Smart Bulbs are the new cool, we took a look at the Philips Hue light bulbs last year and we’re currently looking at another, more independent product – LIFX – who we wrote up all the way back in 2012, when they ran their Kickstarter campaign. They shipped out their bulbs to Kickstarter backers a couple of months ago and they’ve just announced they will begin selling the bulbs in Harvey Norman stores across Australia.
The bulbs are of course doubly interesting to us as they’re made by an Australian company and because they can be controlled by an iOS or Android app. The bulbs differ from the Hue product in that they have their WiFi controller built into the bulb, so there’s no central hub involved. The App is fairly rudimentary, but allows you to change the bulbs colour and brightness, or simply turn the bulbs on and off.
Harvey Norman will be selling the bulbs with two different connectors – Bayonet Cap and Edison Screw – for $129 in their stores across Australia. You can also order them online from the Harvey Norman website.
Check out the demo video and see what you think:
warning do not buy LIFX. after 4 months still none of the extended functions work and their apps sre bug city. LIFX have admitted it will be months before their cloud system is running. buy Hue and not over priced no featured LIFX
Not sure, I still like my LIFX bulbs, but the lack of remote access is kinda taxing. They’ve launched beta online access but it’s only able to connect to NEST so far. Kind of disappointing for an Australian company. Hopefully they fix all this up soon and release some extended features for everyone.
Without them being controlled through a central hub and through a home automation system what exactly is the point? I love technology and understand the awesome novelty to control a light remotely but I miss the big picture with this product.
Hey Craig, our Bulbs deliberately avoid relying on a central hub – rather they work on an ever expanding mesh network capability. We have just over a hundred or so in the office, all without a single hub. The Bulbs designate their own gateway Bulbs within their network and can expand onwards exponentially. As for integration with a home automation system, we’ve released a variety of public libraries through GitHub: https://github.com/lifx. Many of these have already seen a variety of interesting implementations from 3rd party developers: http://apps.lifx.co/ I’m sure we’ll see some pretty neat home automation solutions in the coming… Read more »
Is that $129 for 1?
It’s slightly cheaper from the website definitely.
Nice idea, but the $129 pricetag… ouch!
I guess you should be able to get a discount at Harvey Norman..
LIFX direct will cost $110 for the bulb. Postage is free. Order 4 or more for a cheaper price.
I really really want a few of these bulbs and am stuck deciding between LIFX and Hue. LIFX seem like the better bulbs by light output. Hue come in more plug varieties and have the better first and third party software support 🙁
I have two LIFX bulbs I got from Kickstarter, I’m going to throw the Belkin smart bulbs into the mix here – mainly because they seem to be starting a remote home automation ‘thing’ with their Wemo brand.
Hey Matt, for what it’s worth – check out our current list of 3rd Party Developer apps: http://apps.lifx.co/