Philips Hue Smart Bulb Review and Setup Guide | SafeWise (2024)

FAQs

Are Hue smart bulbs being discontinued? ›

Philips isn't discontinuing Hue smart bulbs altogether. Only a recently-released line called Lightguide is getting the chop, and even then, it's just the triangle and globe-shaped bulbs being discontinued. The Verge has the scoop if you'd like to learn more. How many years do Hue bulbs last?

This lets you control your Philips Hue smart lights using the Philips Hue app both at home and from anywhere else in the world where you have an internet connection. However, the Hue Bridge is not required to use Philips Hue smart lighting.

No matter which type of Philips Hue starter kit you have, setup is simple. Gather your bulbs, your Hue Bridge, and any included smart light accessories to begin your journey into smart lighting.

Download the Philips Hue app

Go to the App Store or Google Play Store and download the app. Make sure that your phone is connected to the same Wi-Fi network as the Bridge. Find your Hue lights in the app and enjoy Philips Hue!

With an average lifespan of 25,000 hours, a Philips Hue light bulb will not need replacing anywhere near as often. Exactly how often you will need to change a Hue light bulb depends on how many hours a day it is used — but it can last up to 25 years.

The Hue Bridge lets you connect some third-party Zigbee bulbs, including Osram, Cree, Innr, and Ikea's Tradfri bulbs.

You don't necessarily need a Philips Hue bridge to automate and connect multiple Hue lights together. You can use IFTTT as the central hub tieing your Hue lights with all of your other smart home devices.

Hue smart lights use Zigbee or Bluetooth to communicate, depending on whether you have a Bridge.

To get started with Philips Hue, you plug in the Hue Bridge and connect it to your router via an Ethernet cable. Then you'll screw in your Hue bulbs or turn on your Hue fixtures. Download the Philips Hue app to your Android or iOS device and open it up -- it'll walk you through the rest of the setup process.

There are two types of Hue Bridges, generally referred to as v1 (the rounded version) and v2 (the squared version). The difference between the two generations of bridges is that the v2 bridge added support for Apple HomeKit and the CLIP v2 API see next paragraph. Both bridges are fully supported by this binding.

Is the Philips Hue starter kit worth it? ›

Bottom line. The Philips Hue starter kits, while pricey, are worth the entry cost for those who want a good place to start upgrading their home lighting. With so many lighting options, along with tight integrations with the various smart home platforms and an easy-to-use app, a Hue starter kit is worth the investment.

“The Hue Bridge is the control centre of the smart Philips Hue lighting system. With it, you can add and control up to 50 lights and accessories,” it says on the product page. The fact that the actual limit is 63 lights and a number somewhere between 10 and 20 accessory products doesn't really make things any better.

The Philips Hue draws between 0 and 0.3 watts which, based on paying a little above average at 15 cents per kilowatt, this will cost you 1.6 cents per month. Say you kit out your entire home with smart bulbs, using 20 or 30 of them, then you can expect to notice the vampire power draw more.

In the app, open the Settings tab, then go to Entertainment areas and Create area. Choose For my monitor, give the area a name, and then select the lights to include in it. The app will then prompt you to show the location of the lights within the room, so it knows how to sync them together with what's on screen.