Ikea Dirigera smart home review: easy to setup and use, finally - The Verge

Ikea’s caller Matter-ready Dirigera astute location hub is hitting retail shelves successful North America and astir of Europe this week, alongside a wholly redesigned Home astute app. Dirigera — which means “conducting” successful Swedish — is astatine the bosom of Ikea’s effort to infuse the location with integer intelligence. It’s meant to bespeak the company’s astute location ambitions that person grown from a elemental lighting hobby to a full-blown strategical focus, arsenic important to the 79-year-old institution arsenic beds and Billy bookcases. That requires hardware and bundle that’s casual to setup, casual to use, and unchangeable supra all; characteristics that Ikea struggled to present with its archetypal Trådfri Gateway.

I’ve been surviving with the caller Dirigera hub for the past week, utilizing the caller app to migrate 22 devices disconnected my aged Trådfri Gateway portion adding 3 further Ikea devices to my caller astute location setup. One hiccup aside, everything went smoothly. So smoothly that I was shocked aft having suffered done years of vexation with Ikea’s aged gateway which often struggled to adhd devices and past support connections to them implicit time.

The large happening that’s missing close present is enactment for Matter — it’s coming. But aft immoderate aboriginal stumbles I’m good taking a infinitesimal to observe the information that Ikea present gets the basics right, adjacent if the Dirigera hub costs $69 / €59.95, doubly the terms arsenic the aged Gateway.

Ikea doesn’t connection a migration instrumentality to determination existing devices and scenes implicit from the Trådfri Gateway to the caller Dirigera hub. That volition fuss some. I didn’t caput it since my existing Ikea setup had drifted into a partial zombie-like authorities implicit the past twelvemonth and needed a implicit overhaul. In each honesty, I was avoiding the vexation of trying to hole things that again went sideways caused by yet different strategy glitch oregon bundle update.

Sometimes you conscionable person to commencement over.

Adding devices and scenes

Fortunately, you don’t person to region your existing devices from the Trådfri Gateway earlier adding them to the Dirigera hub. In fact, you ne'er person to unfastened the aged Home astute app (now renamed to “Home astute 1”) astatine all. Just travel the steps successful the caller “Home smart” app (available present for some iOS and Android users) to reset each instrumentality and Dirigera volition find them for speedy and casual inclusion into caller oregon existing rooms. Yes, the caller app is organized by rooms that representation to your existent location layout, not illogical groups of devices organized by alleged steering devices similar dimmers and switches. You tin besides bulk adhd devices into rooms. For example, I person 3 astute spotlights from Ikea connected the aforesaid carnal switch. I was capable to reset and adhd each 3 spots astatine erstwhile to the Dirigera hub utilizing the caller Home astute app.

My location has 25 Ikea astute devices successful full that beryllium alongside dozens of others from a assortment of vendors. My Ikea web is simply a premix of respective airy bulbs, switches, dimmers, outlets, and sensors; 2 shortcut buttons; 1 acceptable of blinds; 1 Symfonisk speaker; and 1 aerial purifier. All but 1 of the Ikea devices was recovered and added connected the archetypal effort contempt being scattered crossed 3 floors of my gangly but constrictive home.

The Home astute app’s caller homescreen is simply a elemental but effectual dashboard into the Ikea home. Each country is represented by a quadrate successful your prime of colors. Inside the squares are interactive icons that fto you rapidly power the astute devices successful each room. Click the quadrate and you’ll find much fine-tuned power implicit the devices within.

The lone occupation I ran into erstwhile adding devices was related to Ikea’s Sonos partnership. The archetypal contented is related to bequest Sonos devices, portion the 2nd was a bug solved by a reboot of the Dirigera.

Sonos owners should beryllium alert that Dirigera lone supports speakers that tin tally the S2 operating system, making Ikea’s caller Home astute app incompatible with older Sonos S1 networks and devices similar the archetypal procreation Play:5 speaker. All is not lost, however, since  Dirigera supports integrations with Google, Amazon, and Apple conscionable similar the Trådfri Gateway earlier it. Both Google and Amazon integrations enactment Sonos S1 devices allowing you to make cross-platform scenes with Ikea devices if that’s important to you.

My lone onboarding nonaccomplishment with the Dirigera came erstwhile trying to adhd 1 of Ikea’s Sonos-compatible (gen 2) Symfonisk Table Lamps to the Home astute app. The Sonos S2 app recovered it connected the archetypal effort and started streaming music. But Ikea’s caller Home astute app didn’t automatically observe the caller talker arsenic it should. After a fewer days of on-and-off troubleshooting that included mill resetting the talker and moving it betwixt Wi-Fi and Sonosnet networks, I yet conscionable rebooted the Dirigera hub, and voila, the Ikea app recovered it. Ikea says it’s a bug related to homes (like mine) with some Sonos S1 and S2 networks that volition beryllium fixed with the adjacent bundle release.

That 1 vexation aside, adding devices to the Dirigera proved to beryllium elemental and fast, with the app offering wide step-by-step instructions with utile animations to idiot-proof the full process. Long gone are the days wherever adding a lightbulb to the Trådfri Gateway archetypal required pairing a wireless power with the bulb and past adding the power to the Gateway successful bid to power the bulb from the aged Home astute app. Now, a adjuvant animation guides the caller lightbulb proprietor done the tedious but elemental onboarding procedure.

I can’t talk to the semipermanent stableness of the strategy yet. It’s been unchangeable truthful far, but I’m little than a week in. The strategy is responsive, with lights turning connected and disconnected successful a fraction of a 2nd aft pressing a paired remote, shortcut button, oregon tapping a fastener successful the app. Voice commands tin sometimes instrumentality seconds but that’s not retired of the mean for astute homes, from Ikea oregon not, successful my experience. If I had to conjecture I’d accidental my Dirigera setup is somewhat much responsive wide than my Trådfri setup earlier it, but I can’t accidental that with 100 percent certainty. 

I’ll telephone it a triumph if everything remains operational aft a fewer months without a bundle update oregon immoderate different glitch inexplicably causing a instrumentality to driblet disconnected the web and crook grey successful the Home astute app.

Some different notables:

Matter and much to come

Now that the Dirigera hub and app person started rolling out, Ikea tin crook its attraction to 3 different improvements that it already pre-announced: Matter support, adding the hub to your router implicit Wi-Fi, and enabling autochthonal distant entree to Ikea astute devices erstwhile extracurricular the home.

Enabling Matter is the large diagnostic we’re each waiting for present that instrumentality certifications person begun. The Dirigera hub is already fitted with radios for Wi-Fi, Zigbee, and Thread, allowing it to enactment arsenic a Thread borderline router erstwhile everything is switched connected successful a mates of months. “Ikea has a semipermanent committedness to Matter and the archetypal measurement that we are targeting present is for Dirigera to go a Matter span successful a mates of months,” says Rebecca Töreman, Business Leader astatine Ikea Home smart. In different words, erstwhile the Dirigera hub is updated to Matter, immoderate Ikea instrumentality attached to the hub tin beryllium utilized successful immoderate Matter ecosystem.

For now, Dirigera, similar the Trådfri Gateway earlier it, supports integrations with Amazon, Google, and Apple astute location ecosystems. I person each 3 enabled successful my location and they’re moving good truthful far, allowing maine to usage Ikea’s devices successful respective scenes and power them via Hey Google, Hey Siri, oregon Alexa dependable commands.

Ikea won’t perpetrate to a day but it says that Wi-Fi volition yet beryllium offered arsenic a much flexible enactment to Ethernet for connecting the Dirigera hub to your location router. Until then, Dirigera’s carnal placement successful the location volition beryllium dictated by the availability of Ethernet connectivity. 

Ikea’s besides inactive readying to motorboat its ain unreality work offering successful the archetypal fractional of 2023. Until then, if you request distant entree to your Ikea astute devices from extracurricular the location past you’ll person to trust upon 1 of its ecosystem integrations. I usage the Apple Home app and an Apple TV connected my web with nary issues to report.

With the Dirigera hub and the caller Home astute app, I deliberation Ikea has succeeded successful its extremity to little the geek threshold truthful that anyone tin setup and usage its astute devices successful the home. More clip is needed to justice stableness but things look promising truthful far. It’s been a agelong clip coming, but Ikea’s astute location is present — I can’t judge I’m saying this — casual to setup and use. 

I did find myself wishing for an adept mode to bypass each the handholding aft adding the archetypal fewer devices. But I’ve been automating my location for implicit 15 years, truthful I’m acold from Ikea’s people assemblage of archetypal clip oregon novice astute location users looking for a precise elemental interface loaded with assistance screens. 

Ikea has spent the past fewer years reinventing itself arsenic a furnishings institution that understands the relation of exertion successful the location amended than Silicon Valley. Dirigera is the company’s archetypal existent effort to beryllium that, by simplifying location automation successful the aforesaid mode it simplified furnishings transport and assembly. 

“The preconditions for wide adoption are here,” said Ikea’s astute location main Bjorn Block a fewer months ago, erstwhile helium archetypal showed maine Dirigera. That mightiness beryllium true, this could beryllium a pivotal infinitesimal for the adoption of astute location tech. Or not... let’s cheque backmost successful a fewer much years. All I tin accidental aft a week with it is that Ikea intelligibly learned from its aboriginal astute location mistakes and Digieria is disconnected to a promising start.

All surface grabs and photography by Thomas Ricker / The Verge