With #wyze-bulb hitting the market, the need for a smart light switch that will tell the bulbs to turn on or off without having to speak to a home assistant would be a wonderful addition.
Ideally, this would be a wall switch replacement and install in the wall box in place of existing switches, though it would not need to wire into the circuit since it would be battery operated.
We have smart bulbs in several locations in our home but would like to be able to control them with wall switches in addition to using current home automation solutions because it’s not always convenient to say, “Alexa, turn on the kitchen.”
The existing dumb switches work by cutting power to bulb sockets, which is the same thing existing smart switches do. That’s not what you want with smart bulbs; you need a device that sends commands to the bulb while keeping it energized.
Plus, accidentally turning the dumb switches off means the bulbs won’t work at all until the switch is back on and the bulbs are re-booted. To keep from accidentally turning the existing switches on or off we have installed magnetic switch covers, which don’t look very nice.
A momentary contact smart wall toggle/button device that could be tapped/toggled to tell the bulbs to light/not light/dim/set a scene/change color/etc would be great.
To start with, a battery-only device would be the most versatile because it avoids a lot of pitfalls involved in replacing existing switches and making power connections. Plus, it makes it an option for those that don’t wish to/can’t/aren’t permitted to do electrical work, such as apartment and condo dwellers.
This would be more of a “smart button” design that could be placed anywhere. It would have the same form-factor as a conventional switch so it could be located in a wall box but wouldn’t actually wire into the circuit. For installation, you would remove the old switch and simply wire nut the hot to the switch leg, screw the new device in place, and replace the wall plate.
The new switch device should come with interchangeable face plates included to match the colors found in the consumers’ homes (white, ivory, light almond, brown) to avoid a multitude of SKUs.
Future versions could wire into the lighting circuit to run itself, thus avoiding the maintenance issue a battery-run device would add. These would come with their own issues, though, primarily having the right wire connections being available at all locations.
MODERATOR NOTE:
Your submission has been merged (see below). For future reference, please search the #wishlist and #roadmap categories before submitting a new #wishlist topic. Use these links to search each category:
Search Wishlist (enter your search word/s after #wishlist in the search box)
Search Roadmap (enter your search word/s after #roadmap in the search box)
Please read through How to Use the Wishlist and How to Read the Roadmap.
You can now hop on over to the merged topic (see below) and VOTE for it. For your vote to count, you must click the VOTE button at the top of the page.
=======================