#smart-home

#smart-home

Whether you've read our reviews and agreed or disagreed, here's your chance to help decide what was the best tech of the year in our Readers' Choice Awards. Which phone was your favorite? Was it an Android device or one of the five iPhones (six if you count the biggest iPhone 17 Pro Max as separate) that Apple released throughout the calendar year? Or did foldables like the super thin and light Samsung's Galaxy Z Fold 7 finally win your hard-earned money?

Here's the thing about Peak Saunas: they've managed to pack every feature you'd expect to pay thousands extra for into sleek, minimalist designs that actually fit in modern homes. We're talking medical-grade red light therapy, WiFi app control, oxygen ionizers, and upgraded Bluetooth speakers, all included as standard. Most premium brands would nickel and dime you for these add-ons, but Peak just builds them in from the start.

The 'Dogosophy Button' allows your pooch to control household appliances with a press of a paw. Developed by scientists at The Open University's Animal-Computer Interaction Laboratory, this button is designed to let dogs help their owners with more household tasks. And, according to its inventors, that includes letting your dog pop the kettle on to make you a cuppa. However, recreating your favourite scenes from Wallace and Gromit won't be cheap, with each Dogosophy Button currently costing £96.

Thankfully, multiple retailers are already offering early Black Friday discounts on smart security devices to help you keep tabs on deliveries, with Amazon's and Best Buy's deal on the latest Blink Video Doorbell standing out at just $28.99 ($31 off) until 12AM ET on November 7th. You can also buy it with Blink's Sync Module Core, which allows for on-demand live view, two-way audio, and improves battery life, for $34.99 ($35 off) at Amazon and Best Buy.

Large language models are currently everyone's solution to everything. The technology's versatility is part of its appeal: the use cases for generative AI seem both huge and endless. But then you use the stuff, and not enough of it works very well. And you wonder what we're really accomplishing here. On this episode of The Vergecast, Nilay rejoins the show full of thoughts about the current state of AI - particularly after spending a summer trying to get his smart home to work.

That works out to just $38 per light bar. Each pro gaming light bar has three sides of illumination to cast colored light all across your gaming desk and room. They're made to look futuristic with transparent plates and metal textures like something out of Cyberpunk 2077. The bases are weighted to ensure they stay stable and standing upright. Each measures in at 16 inches tall.

Apple's new M5-powered iPad Pro is the first iPad to officially support the Thread smart home protocol. It comes with Apple's new N1 wireless networking chip, which adds Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 6, and Thread - the three wireless protocols the Matter smart home standard runs on. While other iPads and Macs reportedly have Thread radios, this is the first model launching with the protocol publicly listed in the specs, and it could lay the groundwork for the iPad to be a Home hub - again.

These mini wired cameras are easy to set up, and can be placed anywhere around the house - hallway, lounge, kids' room, your own bedroom, etc. You will enjoy a crisp, detailed 1080p HD full-color picture in all lighting conditions, whether it's a sunny day or dark in the middle of the night. There's two-way audio that lets you communicate with whoever is on the other side, which is great to stay in touch with your children and calm them down when you're not around.

The smart home revolution has reached a thrilling crescendo this October, with technology finally catching up to our most ambitious visions of connected living. Gone are the days when smart devices felt like awkward additions to your space; today's innovations blend seamlessly into your daily routine while delivering unprecedented functionality. From AI-powered cleaning solutions to health-monitoring mirrors, the latest wave of smart home gadgets doesn't just automate tasks-it anticipates your needs, learns from your habits, and creates environments that respond intuitively to your lifestyle.

See a curated selection of product innovations, from smart home tech to sustainable beverages, submitted by designboom guest readers from around the world. These posts showcase a wide range of projects, from modular furniture and reconfigurable systems to sustainable materials and thoughtful new solutions to everyday problems. Powered by designboom's Global Creative Community designboom's guest reader submissions give architects, designers, and makers a platform to share their projects with a vast international audience. This initiative fosters an open, inclusive dialogue within our global creative community.

If your home is your templethe last place where you can escape the blasted outside landscape of billboards, screen ads, bus ads, train ads, and TV adsknow that the Mongol horde of advertising is looking to break down your fortress walls. Samsung's new agenda for its smart home includes sticking ads into its ultra-expensive refrigerators with screens. Don't worry, you can dismiss some of those ads, but the only way to get rid of them completely is to disconnect your fridge from the internet.

The map works by tracking when Ting-connected devices lose power. It promises instant notifications when the power goes out and when it comes back on, down to the neighborhood. It's true that most power companies offer alerts, but at least for mine, alerts can be delayed. My outage notifications come within 10 minutes, but my restoration alerts sometimes come more than an hour after the lights are back on.

Google is overdue an update to its smart home setup, and now we know when it'll come: October 1st. The company has teased some sort of launch or announcement for that day, promising that "Gemini is coming to Google Home."