LIFX, the Wi-Fi enabled, colour changing, energy efficient LED light bulb that can be controlled by your mobile phone has not only begun shipping lightbulbs to Kickstarter backers, but they’ve finaly released their Android App to Google Play.
The App was supposed to arrive last Thursday, but they advised via Twitter that some big issues were holding it back, but it’s now gone live as of this morning.
The App includes the ability to :
- Turn your LIFX light bulbs on and off.
- Adjust brightness from 1000 lumens to completely off.
- Change colors (millions to choose from).
- Create groups.
- Name each bulb.
- Save scenes.
But the team at LIFX aren’t finished yet, they’re looking to add ‘Music visualiser, groups, scenes, notifications, remote access and more’.
Now, while bulbs have begun shipping – to the UK and Sweden first – people who want to try out the App can do so using a Virtual Bulb which LIFX have setup on their website. If you connect to the website on the same WiFi network you should be able to control the Virtual bulb from your App. LIFX Have made a video showing this off :
Tracking numbers should be arriving any day now, with the latest Kickstarter update – from November 25th – advising that the last 14,000 LIFX bulbs should be leaving the factory in the next two weeks.
After trying out the Philips Hue, I’m quite interested to see how the LIFX Bulbs stack up. There’s a big market here and it’s one that Philips already has a pretty big head start on in terms of availability and scope, but with the WiFi components, including the controller built right into the bulb in LIFX there’s a possibility that ease of setup could win here. Look out for a review on the LIFX bulbs to come shortly.
I backed these but my payment didn’t go through.. only realised about a month or so ago 🙁
Virtual bulb doesn’t seem to work on Android.