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I’ve been trying to automate my home. The simplest thing is to automate the lights, then buying smart appliances (like Air Purifier, Robot Vacuum, Cameras) so I can remotely control them when I’m outside or on vacation. Everything went smoothly, so I wanted more.
The latest thing I wanted to automate was my plugs. I’m also trying to make sense of my electricity usage at home, which makes the perfect use case for these smart plugs. Based on the title, you might already guess how it goes.
The Plan
My plan was simple. I want a birds-eye view of the energy usage at my home. Although my energy bill is still within normal means, I want to learn my usage pattern as well as finding out where I can improve.
At the time, I was already comfortable with 2 Smart Home standards (or brands): Apple’s HomeKit and Xiaomi. Honestly, I prefer Matter, due to it being a widely-adopted standard, but unfortunately, they haven’t supported energy monitoring… yet. Apple HomeKit didn’t support this, either, and Xiaomi, well it’s difficult to find their smart plugs here.
Also, I won’t be using that scheduled on/off feature often, since most of my appliances need me to set them up again when they’re disconnected from power source (e.g. setting time, finding networks, etc.).
Wiz: First Failed Attempt
I’ve been using Wiz as my primary smart lighting. They support Matter, and the parent brand, Philips, well, who doesn’t know them? Anyway, they have Smart Plugs, so I decided to buy a couple.
When they arrived, how surprised am I (not the good kind) that they don’t support energy monitoring. Well, to be fair, they didn’t explicitly say that the product I bought have energy monitoring. After digging deeper, it turns out that Wiz has multiple variants of Smart Plugs, and turns out some older models don’t support this feature. I thought that the ones I bought should be the new ones, since I bought it in 2024 (the older models that didn’t support was manufactured in 2020), right? RIGHT?
WRONG! It seems like I got the older model. And you know what? In my country, they only sell that one model! Ridiculous! Now I’m stuck with a couple of “dumb” smart plugs that can only turn on or off.
Tuya and AMC: A Ray of Hope
After that mess, I didn’t intend to give up yet. I scoured the e-commerce to try and find another alternative. The next thing I found was a smart plug by AMC. To be honest, I’ve never even heard about the brand, and I couldn’t find anything on the Internet. My guess? It’s a white-label Chinese brand. The review was good, and the plug is compatible with Tuya, Apple Home, Google Home, and even Samsung’s Smart Things, so I thought, why not? Tuya supports energy monitoring, so I guess we can use that.
So, long story short, I bought a couple of them. I put them to power my kitchen appliances (rice cooker, oven, and air fryer) and my PC + NAS in a separate room. The first few days were delightful. The Tuya app is better than I expected (still is, IMO). The UI/UX is user-friendly to me, and their free version of energy monitoring is sufficient for my needs. I managed to get some data of how much power my appliances were using.
Giving Up Smart Plugs… For Now
However, please note the first few days. The next few days, I start noticing that the NAS turned off on its own overnight. I didn’t configure it that way, but I paid it no mind, probably an electricity glitch at night. However, the next time it did, I became suspicious. My suspicion was confirmed when my PC turned off while I’m using it for work. At that moment, I immediately ceased using it. There’s no point in measuring energy consumption if the smart plugs aren’t reliable, especially when it’s connected to expensive peripherals. But to be fair, the same thing didn’t happen with the other smart plug I use in my kitchen.
That’s one thing. Another setback I found was that the other smart plug starts getting disconnected on its own, something that’s been an annoying issue for many IoT products. There’s no way we can easily reconnect it to the network, except by restarting it. And it’s a major inconvenience for me to keep unplugging and plugging it back, because of 2 reasons:
- The plug was put on the back of a cupboard that’s very hard to reach, since these appliances are not meant to be unplugged that often.
- Every time they’re unplugged, I’ll need to do some setup again (like settings clock, etc.). I can’t complain since again, these things don’t expect you to unplug it that frequently.
So yeah, with those issues, I decided to give up Smart Plugs, for now. They are convenient, I agree, but they’re not for me. At least, until Matter standard supports energy monitoring, and some big names join the competition. Choosing the right plugs are very important, since low-quality ones can damage your expensive electronics, or even worse, cause a fire hazard.
Conclusion: Smart Plugs are Not There Yet
Your mileage may vary, but personally, I think Smart Plugs are not there yet. I mean, if it’s just on and off, I don’t think they’re worth the price, since my appliances are always plugged in (unplugging it will trigger me to reconfigure some of the appliances again, which is a definite hassle). So, what do you Folks think? Do you think you’ll benefit from Smart Plugs?
And I guess that’s all for now, Folks. Sorry for the long rant, but I hope this article can give you a new perspective. As usual, if you have questions, or want to share your experience, please feel free to discuss them below. Finally, thanks for reading this far, and see you in the next article!😁