Investing in a smart home sounds like a great move on paper. However, have you ever worried that smart-enhancing your house will give big companies an eye into your home life? Luckily, it’s possible to reap all of the smart home benefits without sacrificing privacy.
Great, brilliant smart home alternatives include LaView, Amcrest, Aeotec, Belkin, Shelly, and LIFX products. All of these products can run on a local WiFi network without relying on a cloud service. Localized smart homes provide more privacy and reliability in comparison to cloud-connected ones.
Read on to learn more about not-so obvious smart home alternatives.
What Is a Smart Home and Why Opt Out?
Smart homes fully realize our futuristic fantasies, providing centralized networks that control your entire home.
This innovation of the 21st century can offer plenty of benefits, including added security, convenience, and energy efficiency.
However, name-brand smart home systems often rely on cloud support, leaving your home vulnerable to network failures or privacy violations. You may find that the trade-off does not work for you.
How Do Smart Homes Work?
With a combination of heightened technology, high-powered internet, and your smart device, you can control the entirety of your home space.
This development means you can manage your home anytime from anywhere, often from your phone or hub device.
Furthermore, AI can catch any home issues and address them directly. For example, if your smart home detects carbon monoxide, it can turn off the thermostat.
Smart homes offer numerous benefits. Remote control of all of the appliances in your home provides an unprecedented level of convenience:
- Smart AI can help you manage your appliance usage and save energy.
- Security cameras and smart doorbells can alert authorities to emergencies and keep your family safe.
- In-home smart cameras can help you keep an eye on vulnerable family members and pets when you are away.
Reasons a Smart Home Is Not the Best Choice
Unfortunately, smart homes inhibit your house life just as much as they facilitate it. Like Amazon, Google, and Ring, most well-known smart home brands require a connection to a cloud network to operate.
Cloud control smart homes sound great on paper, but they open your homes up to multiple vulnerabilities.
Privacy is a massive setback of cloud-controlled smart homes. It’s already public knowledge that Google makes ad revenue by providing user demographics to advertisers. Do you want a gigantic corporation like that monitoring every time you turn on a light switch or answer the doorbell?
The other significant drawback of cloud-based smart homes is the dependency on the cloud for support.
For instance, losing your internet connection with a cloud-based smart home can render all of your home appliances unusable.
Furthermore, suppose the company decides to shut down the cloud service. In that case, you will lose support to possibly hundreds of dollars of compatible products. Just look at Lowes’ Iris products and Best Buy’s IoT line.
If you seek the convenience and interconnectivity of a smart home without a cloud connection, there is hope for you! There are plenty of products out there that can run solely on a local network connection.
These six options are fantastic for providing you with more privacy and less dependency on a cloud service.
LaView WiFi Video Doorbell Camera
LaView is a well-known brand when it comes to security camera systems.
Their video doorbell cameras boast tons of great features. This camera, for instance, offers a 1080p lens with a 166° angle.
It also uses infrared light to capture movement and work at low-light levels.
And, while this doorbell is cloud-capable, you can also record its interactions onto an SD memory card.
If that package did not sound sweet enough, installation is a breeze.
LaView gives you everything you need to get started. With a few connections between your new LaView doorbell and the chime box, you are ready to go! From there, create a LaView account on their smartphone app and get started.
Amcrest 4K Security Camera System
Amcrest is another security brand that has been around for a while. Their products include security doorbells and cameras, baby monitors, and GPS systems, among other things.
What works well about their camera systems is the high customization, simple DIY setup, and budget pricing.
Furthermore, unless you plan to upgrade to their cloud storage system, there is no contract attached!
There are some minor drawbacks to these camera systems. For example, Amcrest products send push notifications to your phone. However, beyond that, there is no professional monitoring service provided by the company. If you want a more integrated smart home setup, don’t expect much compatibility with these systems.
Aeotec Smart Switch 7
Do not let the name fool you: Aeotec’s Smart Switch 7 is a plug adapter.
The Smart Switch allows you to connect any of your home appliances to a Z-Wave smart home network.
Compared to other adapters of its kind, the Smart Switch 7 offers a lot of value for your money.
The plug adapters are very durable. They can also handle outlet capabilities up to 15A. Furthermore, Smart Switch 7 adapters have surge protection of up to 2,000 volts. Considering their size, this is a significant bonus.
Another standout feature of the Smart Switch 7 is its energy monitoring. It allows end-users to see their energy use habits in real-time, helping them save money. Smart Switch 7 is one of the few smart plugs in its price range with this coveted feature.
WeMo Smart Light Switch 2ND Gen
Belkin’s WeMo light switch requires some extensive DIY know-how to get running. However, this localized smart switch is a highly viable option if you are up for the challenge.
WeMo switches connect directly to your electrical wiring, which is where the steep learning curve comes in.
These switches are very effective, allowing you to control overhead lights and fans with ease directly from your smartphone.
Shelly Dimmer Home Automation WiFi Operated Remote Control Device
If you thought dimmer lights were not possible in your new localized smart home, think again. Shelly’s automated dimmer provides a highly customizable option that you can choose to use locally.
There are plenty of options for Shelly’s dimmers. When setting up your lights, you can control minimum brightness level, fade rate, schedules, timers, and actions that call other smart home devices. That’s pretty advanced!
If you are a tech expert, you can also get around any cloud service you wish to avoid.
Shelly offers localized and cloud control via a web server or smartphone app. However, this dimmer can run various APIs, including MQTT. With MQTT, you can disable cloud connection to your dimmers altogether.
You can check the price here on Amazon for you in case you are interested.
LIFX LZTV1MUS Z-TV LED Light Strip
I addressed smart home necessities, but what about novelties? If you want to add some smart decorations to your home, consider LIFX’s LED light strips.
They install pretty quickly, without the use of a bridge or hub connected to your router. Plus, they provide a feature that lets you “paint” multiple lights onto the strips.
While this “painting” feature is a little imprecise and lacks any way to save your custom patterns, these lights will provide plenty of fun and color!
Brilliant Smart Home Alternatives: Final Thoughts
Operating a smart home offers plenty of benefits, including tons of convenience, enhanced security, and interconnected living space.
However, adding cloud service into the mix introduces service dependency and privacy issues. You can avoid these problems by opting for local network solutions that provide the same features without connecting to a cloud service.
Companies like Amcrest, Shelly, Belkin, Aeotec, LaView, and LIFX are great places to start.