Philips Hue Starter Kit White and Colour Ambiance Smart LED Lighting [B22 Bayonet Cap] Includes 3x Light Bulbs + 1 Hue Bridge. Works with Alexa, Google Assistant and Apple HomeKit [Energy Class A+]
Logitech Harmony & Hue – One Stop ControlLife’s more fun when your Philips Hue lights and home entertainment work as one, directed by your Logitech Harmony remote control.
” data-position=”triggerHorizontal” />Razer & Hue – Next Level GamingMake your gaming experience more immersive by linking your Philips Hue lights to Razer Chroma equipment.
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| Weight: | 760 g |
| Dimensions: | 10.2 x 21 x 21 cm; 760 Grams |
| Brand: | Philips Hue |
| Model: | 929001257499 |
| Part: | 8718699629359 |
| Colour: | White and Colour |
| Pack Quantity: | 4 |
| Batteries Required: | No |
| Batteries Included: | No |
| Manufacture: | Philips |
| Colour: | White and Colour |
| Dimensions: | 10.2 x 21 x 21 cm; 760 Grams |
| Quantity: | 4 |
Great product, easy to use and a whole range of colours/scenes
Such a great, easy to set up and use, kit.
It’s been a few years now that we started our journey with Hue lamps, and we have been gradually building every lamp in our flat with Hues. It allow us to adjust the colour temperature at will from our phones, changes to colours when watching a movie to allow for less glare on the TV or make the lights red in the bedroom when at night not to disturb a lot. It also allowed us to have automations around the house, such as auto-off every night, auto-on at sunset, different mode for working, reading or simple max light!
It is not the cheapest option, but well worth it! I would suggest to wait for some sort of offer, usually you can get good offers during Prime day, Black Friday, Cyber Monday, but also on other occasions, which significantly lowers the price. I do recommend getting a remote to allow for a more traditional switch based ligth operation too.
These arrived days early. If only all my deliveries were like this
I thought I had bought the Bluetooth version of this but it wasn’t. Saying that I’m very please how easy it was to set up. I’m have HomeKit set up on mine. Also I assumed it was wireless set up but you have to connect via the Ethernet cable to your modem. I’m delighted with them I’ll be adding more bulbs as time goes on as they are rather expensive but if you want quality you have to pay.
i ordered these when they were on offer, they are great bulbs and are quite simple to set up once the app is on your phone/ or device of choice, the only problem is the update has changed the way alexa works with the bulbs, before you used to be able to change the colour of the lights with alexa i.e: “alexa turn lights blue” and they would turn blue, now they won’t change colour if you ask alexa after the software update making them worse,
Another thing is yes it is fun to use and nice that you have control of your lights, they are expensive for what they do especially if you wish to expand above the starter kit, 40ish for each bulb thereafter it will soon cost a small fortune to change all bulbs in our house, they are great lights, but so are the 2 energy efficient bulbs you can buy and apart from the colour changing and messing about on your phone bits.
Bought to integrate with Apple home kit and they work perfectly with Siri expensive but effective
hey’ve really just changed the whole vibe of my appartment, couldn’t recommend them more. there are cheaper alternatives out there, but nothing matches phillips hue with its integration into smart homes and appliances and how it can interact with other things in your household.
We all know phillips hue lightbulbs are at the higher range of lightbulbs but it’s so worth it. I brought my first set to hook up to my bedroom, I have these connected to Alexa too.
I now have a routine in the morning where Alexa and the hue bulbs slowly create a warm light environment in my bedroom as I wake and I can’t fault it.
Next in my kitchen and I have used the hue strips in my bedroom and behind a TV and they are superb!
These bulbs have so many colour combinations to play with fitting to your mood and are very bright too!
Obviously these are expensive for the price, with Lifx and a whole host of other brands offering cheaper alternatives. In my case I wanted this specifically to work with a Philips ambilight TV. For this purpose it is great. Lights are easy to control and set up, fairly bright and offer a great range of add-ons. The only slight annoyance is the speed of updating, which inexplicably takes about half an hour.
I bought these for my partner for his birthday. Less than two weeks later we have smart lighted the entire apartment including buying Philips Hue Centris spotlights and I have absolutely no regrets that I started this. Perfect Alexa integration and easy set up with the Hue bridge. Work well with Innr plugs. My only warning would be – your Philips Hue purchases won’t end here. When you’re sitting on your behind on the sofa telling Alexa to warm up your living room lights in a soft purple and you don’t have to move, the *cough* lazy tech geek inside of you will be screaming with joy.
I am an IT engineer and I like to make my life easier as possible. This product is just one step closer to make house smart. I have integreate this with my Fingbox and once I am near by house, then it detects me and enable the lights. Even in night, I dont need to physically for switch to enable lights. Just ask Alexa and lights are on. With multiple colors, atleast my house parties and gaming experience has become better.
The only downside I can think of is the 100% brightness of the bulb is not that much in comparison to other traditional bulbs.
good product but please check that you do not have smart dimmer switches- the bulbs become very unstable and a continuous flicker. Upon power loss the bulb should start up at custom preset startup configured on phone but im afraid this can be hit & miss- my no nonsense review
Much better and brighter than I expected. Easy to set up and great colours. Just need an ambilight tv to go with it now.
Bulbs are great, however they weren’t picked up automatically when I turned them on sadly.
The smart buttons are a waste of time until they update how they turn lights off. I wish the button was simply an on/off switch.
The send/ receive box is great. Works pretty well most of the time. Recommend plugging into router via Ethernet and not Wi-fi though
Very easy to install. Integrated with my google home perfectly fine. I even got the wake up sequence set which is synced with my morning alarm.
The majority of my light bulbs are hue – they work great and are incredibly reliable (not quite as bright or rich as LIFX). They lack a few features that my other lights have which I am sure could easily by integrated easily without having to use third party apps that lack reliability.
Ok, so they’re not the cheapest in the market, but the quality is really good. The flexibility in the App is superb and we’ve had a lot of fun setting them up and getting mood lighting sorted and setups completed. Colours for favourite teams across all sports, watching TV or just setting a different type of lighting effect. Having a couple of keen photographers in the house its really useful to be able to have a ‘daylight’ setting, for not only taking photos but checking the colour prints too.
Also worth noting these 6x 7W LED’s, replaced 6x 50W halogen bulbs………saving some 80% in running costs.
Great fun, and will be installing them throughout the house soo
Absolutely love these bulbs!!! they do exactly what I bought them for makes every room feel so much nicer, creates a great atmosphere and a brilliant statement when guests come over.
This is an excellent ecosystem and it has provided me with very little aggravation since we installed it. This ease of use and reliability significant increases its score in my mind.
The brightness of the lights is equivalent to a 40w bulb or so. The colour changing feature is a nice party trick to show friends and family when they come over.
Alexa integration works well, in fact my wife is constantly using Alexa rather than the Philips Hue Switches I bought to control the lights.
I would recommend some light switch covers to use with these devices, as your light switch needs to remain on to provide power to the bulb. There are reasonably priced options available on Amazon.
The Colour and brightness is fantastic and love playing around with the effects and features, especially the music sync. It’s just a little bit overwhelming when new to these bulbs and the number of official and 3rd party apps available I’ve paid few and have my faves many are similar to each other on many platforms but personally found I use the free pc app hue sync for music and screen syncing and ilightshow on android which works different to others by using Spotify audio analysis.and huedynamic cross platform.
Good product and easy to use. Works well with Alexa. Would be good if Hue App had living scenes
My husband and I bought these as a treat as we quite wanted to be able to dim our lights but didn’t want to go through the hassle of it. The lights connect really well to Alexa, so can be turned on or off using Alexa, your mobile phone or the control panel provided. There are lots of different colours available and mood settings. Would definitely recommend.
Brightness is all right but not much..anyways my living room and bedroom both are small so don’t care much. But it’s a Must have. Nothing beats nice soothing nights and lounge music.
I’ve been using Hue for a couple of years now and have only recently reached a point where all the lighting in my home is smart (with the exception of a couple of bedside lamps). I’ve found it very useful and consistent. Honestly the full colour spectrum lighting is of fairly dubious value in most cases, due to its very limited usefulness, but I still prefer to have the option. Probably the best argument in Hue’s favour is its popularity. It integrates with more or less every smart hub system you can think of. Philips also add features through software updates fairly regularly. There may or may not be better options out there in terms of value, but Philips Hue definitely works as advertised for me.
Really good, as described, just be ready to become acutely aware of how many bulbs you need because they’re not cheap.
Great product. Really easy to setup with the iOS app. It’s literally a case of plugging the dedicated Hue box into your router, pressing a button to link the iOS app on your phone and putting in the lightbulbs and off you go.
I do have a concern over the warmth generated by the bulbs – heat is energy and these bulbs definitely give off way more heat than a normal LED bulb which means they’re costing me more electricity. So I won’t be installing them everywhere, just in a few choice locations.
If you like to control your lights, this is the product
Only thing you have to register hue for Alexa, Siri for each bulb and you should memorize it. It is not possible to migrate from hue or I could not find a way
Great way in to the Hue system, easy to set up. Had intended to use one in the bedroom but it wasn’t bright enough…that’s the next purchase. Great value, but would be great to have some starter switches too.
I bought These bulb just for fun for my kids but it has turn out to be great show off for my daughter when her friends come with her command it does many things good thing is you can set a timer as well and it automatically switches on and off
Good piece of kit. Works every time and there is so many options of the colours available. I only regret of getting the wrong piece of kit should have got the E 27 version of it.
Great product but it isn’t that reliable. The switch frequently stops working, every few weeks.
Initially the bulb would just switch on for no reason during the night. To wake in the early hours and find the room is brightly lit. That seems to have stopped, I wonder if it occurred during software updates?
It’s not as polished a product as I expected. There are a small number of rough edges. Beyond that it works well.
Love Philips Hue lights, this is my second set purchase and ow have 6 lights throughout the house.
Have several different formula running on them and different colours, 2 lamps in the sitting room are setup together as an entertainment area.
Well worh the purchase.
Relatively easy to use if you follow the instructions. Easy to integrate with Alexa but one bulb didn’t update properly and stopped working. It was an absolute pain as I had to reset the Hue hub then reconnect with Alexa. In the end, as the bulb wasn’t responding, I needed to return for a replacement which Amazon were incredible with. New kit arrived the next day!
Its surprising how much it makes a difference! I always thought a light was a light but now to be able to set and adjust the colours and the brightness it creates such different moods in our rooms and so much more relaxing plus my little girl loves it.
Easy to set up and very impressive. When white the light is sufficiently bright to work under. The colour changes re smooth and you can pick your own settings to suit your mood. The blue light is excellent for watching tv as it has zero screen reflection and gives a bit of a home theatre feel to the room.
An additional bonus is that as well as being able to switch on and change colour by voice command you can also dim the lights so if you were thinking of investing in dimmer switches you could simply buy these lights instead.
I thought they would be a bit gimmicky and fun for my daughter but I have been impressed by the lights so much I have bought more for other rooms.
These bulbs are sooo great! We originally purchased these so that we can turn the light on for the dogs whilst we’re away from home, as the Sun sets so early. Love that you can control them with Alexa and from the app on your phone. They’re not as bright, but the colours make an impressive disco party!
Very easy to set up. The app is a bit trial and error but I got used to it quickly. The lights were just what we wanted. I do like the colour changing.
Love the hue system and these kits are often cheapest way to buy just the bulbs when there is a sale on. If buying the kit as a starter kit the bulbs are all pre paired so it makes it super easy for you. If buying the kit for the bulbs only as they are ore paired to hub inside you will have to use the serial number add method to your existing hub but this is very simple just snap a pic of the serial number on base of bulb, turn them on and use the serial number add method inside the app and they will add perfectly. You can then give the hub to someone else to benefit from (they just need to delete the pre paired bulbs one configured). The colour light is really really nice and you can use the hub to create automation events to make the house look lived in and add the hue skill to Alexa and control via voice.
Pros:
* smart lights that really transform how you live.
* Hue kit has the most connectivity with other smart products eg Yale alarms. This takes usability to next level.
* Good value during a sale
Cons
* Pricey when not in sale
* Not very bright bulbs
Grabbed a bargin from the Amazon warehouse and im not disappointed , exactly what i ordered, came in the time expected. Works perfectly and is fine with Google home. I love the fact i can turn my lights on when im not home and they are set for waking me up in the morning. Cheaper than painting the walls lol. Enjoy
Excellent. Great colours and voice integration. Whites are bright enough for larger rooms but colours could be brighter. Wirks as advertised simple to setup and control.
Works as it should and can be voice controlled through Alexa. I was disappointed that the bulbs are just the equivalent of a 60 watt incandescent bulb so no use for a ceiling light really.
I like the fact that unnecessary packaging has been reduced, This set had Three bulbs and the Hub included and was half the size of a previous box that I had purchased with only two bulbs and the Hub.
progress is being made.
Although our house is very much a “smart” home, I was relatively late to the smart bulb party but I was an immediate convert though.
Over the last year I have slowly been changing as many of the bulbs in the house that I can with Philips Hue bulbs. Hue bulbs are usually available in three flavours. White, White Ambience and Colour. The White bulbs are basically just a dimmable bulb, the White Ambience adds a huge range of temperature to your light which can really alter the mood of the room. The Colour bulbs have everything that the White Ambience have, but an almost infinite variation of colours. I do see the Colours more of a gimmick that you’ll rarely use, but if you get creative there are some funky things you can do with them.
They’re much more expensive though, so I’d generally recommend the Philips Hue White Ambiance bulbs as they give the best combination of lighting options against cost. If your budget stretches though, you can have some fun with the Colour bulbs.
Currently I have 11 White Ambiance GU10s and 3 Colour GU10s, 4 White Ambiance B22s and 1 Colour B22, 4 E27 bulbs and 6 E14 bulbs dotted around the house and have space for several more in the coming months. The elephant in the room with these bulbs is the cost. There’s no getting away from the fact that they are expensive, even if you manage to pick them up on a Lightning Deal. That said, you’re paying for much more than a way of lighting your room. Smart homes are only limited by your imagination, and you can implement some pretty funky routines through the Alexa app if you’re brave enough to delve deeply. Beyond the Hue bulbs I have 12 TP Link smart sockets controlling things like the lights on my two fish tanks, I have 7 Echo dots, 2 Sonos Ones, a Logitech Harmony, Nest thermostat and two Nest smoke detectors. My Denon amp is connected by its HEOS app, and I have a couple of LG TVs with Alexa built in plus another with a Fire HD stick. Five internal IP cameras and 8 external cameras plus my recent addition of a Ring door camera. If thought through, all of these can be interlinked. For example, should the smoke detectors or doorbell go off, I can have the Hue light bulbs dim or light up. If a motion sensor is tripped on one of the IP cameras, I can have the Hue bulbs in the patio lights come on.
Additionally, even without working with other smart devices, the Philips Hue bulbs offer plenty of things on their own. The ability to gradually lower the light as the night goes on, and likewise gradually bring the light up as your morning routine begins. You can have lights come on as the daylight begins to fade, and set them to many different shades to suit your mood such as reading or night light, through Savanna sunset and white brilliance.
Your options are many and varied, and if you can look past the initial set-up costs, they can hugely enhance your home.
Loving this so far, the light is bright enough, and the colours are great. The only downside, I’ve ordered two sets (one for me, one as a gift), and both seemed to be used returns
Wait for a deal if you are going to buy them as i got this starter pack for 69.99 and it was definitely worth it for that price any higher i’d have to say no.
I got these for Christmas about a year ago, and I have to say they are now my favourite thing about my house.
I’ve got them set up with Alexa and I’m not ashamed to say I’m incredibly lazy now and I love it. I’ve been over to friends houses and it’s so irritating having to actually move to turn off switches!
Colour profiles can be set up in the hue app and synced with Alexa, so a simple command like “Alexa, turn on the evening lights” lowers the lamp brightness, turns off the ceiling light and makes the bedroom nice and cozy
They are a little expensive considering how cheap non-smart (otherwise known as “dumb”) lightbulbs are now; but I’d say it’s honestly worth the money, I plan to eventually fill a whole house with them and that’ll cost a fair bit!
These lights are very easy to install and integrate with Alexa or Google Home. They are very flexible in their lighting capabilities and lamps may be controlled individually or in groups. Of course, they may also be controlled remotely via the internet, which may help with home security.
Like many others before me, I am hooked ! Easy to install and we are loving it so far. I have since placed another order and will be buying more still. A bit pricey to set up the entire house, but once you start you will will want them everywhere. We have some coloured ones int he kids rooms which they love, but the hue ambience ones are perfect for my liking so I will probably go with these d=for the downlighters etc.
I cannot rate the Alexa integration but we use it with Apple Home and Siri no problems.
Great product.
At first I was like who would use this but after getting this on Prime Day sale I though I test it out and if I like it I will keep it. Guess what I kept it and my kids love the fact we can change colours and give the room a new dimension and can set different scenes.
So on different occasions we change the mood to suit the needs that day and make a boring room fun again. I went and bought other bulb for other rooms as like the ability to control light from my phone Siri or the Alexa echo dot I got.
Would it save money? well depends on the current bulbs you charging from. I had led bulbs already so for me it did not save money but I got this for the colour and able to change the mood of the room and for that reason it made sense to me (of course buying at sale price) also the ability to automate the lighting which there are many to choose from.
Can be expensive to do but depending on what you want to achieve for the use of these.
There are other cheaper brands but I wanted to go with a brand that I know that has been tested and well recognised and reviewed by others at great numbers.
Easy installation, good choice of colours, but I wouldn’t have paid full price, only considered the purchase due to it being heavily discounted on Prime day
Bought these at Christmas but had no tech help to set them up so now in July I am just getting confidence to try again..
So far I have one light working but have been unable to change the colour despite finding the colour wheel . They do however dim and brighten with the little gadget I received with Hub. Will keep trying .
Well Philips Hue to the rescue no more arguments or getting left behind while you switch off that light you left on with the philips hue app you can set up location based settings so your light turn off when you leave the proximity of your home and turn on automatically when you arrive home perfect for when you’ve got your hands full with groceries and it’s late in the evening but you or partner is busy working, playing computer games or watching tv so can’t help get the shopping in from the car.
When i ordered these they were 79.99 which is a absolute bargain!
I have since covered my entire house with philips hue bulbs as they work with the Google assistant extremely well! i have put a switch above my bed so i can turn off all the lights with one press without needing to say a word if the family are fast asleep.
I would highly recommend philips hue to anybody looking to make their live easier. It’s the little things that just make all the difference.
I bought this Philips Hue White and Colour B22 Wireless Lighting *3, with Bridge. Received the items as described and the delivery was on time. It was very much easy to set up the bridge with the network and with the Hue and Alexa App.
It turns the ambiance of the room through just a click in the mobile and Alexa integration is also very cool. My 3 years old likes the colors very much and totally we love it. Highly recommend.
After trying many off brand smart light bulbs and suffering from various connection issues, I decided to finally invest in the Philips Hue set and I have now realised I should have done so a long time ago!
The lights are so easy to set up, the app walks your through everything step by step for connecting them to the network. Once setup the colours are fantastic, very vibrant and I can definitely see a difference. Not had any connection issues so far!
Would definitely recommend these Philips branded lights over the cheaper alternatives.
Amazing what you can do with these lights, easily change the mood in any room and no longer having to get up to turn off a light or reach over to turn off a lamp before bed. Integrated with Amazon Alexa makes it even easier where you can simply say ‘Alexa, turn off the big light’ or ‘Alexa, set the brightness for the lamp to 10%’. Recommended to friends and family and will be buying more in the future. Worth the money.
Very easy to set up the Bridge, the bulbs fitted easily and work seamlessly with my phone. I have a lot of candle bulbs that I have to replace as and when they are on offer and they can be added to the existing bridge. I haven’t yet used the dimmer switch but will at a later date. Upgrades are automatically provided by Philips.
I bought this set on sale for less than 60, which was a steal (you’d want to have your head examined if you payed full price). The product itself is excellent and functional. But there are now much cheaper alternatives that are just as good. Paired with Alexa they work well, however I’ve found that telling Alexa to turn the lights on without specifying the room results in all the lights in the house being turned on, which is not great!
Amazing items, they’re not as bright as I hoped but in all fairness the sheer range of colours, control, using an app, voice, switch etc. These are utter banging bulbs.
I will now highly likely replace every bulb in my home with them or the normal white ones.
Honestly I think these are great. The shape is unecessary and application limiting but it’s clearly a signature design for Philips so whatever. So in summary: great (pity the remote switch shape etc), very expensive – and if you’ve replaced the bulbs in yoour cooker hood extractor with these then YOU HAVE GONE TOO FAR (I know no one who has done this, no YOU stop looking at ME).
+
Great variety of light options you could choose from on the mobile app
Easy to setup – make sure your hub got a spare Ethernet connection to connect the bridge to it
Should be working with Alexa and other IFTTT
–
Updates of the bridge and lights can take some time
According to the comments on the Phillips website, Alexa support is a bit broken at the moment. But I believe it would be fixed soon
Spare bulbs are expensive, so make sure you can afford it 🙂
Colour change bulbs are great and cool but you will have to ask how often one would use the colour change features in ceiling lights, whose role is predominantly to light rooms. If creating moods is something that you will do often then the extra expense is worth i
Worth every penny. I’ve always wanted these but thought they were too pricey. I saw this starter kit and couldn’t resist.
Now I have them and they are working so well with Home Kit and Siri, I wish I had got them sooner. With the Philips App you can do so much, once you work it all out it’s amazing. So many options and ways you can control the lights. Highly recommend.
We had these before and bought some more after moving house. However the new house has built-in dimmers and I discovered that unfortunately you cannot dim using the built-in unit, this can only be done with the app with the manual dimmer set to 100%. Other than that, great product, works very well with the app, Siri, and Apple TV, and kids love playing with the light options.
hey are simply the best out there (and probably the most expensive) but when you buy the color bulbs and have a couple of lamps in the same room and set up scenes… well you’ll be amazed and thank yourself you actually bought them. One of my fav features is the possibility to select a picture on your phone and the lights will find the main colors in it and light up accordingly.. (say you have a picture of a sunset over the African savanna.. the lights will color with the same colors as that pic so probably orangish and yellowish and reddish.. and if you have a picture of the outer space.. or a red moon over a blue sky… or some party lights in ibiza.. well you’ll see)
also work like a charm with Alexa ! totally in love with them
Was so easy to set up. The quality is very good. I am new to Hue lighting and this has introduced me to it. I will be buying more bulbs etc. Good product, not sure why it has taken me so long to try it lol. You can even control your mouse with it AND also control your lights while you are away from your home!!!
Daughter installed it for us. Modern update on our current light switching on and off arrangement as we have a push button device for our table lamps but it’s old and very often refuses to work. I have these in addition to an Amazon echo. I like the lights, not sure about the echo yet as my husband keeps asking it stupid questions but hopefully he’ll get bored. The lights turn off and on much easier though. The lighting is different. The different colours can have advantages and the white light is just short of too bright. Happy with the purchase so far.
Having brought the echo 2nd generation and love it. I wanted to use it to it’s full potential so I perchest the Phillips hue starter kit you get 3 colour bulbs a bridge and dimmer it was on offer so I saved 55.00 still a little expensive but it’s all still relatively new technology . I’m sure it will come down in price at some time. I ordered kit and it came next day very easy to set up with Phillips hue bridge and app . Works lovely with Amazon alexa . Got one bulb in hallway and two in Lounge plus an Amazon smart plug in kitchen that works the under cupboard Led lights. The colours are stunning the whites are from warm to bright white I can independently control the two lounge lights it’s just amazing what you can do I will be adding on more bulbs. Very happy.
Getting in to the smart home way and bought this pack of lights to see what the fuss was about as have heard good things about philips hue lights.
Nicely packaged, 3 bulbs, hue bridge, power supply with uk and euro head, ethernet cable. It was easy to set up and am having lots of fun trying out all the different settings.
The bulbs are quite pricey but I’m guessing that’s cause they have more hardware than normal bulb. There are cheaper smart bulbs but I went for the philips hue because of the good reviews I heard.
If you are getting in to the smart home way of things then these are a good place to start.
Fantastic product, got this on an Amazon deal with a couple of extra bulbs so made the price a bit more bearable. They are fantastic smart lights and work with both Amazon Echo Dot and Google Home in the same house. I have Alexa upstairs and Google downstairs.
The remote is very handy too if you want to turn the lights on and off without speaking to one of your smart speakers.
These lights have a high price point however they will outlast and outperform most bulbs on the matket. The build quality is great.
These bulbs are of a great quality and allow for lights to be as bright as older incadecent bulbs or a very low light level and everywhere in between.
The colours can be adjusted to anything you desire with the touch of a button.
Installation- download the app and install the bulbs. They will then connect to the app to allow control. With the hub the loghts can be controlled when away from the home. And timers set when away for longer periods of time to make it look like people are still in the house
The lights can also be connected to the alexa system wich can allow for voice control to turn off/on and alter the colours of the lights.
Once the hub is installed more bulbs can be added to the network easily.
Been looking at the Philips Hue system for a while now, so finally took the plunge and decided to invest in it, and it really doesn’t disappoint! Easy to setup, vibrant colours, and allot of fun.
Only criticism is that in the description it say’s there are 16 million different colours to choose from, i could only find fifteen million nine hundred ninety-nine thousand nine hundred ninety-eight colours. A bit of a shame really, i would’ve given 5 stars otherwise!
Love them. High quality and well worth getting into trouble with the wife! She likes them now but at first i think she was put off by the price. But don’t let the price detract you from the quaintly of this product and with the range expanding, just makes it all the more worth buying.
These are the ones to buy. The setup is simple, as is the app, ‘it just works’ once you setup an account you can tie it to a Home/Alexa and control most of the features through that if you wish.
The morning/night dimming and coming on cycles are a really nice touch and keep you in a routine, though can be disabled/enabled quickly.
Scene setup is easy and will have you setting various moods. If you use IFTTT you can set a variety of hot-words that perform actions.
The only let down is cost, outside of bedrooms and possibly the living room I don’t see the need for the white and colour bulbs. The white ambiance bulbs are what I’d recommend in the other rooms as changing the colour temperature is useful, but still, both the white & colour and white only bulbs are eyewateringly expensive individually.
Definitely fun and worth doing, just be aware how expensive it can get once you add extra bulbs, switches, strips and sensors.
Love these Hue bulbs, have purchased quite a few now and it’s nice to be able to dim and change colour temperature to set the mood. To be honest I rarely use actual colours beyond colour temperatures, but I wanted the Hue Colour bulbs for living areas because they go to 2000K whereas the ambience only go to 2200K. Got these on a Black Friday deal so they worked out cheaper than the ambience bulbs, once I sold the bridge I didn’t need.
One thing to watch is loose pins in the bayonet cap (B22 bulb), I contacted Philips as never seen this before in regular bulbs and they said defective – they replaced 4 bulbs, yes FOUR bulbs. All 3 in this kit, and 1 of the replacements as the pins were really loose. To be honest they all move fractionally, so I think this is a manufacturing variance but they confirmed all returns as defective and these ones the pins did move a lot. I note in the supplied kit the bulbs were light weight, the replacement bulbs are heavy. Assume they have found a way of making them cheaper, they all are richer colours B22 bulbs. The replacement bulbs were retail packed as extension bulbs, assume older stock probably with a nice metal heatsink.
Someone once said that nobody ever got sacked for buying from IBM. Philips Hue is the IBM of the home automation lightbulb arena – they’re the ones to have. As the BBC say, ‘other home automation lights are available’ but I’ve not seen any significantly cheaper than Philips Hue and I can vouch for these operating flawlessly. I have a version 1 Amazon Echo device and hence needed the bridge – I believe later devices don’t need this.
I bought these when they were on offer as my wife wasn’t convinced that they were worth the money. Even with the lower price – “What do you want the coloured ones for?” but, having got them, she’s completely won over. We can just say ‘television’ to Alexa and the front lights go dark, while the back light just has a low, ‘cinema’ kind of red colour so we don’t trip over the dog. (It also turns the TV on at the same time – but that’s another device.)
The lights can be any colour and any brightness, all independently. Controlled from any of the ways you’d expect (An Amazon Alexa, or the Google, Apple etc. equivalents) or form your phone (with an easy to use free app) or a neat little switch ( Philips Hue Wireless Lighting Dimmer Switch Smart Accessory, Apple HomeKit Enabled, Works with Alexa,White )
My advice is to place the bridge unit where you can reach it so you can jab the button easily for setup – I put it on top of a bookcase which proved to be ‘inconvenient’ but I’ve not needed to touch it since I set things up so that’s not really an issue.
Someone once said that nobody ever got sacked for buying from IBM. Philips Hue is the IBM of the home automation lightbulb arena – they’re the ones to have. As the BBC say, ‘other home automation lights are available’ but I’ve not seen any significantly cheaper than Philips Hue and I can vouch for these operating flawlessly. I have a version 1 Amazon Echo device and hence needed the bridge – I believe later devices don’t need this.
I bought these when they were on offer as my wife wasn’t convinced that they were worth the money. Even with the lower price – “What do you want the coloured ones for?” but, having got them, she’s completely won over. We can just say ‘television’ to Alexa and the front lights go dark, while the back light just has a low, ‘cinema’ kind of red colour so we don’t trip over the dog. (It also turns the TV on at the same time – but that’s another device.)
The lights can be any colour and any brightness, all independently. Controlled from any of the ways you’d expect (An Amazon Alexa, or the Google, Apple etc. equivalents) or form your phone (with an easy to use free app) or a neat little switch ( Philips Hue Wireless Lighting Dimmer Switch Smart Accessory, Apple HomeKit Enabled, Works with Alexa,White )
My advice is to place the bridge unit where you can reach it so you can jab the button easily for setup – I put it on top of a bookcase which proved to be ‘inconvenient’ but I’ve not needed to touch it since I set things up so that’s not really an issue.
Have used this for three weeks. It was easy to set up and works quite well. I do find that on occasions when using scenes, grouped lights get out of sync ie lights come on in different colours. It also works with Apple HomeKit and HomePod but I do find that when using verbal scene commands HomePod doesn’t always recognise the scene names which I suspect this is more of a Siri problem. The wireless switch works very well.
When these work, 95% of the time, they are great. We love them and having them connected to our Google home makes it even better.
They could do with going to a much brighter level as they are just missing that final bit when you really want to see what you are doing.
The colours are fun i guess but we hadn’t used anything other than the white spectrum since it first testing when we got them.
The only issue we have had is that they completely stopped working with the Google home for a whole day. I did everything to trouble shoot and found that it WAS the hue bulbs at fault. So after a few hours of resetting them, my Google home, my router etc, they just started working again on their own. Very annoying and i don’t know what caused it.
I was unsure about these due to the price…. but having ummed and ahhed over wanting smart bulbs, and seeing many reccomendations on the Phillips, I managed to get them in the Black Friday deal. These do everything I could have wanted and more. I love the sunrise setting which wakes me up much more gently than a blaring alarm. I also find the timers very useful for when I’m out or away. Makes me feel at ease that my home is not left in darkness and is also nice to come home to a lit up place. I don’t really use the colour options and perhaps I would have been ok with just the white, as I use the bulbs in my main lights, but it is nice to have the option…. and I hear green light is very soothing for headaches. I will definitely be purchasing the wall switch as I’m not used to NOT having a switch, and opening the app all the time can be a bit annoying. All in all I am very pleased with them. Easy to set up and use and I can’t wait to get my bathroom and kitchen kitted out too!
Got the b22 starter kit in sale over with alexa. Brilliant. The ability to put lights on from anywhere in the country is great using the hue app. Good themes you can create for xmas times etc. Ive had no connectivity issues. Took me 10 mins to setup. The bulbs are expensive to buy individually but as long as they dont blow in the next year or 5 i am happy. I want to get 4 x e14 colour bulbs but thats going to cost me 180 quid! Dont need to be a tech wiz to setup. Good for setting the mood!
Having had Hive lights installed for some time and frustrated by some of the limitations (and the fact that they charge for features), I decided to try the Philips Hue system after a couple of recommendations, I wasn’t disappointed, the Hue system is leagues ahead of the Hive lighting control to the vast array of features. Simple things like responsiveness, as an example the Hive system works on increments of percentages and you click around the app to get the level of brightness you want, this can take a second of to for the light to actually respond, with the Hue system you can slide your dimmer control in the app and the lights respond in realtime increasing and decreasing at the swish of a finger.
The built in scenes are great to quickly change the mood of a room from a bright light with a yellow hue for concentration to a low light orange hue to relax at the push of a button and if aren’t content with those you can create your own
Going beyond the basics the ability use IFTTT with these provide endless possibilities and Philips are constantly looking at improved function within the labs section of the app. The ability to use sunset and sunrise to control lights is extremely useful rather then having to constantly change the on and off times for my external lights.
There are tons of pre-built recipes to play with some you will use just to show off to friends (like creating a lightening storm in your house) and others you will use all the time (like a go to sleep setup that slowly dims the light before turning it off)
All in all a fantastic setup
Where these really shine is how Hue talks to the Internet. You can have them turn off when the sun rises and turn on when the sunsets and Hue will know exactly what time of day the sun rises and sets each day. You can pair them with motion sensors so that they save energy by only being on when someone is in the room. You can link them with your smart smoke alarm so that they flash red when there’s a fire. You can have them automatically cycle on and off when you’re away to make it look like your home. The possibilities are endless as Philips has taken the approach of opening their API completely to all prospective developers meaning thay they aren’t making themselves exclusive to one particular smart home platform. Versatile and smart.
On the flip side, this means that the Hue app itself is pretty poor. You will need to rely on third parties to get all the potential features, such as Smartthings, HomeKit, Nest etc. These other apps and platforms will allow you to really unlock Hue’s features and have it talking with other parts of your home. You mate also find that costs will escalate as you are buying sensors, hubs and switches galore. A cheaper option might be to go for the White or White Ambiance Hue bulbs if you don’t mind not having the colour. That will potentially reduce the cost by half.
I’d certainly recommend the motion sensors and Tap switches to go with your setup. This is because you need the bulbs to always be switched on at the wall to work properly. If you switch them off at the wall then they won’t be able to turn themselves back on again when the time is right. You don’t want to be pulling out your phone every time you need to use the lights, so if you buy the Hue switches and motion sensors, you can resolve this easily.
Highly recommended, but the costs can spiral and you’ll need to be prepared to look into 3rd party apps and platforms to really make the most of them.
By far the best bulbs I’ve used, works with my Apple HomeKit and Siri. You can download apps which allow you to play music through Apple Music and Spotify (if you have the relevant streaming account) and the lights flash to the music. I have 3 daughters so this was a hit.
Went with 4 stars as they are sooooooo expensive. I even bought mine on Black Friday (90 for 3 bulbs and a hub I think) and that still hurt!
I guess you eat what you pay for.
I got these lights after receiving my Amazon Echo, and I’m pleased to say they are super easy to install and make all the difference in our house. Knowing that I can schedule lights to come on when I’m out, gives me piece of mind.
The install is the download of an app, three cables to plug in, and five mins adding bulbs to the app and away you go! SUPER QUICK!
Top Tip – Download the Hue Disco app also, set it up and place your phone near a speaker for an in-house disco!
Bought this as a lightening deal for a bargain price.
I am now fascinated that I can now change my lights via the app or via my Sonos one speaker using Alexa.
Great range of colours and took 2 minutes to set up.
Just need to get bulbs for the rest of the house now !
I’ve never loved my lights so much!. I kind of bought these as a spur of the moment idea after hearing a lot about them and doing a bit of research first. I was going to go for these ones but in the light version but I couldn’t resist getting the colour ones as everyone says. Omg I’m glad I did!. It never get old turning you lights on as your walking into the room from you phone and it makes you feel like James Bond or maybe a Jedi?.
So first of all these are perfect because they are fun and practical. I have these in my bedroom so use them everyday. After messing around a bit with the colour settings you can find the perfect colours to use in normal use and save it at the click of a button. I prefer to get the colour close to regular lightbulbs which is a slightly yellow/off white colour as to not be too bright and strain you eyes. I have setting for normal use, 100% brightness, pure white, a movie/low light mode etc. You can spend hours messing around with the app and it’s pretty easy to use once you get the hang of it. I’m great with technology so picked it up in no time without reading hardly any instructions but I’m sure one it’s setup more people can use it.
My devices are all iOS devices and these integrate perfectly on all of them. I find the most useful one is the apps widget because I can just flick to the side from my devices lock screen and tap a icon from the ones I had setup prior. You can also swipe up on iOS devices and select the Apple Home icon but this has been made more difficult and takes twice as long with the release of iOS 11 as you now need to swipe up, tap the Home button and only then does the menu come up. Also it’s not as instant and the Hue widget and seems to have a slight delay but the widgets are instant. I make it sound like a big deal but it’s literally a 1 second delay sometimes. The lights do work with siri but I find that more as a party trick to show people and isn’t very quick or practical.
It’s very easy to add new devices to the bridge via the app and tapping the button on the bridge. I bought 1 extra light bulb for the next room and it was so quick and easy to setup. It’s a shame the bridge has such big blue lights on constantly though, they don’t seem to flash or do anything and just stay on. I put it on the wall behind my curtain and it still show though a bit. Also while I’m on the subject, I bought a Hue Tap to go with these lights which is again, easy to setup and highly customisable. It’s a rip off though at 50. But you’re paying a premium price for this whole kit anyay.
But overall I’m super impressed with how well all this kit works and I really cannot fault it. I feel as if Philips are definitely leading the way currently with this one. The perfect combination of fun, practicality and combustibility.
Kids love them, I love them, wife loves them and everybody else I know loves them, if you are thinking of buying them, stop thinking and start buying, the fun that can be had watching lights will truly surprise you, me and wife have spent hours looking at nothing but our light shades, the colours will blow you away!!
They also work great with my Phillips 4K ambilight tv, which when watching a movie adds a whole dimension to movie itself.
eally good, though many of the shown effects (fireworks ect) on the advert are in fact ones that require you to pay via the app and feel like third party extensions, so more cost to recreate what they advertised. however works well with alexia to change colour and dim, though she cant access all the abilities that the app has. takes a little setting up, and the instructions could be a little better esp how to link with alexia, had to use youtube to work it out properly, extra bulbs are really overpriced though so get as many as you can in a pack.
Wouldn’t have bought if it weren’t for an Amazon Prime day deal as too expensive otherwise. Glad I did though because they work a treat. Slight clash if you have an Amazon Echo in that if you load up the ‘skill’ then it doubles up the list of lights and gets confused when you issue instructions. Had to disable the skill in order for it to work smoothly. Might revisit in case an upgrade sorted it out, but no rush as works fine for my needs as is.
It came to no surprise to see that gatherings seemed more special with the right scene set and almost felt like you are controlling the mood and atmosphere just by changing the colour and brightness of a bulb. Movie nights seemed more authentic with a low light orange (like a cinema) and evenings felt like a sunset was occurring in your room. However you choose to spend your free time, these will make it all the more worthwhile.
When I eventually bought the bundle, (after spending the best part of an evening painting my walls a different colours) I realised their true potential with the addition of routines. Now my lights slowly get brighter as my morning alarm approaches, then turn off by themselves as I leave for work. Then like clockwork, they turn back on when I arrive home and slowly dim as bedtime approaches.
I then bought an Amazon Echo dot and linked the bridge so that I could control just by simply using my voice. This was almost too easy to setup and gives you the real feeling of living in the future. I never thought I could be so thrilled on having a light bulb, but these changed my mind.
My only critic would be that there is a bug in the hue software that makes the geolocation not work (for turning on/off lights upon arriving/leaving somewhere). I’m sure this will be fixed in a future update.
Bought it for 84 on prime day, but at full price I believel price is rip-off and requirements of Philips hub is compulsory which is another rip-off, this things supposed to work without HUE hub and complete wireless but instead it has to connect with wire directly to WiFi router which is not a positive innovation, the bulbs are wireless and many devices like laptop, router, mobiles etc are wireless than why I have to use Philips hue hub? and another rip off things is I need another device like Amazon Alexa or Google home speaker etc. need if you want bulb to be controlled by your voice, so complete package which needs Router+ Philips HUE hub+ bulb+ Alexa etc. so many WiFi devices with lots of wires means not energy efficience as you would expect from package, Philips need to eliminate the use of hue completely and make things controllable directly using mobile devices, the bulbs are are bright enough in white or yellow light but not bright enough whrn use with colours like red, green etc. Also this is too expensive when compared with two bulb package that come with ambient 2 light bulb+philips hub+ wireless switch, unfortunately wireless switch does NOT come with expensive (this) package. So this package is not much user friendly for people who are older aged or disable as it requires smartphone to control the light. The smart light which is not as smart as it would expected. Philips needs to work bit hard and makes this innovation more innovative in next version of iteration.
Having a setup like this in your home can really set the ambience for anything.
A good use for this is to turn on all the lights from your phone as you arrive at the door of your house (as long as your WiFi is good enough) and not need to worry about feeling for switches.
Its compatibility with Amazon Echo makes this product even better, being able to control your home lighting with a simple command makes life so much easier.
Love these lights, (when they eventually turned up, bad delivery Co lost them somehow) easy to set up, good colours, works well with Google assistant but had some problems with Elexa (it logs every state I’ve ever set each built to as an actual device, after it thinking I have 84 devices I gave up) works well with IFTTT I have a couple come on at Sun set and it changes the time daily as the days are getting longer, also have them set for earth hour, IFTTT is a excellent partner for these already excellent set of bulbs.
Philips Hue Ambiance – what more can you say. These are the latest and greatest version of the colour bulbs. There are lots of reviews about the green colours being washed out, but this problem has been sorted in the Ambiance range, and I can testify all colours are good.
Saying that, these are bloody expensive! But they work… Also (and in my case most importantly) they are the same size as a normal bulb. I tried a couple of LIFX bulb but they are HUGE!!! The LIFX bulbs stuck outside of the half-moon wall fittings and you could see the bulbs. The Philips bulbs are the correct size and are hidden.
I used to have my lighting on normal remote on/on using the bye bye standby system, this works very well for controlling any device up to 4amp, and in my instance was connected to bedside lamps/TV power socket etc, however I have just upgraded to this system and am so glad I did, its wonderful!.
For any new starter to the HUE system, this is very easy to get up and running, all you need is a router with a free RJ45 socket, and you are good to go.
Buying the starter kit is highly recommended, as the HUE bridge will cost you 49 (if bought separately) and if you opt for the Colour Ambiance Bulb another 49 each, so buying individually would cost you 49 x 4 (Approx) making a total of 196. Buying this via the starter kit will only cost you 149 meaning you pretty much get a free bulb (or bridge).
Configuration is so easy:
01. Plug in the bridge to the router using the supplied RJ45 network cable,
02. Plug in the power adaptor, put the hub somewhere as central as possible (but not vital),
03. Download the app for the iPhone OR Android. Press the centre button on the Bridge
04. Done.
To allow this to work outside your network, you just need to ensure the network part is done, then switch off the “Wifi” on your phone, launch the app, then create an account on the HUE system with an email/password. You can then switch on Wifi on the phone again.
If you wish to set up “location aware” which is in the Hue App, then you MUST switch that on when logged on your home network, and do not switch it off again when away from the house or else you wont reconnect again till you get home. As soon as you get back in close proximity to your home and you mobile connects to the bridge the lights you have set to turn on/off will power up.
If using this with Alexa, this is just as easy to do using the Skills for “Hue”, after a lot of trial, error and testing I got this to work perfectly, the issues can be if you have TWO or more hue bulbs in the same room. Calling the bulb under Groups the same or similar names will cause Alexa to struggle with the names. Bad names for example: Bedroom 1 and Bedroom 2 (Alexa will struggle with the 1 and 2), For two bedside lamps on a double bed, try using “Left” and “Right”, I found that causing One and Two also could be problematic, you need two distinct words that Alexa can easily distinguish. I admit the coloured bulbs are dear, but with a long lifespan (and no heat) they should last years.
White bulbs for main hallways etc, come in cheaper at about 15. Remember the Hue Bridge is NOT a hub, so it works with lighting best and it excels at that with smooth on/off on lamps and no noise.
Being able to set actions for individual lamps or combining into groups is great! I have all lamps switching on and off at set times based on sunset and sunrise and the landing light goes to nightlight mode at midnight.
Being able to control your lights from anywhere in the world is amazing and now also with the Echo from Amazon I can control all the lights in the house just by asking.
Nice one Philips!