Meross Smart Plug with Energy Monitoring, Mini Smart WiFi
Meross Smart Plug with Energy Monitoring, Mini Smart WiFi Plug Work with Alexa, Google Home, SmartThings, Smart Socket Remote Control Timer Plug, No Hub Required, 13A, 1 Pack
From the brand
Meross Smart Power Strip
| Weight: | 40 g |
| Size: | 1 Pack |
| Dimensions: | 6.1 x 4.8 x 3.3 cm; 40 Grams |
| Part: | MSS305 |
| Pack Quantity: | 1 |
| Batteries Required: | No |
| Manufacture: | Meross |
| Dimensions: | 6.1 x 4.8 x 3.3 cm; 40 Grams |
| Quantity: | 1 |
| Reference: | MSS305 |
| Size: | 1 Pack |
So glad I have these. Easy to set up and not bulky. I intend to buy more when on sale to replace ones that are twice the size. This brand gets great reviews and are a good price.
Reviewed Jan 2024:
We’ve 3 of these.. A 4 gang version in the shed, and a couple of the 6 gang versions that are in the house.
The shed one is connected to a motion detector and internal and external cameras, the idea being that if there are connection problems with those devices, I can reboot them from the power strip. To be fair, I’ve not yet had to do this, but I’m a little paranoid about stuff getting pinched.
In the house, one is on my desk, so PC, monitors, powered USB hub and the other one is in the bedroom, powering AppleTV, TV, soundbar, etc. I bought both of these because they were on sale around black Friday and they replaced cheap power strips that did not have individual switches per gang (yet along the ability to control them remotely).
As I’m typing this review, I’m asking myself if I really need these to be connected and remotely controlled…. Perhaps I will want to shut them down at the power source if I’m away for a long period of timne, maybe I’ll be saving a tiny amount of standby power if I was to power them down from a day to day perspective, but so far, I’ve not been motivated to do this.
Away from the use, what I can say…
Setting them up and getting them connected was really easy.. Note I’m using Apple homekit, and for me, the QR scanning code rarely works during setup, this might be as a result of my antique iPhone. But setting them up in the Meross app was relatively straight forward.
TIP: Keep the box so you know exactly what item you are setting up in the Meross app, as there are several model numbers to choose from.
Nice and compact, seem to be of good quality. Fairly straightforward to set up. Using three to control Christmas lights and two of the plugs have needed a few resets but seem to be calming down now. So very useful and nice not to be sliding on my belly to get to the tree lights so worth the pond reset; Id buy again.
Had some trouble getting this to link either with apple homekit method or with the Miross app. Eventually figured out that it didn’t like my 2.4Ghz/5Ghz access point, had to disable the 5Ghz temporarily for it to connect. Think there is a mention of this in the troubleshooting steps, but a bit strange you have to do this. Also found that if you power it off eg. to move it, you have to disable 5Ghz again otherwise stays in the fast flashing mode and doesn’t reconnect to Wi-Fi . I’ve used it with Alexa to schedule on/off routines as I don’t have an Apple Homepod for the HomeKit route, seems to be working fine.
Have only had this set up for a few days thus far. Setup was easy enough, my only issue was concerning Alexa integration (I had one of the plugs hooked up to the TV, which I named TV the in Meross app + HomeKit — except Alexa was confusing the smart switch TV socket with actual TV’s, which are added to Alexa if you have a FireStick hooked up to them and go through the equipment control process, long story short had to delete those first to get this to work – not the fault of Meross, only adding this on the off chance someone has a similar issue).
Connectivity is good (although I can’t judge for certain because mine is next-door to my Eero), though some might struggle setting it up if they’re not splitting their WiFi bands or if they don’t know how to temporarily pause 5Ghz — it might still work without doing so, but it’s a hell of a lot easier to ensure that 5Ghz is paused beforehand. The only issue with these sometimes is that through the Meross app sometimes it doesn’t “update” it’s correct status, though it’s not really an issue for me as I’ll only be using this via Siri (via HomeKit) and Alexa.
I’ll update this review if I run into any further issues etc.
As we’re going away for a few days over Xmas, I wanted a way to reboot the cameras over t’internet. Did sa bit of research and found this set of 4 for a reasonable price. The big thing is that they don’t need a smart hub (Alexa, Google etc.).
Received them yesterday and set them up today. After downloading the app, it was simple to hook them up to our home wifi and then distribute them around the camera power supplies. It took literally 2 minutes to set up each plug, update the firmware and rename it with the camera locations.
I am now able to be confident that the app will reboot the cameras every day (by scheduling in the app) and ensure that all cameras are recording (virtually) 24/7.
I’m OK with technology, but found these simple enough to set up by anybody. I haven’t explored the app fully, but there may be more useful features lurking in it. If you have difficulty setting them up, as long as the plugs aren’t faulty, it may well be your wifi strength, or something like that, as the whole set of 4 were done in way under 10 minutes and that was including renaming and putting them where they needed to be used.
No hesitation in giving 5 stars, as they caused me much less grief than I was expcting i.e. none at all!!!
Some IoT devices come with awful apps. Not here. These smart plugs have a great and easy install process. Download the Meross app and follow the steps for a quick 60 second deployment.
For Alexa users, there is 1-click integration. Ditto for Google.
The app remembers your Wi-Fi details making further plug setup a breeze. These plugs remember their settings when unplugged and used elsewhere.
My only criticism is the Wi-Fi isn’t super strong on these. Despite one awkwardly placed plug saying it’s at 50% signal strength I’ve had no issue with it.
I would buy more if I had more devices that needed remote control.
I have a Google smart home set up with Samsung Smartthings and Philips Hue. The meross plugs are easy to integrate and work seamlessly with voice control and my home hub. Great plugs. Great price!
Now the downsides:
The initial setup failed about 5 times before eventually working (the device was about a foot away from me and about 5 feet from the wifi access point so none of those are reasons why.
There is no way to individually turn the plugs on and off other than the app or a voice assistant. Only a switch to turn them all off or on. Other smart power stripes I’ve used have a button for each plug.
If it loses WiFi then it needs to be reset and reconfigured (with the very buggy process to do that.)
The app sometimes fails to correctly read the on/off status of an indivual plug if it has been changed buy a different app or device or by schedules within the meroos app and this works fine but the app won’t recognise the change. For example I have a the app scheduled to turn my electric heater for my work room off after 20 mins, and this works correctly, but the app will still show the plug is on even after closing the app, a refresh button that works would be nice.
Other companies have made strips for the US and EU and left the UK out! Yet again Meross has beat them to market and made a far superior product that costs considerably less. Other brands are producing home kit power strips that are twice the price and are not even available in the UK. Well done Meross for finding this spot in the market.
I was looking for something to smart control three sets of garden lights though Apple HomeKit. My lights are currently powered through to my garage on independent switches and are not smart. I wanted to smart control them via Apple Home and Siri without the need to buy three independent bulky and expensive home kit plugs.
The extra plug that this extension has will be an added bonus when I put up Christmas decorations.
With this single extension I have freed up precious wall plugs and gained the ability to set independent timers on each of my garden lights. An added benefit to security with the ability to control the strip remotely.
The strip sets up in minutes through Apple Home via a 2.4ghz Wifi connection and is controlled effortlessly with Siri on my iPhone and Apple Watch. There is no hub or extra devices to purchase to get this device to work.
The power strip also has a long high quality 6ft power cord and has overload protection.
The strip is big but not bulky and it has four nicely spaced plugs on the strip which can be controlled individually on the app or via voice commands via Siri, Google Home and Alexa. There are also 4 USB ports which are controllable together as one again though Siri, Google Home and Alexa. I can see this being useful for some USB fairly lights in the future.
The single button switch located on the strip controls all the plugs on or off. Some may say this is a downfall of the strip as it prevents independent control but I would argue that you are mainly going to be controlling this strip through Siri and this is a precautionary measure to turn off all your devices in case of an emergency.
One thing that this power strip does no have that many new strips are starting to get is Wifi Energy monitoring. For my intended purpose this is not really necessary but would be a cool feature to add to the next generation of this power strip – I would have no hesitation buying an Meross energy monitoring version of this power strip if it came ever came to the market.
This strip is pricey but when you consider the value proposition and the home kit support it a real bargain.
It is essentially 4 home kit plugs all combined on a nice high quality power strip with the added bonus of having 4 USB plugs that are controllable via HomeKit as well.
I would highly recommend this item to anyone looking for a home kit strip and to anyone looking at buying independent plugs – by paying the extra now you may save buying lots of plugs in the future.