Philips Hue Lights Get Bigger, Brighter, And Cheaper With A Major Product Refresh

3 months ago

Smart lighting institution Philips Hue debuted a bunch of caller products this week astatine nan IFA tech show successful Berlin, Germany, and astir of them are disposable now. The launch, which is nan biggest successful nan company’s history, includes cheaper smart lights, a caller span for its Zigbee ecosystem, a redesigned statement of ray strips, and caller package features and connectivity capabilities. Hue besides introduced its first video doorbell and an upgraded camera to its Hue Secure line.

Hue’s third-generation span arrives

The Hue Bridge Pro ($89.99 / €89.99) is simply a full redesign of nan ecosystem’s cardinal hub and nan first upgrade to Hue’s span successful 10 years. It connects to Hue’s Zigbee bulbs and accessories to adhd features for illustration lighting scenes, move effects, schedules, and out-of-home control. Sporting a caller achromatic look, it has a faster processor, much memory, and accrued capacity. Designed to entreaty to Hue super-users, it tin link 150 lights and 50 accessories (a soft limit) — that’s 3 times nan capacity of nan V2 bridge, which is not being retired.

Additionally, nan Pro tin shop complete 500 civilization lighting scenes and supply faster consequence times, according to Signify, Hue’s genitor company. Its Hue Chip Pro enables the company’s caller Hue MotionAware feature, which turns your existing Hue lights into mobility sensors for motion-activated lighting and information features. The Pro yet brings Wi-Fi (2.4GHz) to a Hue bridge, truthful it doesn’t person to beryllium adjacent to your router.

There’s a migration instrumentality that will transportation each nan settings of your existent Bridge pinch a fewer taps. The institution says support for combining aggregate bridges into a azygous Bridge Pro will get earlier nan extremity of nan year. The Hue Bridge Pro is disposable now for $89.99.

New statement of low-cost lights

Well known for being 1 of nan pricier, premium smart lighting companies, Philips Hue has announced a new entry-level lineup of smart lights, which it says is designed to entreaty to caller smart location users.

Starting astatine $25 per bulb, aliases arsenic debased arsenic $15 successful a multipack, nan caller Hue Essential lineup includes A19 bulbs ($24.99, aliases a four-pack for $60), BR30 downlight ($24.99, aliases a two-pack for $40), and GU10 spotlights ($24.99, aliases a four-pack for $60). An RGB colour Essential Strip Light costs $59.99 for 5 meters and $99.99 for 10, and an Essential Flex Strip Light, a caller neon action for Hue, is disposable for $99.99 for 5 meters and $169.99 for 10 meters.

These lights are compatible pinch nan Hue Bridge (V2 and Pro) and person each nan aforesaid capabilities and connectivity features arsenic nan company’s higher-end lights, conscionable pinch little specs. The cardinal differences are that they don’t dim arsenic low, person a narrower scope of achromatic (2200–6500K), and connection much basal colour quality.

The Essential bulbs (not nan ray strips) will besides support Matter-over-Thread connectivity, arsenic portion of a next-gen connectivity spot for each its caller bulbs. This will beryllium alongside nan “core technologies” of Bluetooth and Zigbee.

This intends you tin link them straight to Apple Home, Amazon Alexa, aliases immoderate Matter platform. (You’ll request a Matter controller and Thread separator router for setup.) Previously, you needed a Hue Bridge to link to Apple Home, but you could link to Alexa via Bluetooth aliases Zigbee pinch nan correct Echo Hub.

The bulbs are disposable now, pinch nan ray strips slated for December. There will beryllium respective starter kit options that bundle lights pinch Hue Bridge V2, starting astatine $79.99.

New flagship bulbs

Along pinch nan motorboat of its lower-cost line, Hue is revamping its flagship bulb, nan Philips Hue A19. The institution says nan caller exemplary is 40 percent much power businesslike compared to its anterior bulbs, and tin dim to 0.2 percent brightness. The color-capable versions support Hue’s apical color-matching quality, which nan institution is now calling ChromaSync, to differentiate from nan Essentials.

All nan caller Hue bulbs besides person nan next-gen connectivity chip, which supports Matter-over-Thread connectivity to link to immoderate Matter-compatible smart location platform. They’re disposable now, starting astatine $59.99 for achromatic and colour ambiance, $44.99 for achromatic ambiance, and $15.99 for white.

Hue’s existing bulbs will not beryllium upgraded to Matter-over-Thread, and nan Bridge Pro does not support Thread, but existing Hue bulbs tin beryllium bridged to Matter done nan Bridge V2 aliases Bridge Pro.

Lots of emotion for ray strips

The company’s statement of ray strips is being expanded and will characteristic 7 models, which are group to motorboat successful nan US successful March. The flagship exemplary is nan caller OmniGlow portion light, which Signify’s John Smith says is “the champion ray portion we’ve ever made.” It uses precocious chip-scale-package (CSP) exertion to get free of nan spottiness commonly recovered connected astir ray strips, packing together 170 mini LEDs successful each quadrate centimeter. It tin dim down to 0.5 percent and pump retired up to 4,500 lumens of brightness.

Along pinch nan 2 caller Essential ray strips, Hue is introducing a little costly type of its achromatic and colour gradient ambient ray strip. The Hue Flux Strip Light costs $70 for 3 meters and $99.99 for 5 meters. An Ultra Bright type that tin besides scope up to 6,000 lumens is slated to motorboat later adjacent year.

The caller ray strips will each activity pinch a caller statement of accessories from Hue, which includes corners, blackout cables, and extenders that tin scope up to 20 meters, providing much elasticity erstwhile placing nan strips. Outdoors, a caller gradient ray portion and neon portion are joining nan lineup. All of nan caller lights, isolated from for nan Essentials, characteristic ChromaSync exertion but run complete Zigbee and Bluetooth only, without Thread.

Here’s a rundown of nan caller ray portion lineup:

Philips Hue OmniGlow portion light, starting astatine $139.99.
Philips Hue Flux portion light, starting astatine $69.99.  
Philips Hue Flux ultra agleam portion light, starting astatine €99.99 (no US pricing aliases motorboat date).  
Philips Hue Flux outdoor portion light, starting astatine €149.99 (no US pricing).  
Philips Hue neon outdoor portion light, starting astatine $149.99.  
Philips Hue Essential portion light
Philips Hue Essential flex portion light, elastic neon-style light

Permanently outdoors

The Festavia Permanent Lights tin enactment up year-round to instantly decorate your location for nan season.

Hue is expanding its already robust outdoor lighting offerings pinch imperishable patio lights and imperishable outdoor lights. The Festavia Hue Globe drawstring lights commencement astatine $159.99 and characteristic colour and tunable achromatic light, nan aforesaid effects arsenic nan existent Festavia drawstring lights. They person a striking creation akin to Hue’s high-end LightGuide bulbs.

Hue is getting successful connected nan craze for imperishable outdoor lights fixed to nan extracurricular of your location pinch nan Festavia Permanent lights (starting astatine $119.99). These are achromatic and colour ambiance lights designed to beryllium fixed to your location “permanently” on a roofline, for example. They are disposable now successful respective lengths.

Overall, it’s an awesome rollout for nan company, which has faced mounting unit from cheaper competitors.