The best smart home products of 2023/2024

The third-gen Amazon Echo Show 8 can perform as a complete smart home hub, thanks to the presence of both a Zigbee radio and a Thread border router. Outfitted with a 13-megapixel camera and an 8-inch HD display with edge-to-edge glass, it can make and receive video calls in addition to streaming entertainment from services such as Netflix and Amazon’s own Prime Video. For music listening, the Echo Show 8 supports Amazon’s own spatial audio technology.

Yeah, the Google Nest Hub Max is getting on in years, but if your smart home revolves around Google Assistant, it remains your best choice in smart displays. And yeah, the Google Pixel Tablet is newer and more powerful, but it’s also more than twice as expensive; besides, it was never designed to be a smart home hub (it doesn’t have a Thread radio, for instance). Perhaps we’ll see something new from Google on this front in 2024, but this is the best there is right now.

If Alexa is the master of ceremonies in your smart home, the uber-capable 5^th-gen Amazon Echo Dot With Clock should be in just about every room—it’s certainly inexpensive enough to be. First brought to market in late 2022, it features a powerful CPU, very good audio performance for its size, and an ambient temperature sensor that can trigger Alexa routines. And if you’re using an Eero mesh Wi-Fi router, the smart speaker can function as a Wi-Fi extender to eliminate dead spots in your home. The Echo Dot without a clock is slightly cheaper if you don’t need to see the time, the weather, the name of the artist you’re listening to, and similar information.

Apple’s HomePod mini remains the best smart speaker in the HomeKit ecosystem—albeit almost by default. The larger second-generation HomePod can do all the same tricks and it’s a more powerful audio performer, but that makes it more of a home entertainment product than a smart home device. The HomeKit ecosystem, meanwhile, remains much smaller than that of Alexa or Google Home, but it’s growing increasingly strong, and it provides better privacy than either of its competitors.

Google did such a great job designing its Google Nest Audio smart speaker that we forgive them for not coming up with a replacement since its introduction way back in 2020. That said, you’d think they could have reduced its $100 price tag by now. Be that as it may, Google Assistant is super intelligent, and it’s augmented by an onboard machine-learning chip that protects your privacy by processing your questions locally, versus spending them up to the cloud. This smallish speaker produces a much bigger sound stage than you’d expect for its size.

Philips Hue has become nearly synonymous with smart lighting, and the brand remains at the forefront of innovation in this space. Yes, you’ll find any number of less-expensive competitors, but none that offer such a wide and deep ecosystem of other smart lighting products—indoors and out and including fixtures. The simple White Ambiance bulb is the natural entry point, because it’s the most affordable model—selling for about $45 for a 2-pack. But the White and Color Ambiance model adds the fun of color. Both bulbs can be controlled by Bluetooth, eliminating the need for the $60 hub. But take our word for it: You’ll want the hub, simply because it provides so many additional benefits.

A smart thermostat will be the first smart home product many people buy, and we think you should start with the best. The Ecobee Smart Thermostat Premium features exquisite industrial design, and is fabricated from zinc and glass. A remote sensor will not only monitor the temperature in another area of your house, it can also determine if that room is occupied and should be conditioned. If it’s it’s vacant, the thermostat will ignore that location. If you have a large home, you can add additional sensors. In other words, The Ecobee Premium can do more than ensure your home doesn’t suffer from hot or cold spots, it will save you money by not heating or cooling unoccupied rooms. It can be integrated into any of the three major smart home ecosystems—Alexa, Apple HomeKit, or Google Home—and Ecobee also offers its own home security service and a pretty great security camera (if you’re an Apple HomeKit user).

Smart bulbs are great—especially the color models—but smart switches make life even easier. The Lutron Diva smart dimmer is an attractive rocker-style switch that’s not only supremely easy to install, it doesn’t require the presence of a neutral wire in the electrical box. It’s part of Lutron’s brilliant Caséta ecosystem, which is compatible with everything from Alexa, Apple HomeKit, Google Home, and Ring’s Smart Alarm systems to Sonos multi-room audio setups and more.

There is no better smart lock than the Level Lock+ Connect. First, there’s no smart lock that’s more attractive in its simplicity. Second, there is no smart lock that’s more capable, offering both Bluetooth and Wi-Fi connectivity (the latter via a bridge), and it will soon support Thread (the radio is there, but not yet activated). You can open the lock with a touch, with a key card, with an inexpensive keychain dongle, an iPhone or Apple watch, or with a physical key. It’s the only smart lock on the market that doesn’t look like a smart lock—from either side of the door. It’s also the easiest-to-install lock we’ve encountered. Yes, it’s also one of the most expensive, but it’s oh so worth it.

The security camera segment of the smart home is more crowded than any other, and while there are lots of good products other there, nothing beats the Arlo Pro 5S 2K for its performance and quality. This camera captures video in 2K resolution with HDR, and it has an onboard spotlight to capture nighttime scenes in full color. It has a 160-degree field of view, an integrated siren, and it operates on battery power, so you can install it anywhere within range of your Wi-Fi network. Speaking of which, where most of its competitors can only join crowded 2.4GHz Wi-Fi networks, the Arlo Pro 5S 2K can also operate on the less crowded 5GHz frequency band.

If you’re all in on Alexa in your smart home, the Ring Stick Up Cam Pro is the best security camera to keep an eye on your property, indoors or out. Available in battery, solar-powered, or plug-in configurations, it can be deployed almost anywhere, but radar motion detection is its biggest selling point. It will trace the path an intruder took as they approached the camera, but the pre-roll feature that captures them even before the camera alerts you to their presence is even stronger. You’ll also get color night vision, an onboard siren, and dual-band Wi-Fi support. And if you also have a Ring Alarm Pro system, you can store video recordings locally on a microSD card.

Google’s cadence of new smart home products has more in common with Apple than Amazon, so it’s a very good thing for the patrons of its ecosystem that its products are so good. While the Nest Cam came to market back in 2021, it remains the best home security camera for people who have Google Nest smart displays. This attractive indoor/outdoor camera can operate on AC or battery power, and it’s a cinch to install. Excellent machine learning enables the camera to distinguish between people—including being able to recognize familiar faces—vehicles and animals.

Ring Alarm Pro remains our favorite DIY home security system. Unique in its class, it incorporates a dual-band mesh Wi-Fi router (an Eero Wi-Fi 6), an LTE radio for broadband backup, a microSD card slot for local storage of video clips from Ring security cameras (you provide the card), and an optional battery packs to keep the entire system operating in the event of a power failure. There’s a Z-Wave radio for connecting motion, contact, leak-detection, and other types of sensors and accessories. And the Works with Ring program includes a host of compatible third-party smart home devices, including smart locks, garage door openers, smart light switches and plugs, smart thermostats, smoke and carbon monoxide detectors, and even smart water valves. A $20-per-month subscription includes professional monitoring that can summon first responders in the event of an emergency.

Ring is credited with inventing the video doorbell business, and the Ring Battery Doorbell Plus is a fabulous example that’s very reasonably priced. It can operate on either battery or hardwired electrical power; so, if you’re replacing a wired doorbell, the onboard battery will take over in the event of a power outage. The camera provides a head-to-toe view of your visitors, thanks to its very high resolution of 1,536×1,536 pixels. And a new package-alert feature will recognize when parcels are left on your porch and send you an alert accordingly.

Like the Nest Cam, the Nest Doorbell (Battery) came to market way back in 2021. And like that product, this one remains best in its class—provided you define that class as doorbells in Google’s smart home ecosystem. Don’t let its name fool you. Like the Ring product discussed above, the Nest Doorbell (Battery) can run on either its internal battery or the wiring your existing doorbell uses. And like the Nest security cam that came out the same year, Google’s doorbell performs its image processing on the device itself, instead of compromising your privacy by uploading video to the cloud. It can recognize familiar faces, discern between people, animals, and vehicles, and it can alert you to the presence of packages on your doorstep.

Tired of porch pirates absconding with the goods that were just delivered to your house? A smart delivery box will solve that problem, and the Loxx Boxx Classic is the best one we’ve found yet. Fabricated from steel, the box connects to your home Wi-Fi network and logs every delivery when the driver enters the last four digits of the package’s tracking code. Cloud-to-cloud connections to Amazon, DHL, FedEx, UPS, and USPS help you track, trace, and log every delivery. The box runs on battery power, so you don’t need to worry about having an outdoor outlet, and there’s an LTE option if you can’t connect it to a Wi-Fi network.