Make your life easier by installing lights that automatically turn on when you walk into the room.
IKEA Tradfri smart bulbs present an affordable entry into smart lighting or a budget-friendly bulb if you don't want to pay premium prices for the Philips Hue bulbs.
Price points for IKEA Tradfri smart bulbs are as low as £6 for LED whites and £10 for vintage filaments, they’re a snip.
And you can even hook them up to your Philips Hue Bridge hub which is a bonus if you want to save money on colour-changing smart light bulbs. You will have to make do with just the 20 shades though - a far cry from the 16 million available with competitors such as Philips Wiz, Sengled and Sylvania among others.
And if you’re wondering why these bulbs have got a weird name, it’s the Swedish word for wireless.
So there, not so weird after all.
As you might expect from a budget smart bulb, the Ikea Tradfri only has few settings. For some people, that will be enough.
You can schedule morning and night lights, add extra timers and Away from Home settings.
Cool: Away From Home Mode allows you to program a time for your lights to switch on and off automatically. It mimics your home routine.
Not Cool. You have to be on the same Wi-Fi network as your Tradfri Gateway to change the control settings. So you can’t adjust your lights whilst you're sunning yourself on the beach sipping cocktails. Oh well…focus on the next cocktail.
All in all, Ikea Tradfri smart light bulbs offer more than you might expect considering the low asking price.
There's also a good range of bulbs and a decent colour spectrum if you’re not too choosy about fireworks skies all over your house.
If you're new to smart lighting, 20 colours in a smart bulb is satisfactory. For a couple of extra quid or so more you get a wider range of colours out of Philips Wiz, Sengled and Sylvania smart bulbs.
Limitations include the inability to control your lights when you’re not connected to your home wireless, and there’s no IFTTT which allows you to sync lights with other smart devices such as cameras, doorbells and stereo. Minor grumbles.
