Homey Adds New Energy Management Features And A Dongle

Smart location institution Homey has added a caller power guidance tab to its app to measurement and show powerfulness usage from compatible smart devices specified arsenic plugs, appliances, thermostats, and EV chargers. This week, nan institution too announced nan Homey Energy Dongle for Europe, which tin nexus consecutive to a smart metre to show a home’s powerfulness consumption.

Together, nan package and hardware are a ample measurement toward a afloat location powerfulness guidance system. Homey says it plans to bring support for automatic move powerfulness pricing adjacent year, truthful users could group up automations to do things for illustration title their EV erstwhile power prices are low. 

The caller powerfulness guidance tab is disposable successful nationalist beta to each Homey Pro and Homey Cloud customers, and nan dongle tin beryllium preordered for €39 if you’re successful nan Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, Denmark, Sweden, Finland, Lithuania, Austria, Switzerland, and Hungary, pinch shipping expected successful March 2025.

Homey is simply a smart location level centered astir a smart location hub, either nan powerful, locally based Homey Pro ($399) aliases nan lighter Homey Bridge ($69). Depending connected which hub you have, Homey tin nexus to and powerfulness a wide scope of smart location devices thanks to radios for Zigbee, Z-Wave, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, Thread, IR, and more; there’s too nan action of cloud-based connections and compatibility pinch different bridges, specified arsenic Philips Hue. Homey too supports nan Matter smart location standard.

“The Energy Management functionality useful pinch each devices connected to a Homey setup, nary matter if they usage a proprietary local/cloud API, Zigbee, Z-Wave aliases Matter to nexus to Homey,” explained Homey commercialized caput Stefan Witkamp successful an email to The Verge. A afloat database of presently compatible devices is connected Homey’s website.

The powerfulness tab uses charts to show a home’s unrecorded electricity, gas, and h2o usage (with compatible hardware) and tin proviso humanities data. Homey says it “can too measurement prima generation, show EV charging, and show powerfulness proviso to, aliases depletion from, nan grid.” It’s compatible pinch smart batteries and tin show a database of your apical powerfulness consumers, adjuvant for figuring retired wherever to trim down connected usage. You tin participate your powerfulness worth to get costs estimates, and Homey says it plans to adhd support for move pricing adjacent year.

LG acquired Homey earlier this twelvemonth and has said it plans to incorporated Homey’s connectivity and package into its ThinQ platform. However, Homey will proceed to tally independently. While LG plans to merge its appliances pinch Homey, charismatic support is still connected nan roadmap, says Witkamp. 

Energy guidance is group to play a cardinal information successful nan smart location arsenic a compelling logic to nexus each your devices. Allowing a strategy to automate powerfulness usage successful your location could prevention you powerfulness and money. Several smart location companies already relationship immoderate functionality here. Samsung’s SmartThings Energy platform, which useful pinch its appliances and respective partner devices, was nan first level to beryllium recognized by nan Environmental Protection Agency arsenic an Energy STAR Smart Home Energy Management System. Others, specified arsenic Home Assistant, relationship immoderate powerfulness guidance features, and Apple introduced an power usage page to its Home app this twelvemonth (although it’s constricted to PG&E customers).

The caller Matter smart location modular conscionable added powerfulness guidance to its spec connected pinch support for respective cardinal devices successful nan abstraction — electrical conveyance proviso equipment, prima expanse inverters, location batteries, and more. All of this shows important momentum successful location powerfulness management, and Homey’s latest move is different action for group looking to usage smart location tech to maximize nan ratio of their powerfulness usage and minimize their costs.