smartphone, tablet, or computer. If you’ve got a hot water tank you can control that too.
How do smart thermostats work?
A smart thermostat aims to save energy by increasing and decreasing the temperature as quickly as possible. Smart thermostats try to avoid overshooting the target temperature by learning how your home heats up, so that the boiler switches off at just the right moment.
What are the benefits of smart thermostats?
- They are easy and convenient to use, so you never have that “is the heating still on” moment again when you’re out of the house
- You can tell your thermostat when you’re going on holiday, so it pauses your normal schedules and automatically resumes when you get home
- Smart heating can be personalised to you and your family – you can set a different schedule every day easily from the Hive app
- For winter weekend lie-ins, you can turn up the heating without needing to get out of bed
- If your smart thermostat has Geolocation alerts, it can recognise when you are home, or when you are on your commute home, so it knows to turn the heating on
Can smart thermostats help me save money?
Yes – you can manage your energy efficiency a lot more easily with smart heating, learn about your energy consumption, and assess where you can cut down your usage.
What do I need to get started?
You will need a smart thermostat which connects to your boiler (sometimes using a receiver), a main control/home network device (hub) which connects to your smart thermostat and your internet, and an app you can download to your smartphone. Smart heating needs to be safely installed by a professional. Even better, you don’t need to be a British Gas customer for your Hive smart heating to work.
Perhaps the simplest way to get started is with the Hive Thermostat Kit, which includes the thermostat to get the temperature right, the Hive Hub, to connect your products to your smartphone, and the Hive receiver, to link your products to your boiler.
Do Hive thermostats work with Alexa and Google Home?
Yes – Hive thermostats do work with voice assistants like Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant. So, if your hands are full and you can’t tap the app, just say “Alexa, turn the heating off”. Even better, anyone in your family can do it. If you forgot to turn the heating off, you can also turn it off remotely using your phone.
(https://www.hivehome.com/discover-hive/guides/beginners-heating-guide)