Want to integrate one of the wireless thermostats to your wired smart home? Check what products we offer: 1home.io
It’s easy to save energy and stay warm at the same time, if you own a smart thermostat. The question remains, which one to buy that will work well with your Loxone or KNX wired smart home?
Sure, there is a selection of KNX thermostats available and Loxone has its choices as well. While Loxone handles its heating in a very elegant way (pretty good heating automation and accessible price of the thermostat), KNX thermostats are usually extremely expensive and require an additional logic server for you to set up heating automation. But there are so many other thermostats to choose from that you can integrate into your Loxone, Gira or any other KNX smart home. We'll help you pick the right one.
What to look for in a smart thermostat?
Smart thermostats have transformed modern heating with added mobile app controls, zoned heating and home-away detection. All of these combined effortlessly cut your energy bills, improve convenience and help save the environment. And since heating and cooling your home accounts for nearly half of the average home’s utility bills, it’s worth looking into minimising these costs.
Wireless thermostats vs. KNX thermostats
One of the main reasons for choosing a wireless over KNX smart thermostat is that it allows you to program your home’s temperature to match your schedule. This custom programming is known as smart home routines or automations, provided by smart assistant platforms such as Amazon Alexa, Google Home and Apple HomeKit (Read more on creating automations). Essentially, it allows you to use less energy cooling or heating your home when you’re not there, or to adjust the temperature just before you arrive home. It's much friendlier to set up these automations on a wireless thermostat than a KNX one, while the wireless thermostats are price-wise much more accessible.
With a smart thermostat, you can automatically regulate the temperature in your home to maximize efficiency and comfort. The compatible KNX or Loxone thermostat will adjust the temperature setting for you, so you don’t have to worry if you forgot to turn off the A/C before leaving, for instance. The Away mode can also be set automatically with some thermostats as soon as you leave home with the help of geofencing, which is probably the best feature to combine with your smart KNX thermostat.
How to set up geofencing in your KNX home for Amazon Alexa users >>
How to set up geofencing in your KNX home for Apple HomeKit users >>
Benefits of a smart thermostat in your KNX home
Wireless smart thermostats go above and beyond the features of a regular thermostat to deliver an effortless indoor comfort experience.
With a smart thermostat, you’ll get:
- Simplicity → A smart thermostat learns your schedule and preferences, keeping you comfortable without the need to adjust temperatures or set automations on your part.
- Wireless connectivity → Control your thermostat from your smartphone, tablet or computer
- Usage data → Your smart thermostat compiles data regarding your energy usage for your review, so you can further fine-tune your HVAC system usage to maximize your savings
- Diagnostics and maintenance alerts → it helps you stay on top of system maintenance, alerting you when it’s time to change the filter or providing diagnostics to assist in system repair.
- Geofencing → adjust the temperature based on who is home at any given moment.
Before you can start adding any wireless smart thermostats, you need to connect your home with a smart assistant platform.
It doesn’t take more than 5 minutes, that’s a promise.
Here's how you do it:
- Connect Amazon Alexa to KNX & Google Assistant to KNX & Apple HomeKit to KNX
- Connect Amazon Alexa to GIRA & Google Assistant to GIRA & Apple HomeKit to GIRA
- Connect Amazon Alexa to Loxone & Google Assistant to Loxone & Apple HomeKit to Loxone
Or you can get right to your free trial and see for yourself.
6 best smart wireless thermostats
Several models of wireless thermostats are available, each with different features. Now you can finally find the best solution for your home’s needs.
Here are our top picks of smart thermostats for your Loxone, Gira or KNX smart home:
Google Nest Learning Thermostat
Nest learns from you and programmes itself!
Supported smart assistants: Amazon Alexa, Google Home
Price: ~240€
When I hear ‘wireless thermostat’ the first thing that comes to mind is the Google Nest Smart Thermostat. Its sleek and rounded look fits into almost every household (it was designed by Apple alumni Tony Fadell and Matt Rogers after all). Setting up the Nest is user friendly. You simply answer questions, hook it up to your WiFi network, and let it figure out your schedule.
But what is so special about it? Why such a price? Well, to begin with, Nest actually learns from you, as it logs your routine. This means once you have given it the basics, it will modify how it works to save energy for you all the time.
Nest knows when you're away, so it won't cool or heat an empty house. If you tell it when you usually go to bed, Nest will make sure the house is at your target temp by then. It figures out, not just your schedule, but how long it takes to make your house comfortable as well.
You can control everything with either voice control or Google Home or Alexa mobile app. This means that you can create custom routines that involve Nest thermostat as well as your Loxone or KNX smart devices.
Tado° V3+ Smart Thermostat
Minimalist, efficient and easy-to-use.
Supported smart assistants: Amazon Alexa, Google Home, Apple Homekit
Price: ~200€
A lesser known system out of Germany, Tado° treads the line between a system aimed at those who want the maximum features from their smart thermostat, and something fairly stylish that won’t look out of place in your home.
Tado° can be easily retrofitted to your current heating setup and uses a cloud-based heating app to let you control your heating directly from your smartphone. The Tado V3 system also brings home control in the form of a small square control unit with LED lights that displays the current temperature. The V3+ system adds air quality control through the redesigned app.
It will get your house ready for you in time for when you step through the door by measuring the weather forecast, time it will take you to get home and how fast your house heats up.
The Tado° smart thermostat is clever enough to learn the layout of your home and the heat capacity of your house, so if you want it to be 18 degrees at 7 am, it'll fire up in advance if needed to hit the target. It also works with Alexa, Google Assistant and Siri, which adds to its credentials as one of the best smart thermostats for your KNX or Loxone smart home.
Honeywell Home T9 Thermostat
“Honeywell, I’m home!”
Supported smart assistants: Amazon Alexa, Google Home
Price: 180€
One of the first to market with programmable digital thermostats, Honeywell has gone all-in on wireless thermostats. Their latest T9 thermostat is WiFi ready, app-enabled, and can pair with smart sensors to detect presence and monitor temperatures all over the house (motion and temperature sensors).
It doesn’t have the learning capacity of the Nest and instead uses the optional sensors to follow you around the house. The T9 works with all voice assistants and sports a muted white exterior that will fit into most homes.
While it might lack some of the flash of its competitors, there are still plenty of reasons to get it. Chiefly, it has the best range of sensors, which can track humidity, temperature and presence. The T9 supports up to 20 sensors, and if you wish you can tell your system to average the temperature out across them all so the whole home is comfortable, or target just one. It can even prioritize rooms where motion is happening – handy!
ecobee SmartThermostat
Talk to Alexa without buying an Amazon Echo and ask your thermostat to tell you a joke.
Supported smart assistants: Amazon Alexa, Google Home, Apple HomeKit
Price: ~180€
The Ecobee SmartThermostat has a built-in Alexa speaker. Ask the speaker for the temperature, current weather forecast, to tell you a joke, all that without needing a separate Alexa speaker. This Wi-Fi programmable thermostat also offers mobile app integration with Google Assistant and Siri, so if you have a Google-Assistant-enabled smart speaker or the Apple HomePod, you can control your KNX home with Google Assistant and Siri commands.
Why buy a thermostat that can work with an Alexa device, when this one actually is an Alexa device? The latest ecobee Smart Thermostat has an impressive speaker and a powerful microphone to hear you from practically anywhere.
Netatmo Smart Thermostat
Affordable smart thermostat with few limitations.
Supported smart assistants: Amazon Alexa, Google Home, Apple HomeKit
Price: ~170€
Netatmo, the French company that revolutionised the home weather station, has employed the services of product designer Philippe Starck to create its take on the humble thermostat. Their smart thermostat offers the same remote access as others available, while also claiming to be the perfect balance between functionality and design. Netatmo predicts its thermostat will save the average user about 37% in energy costs, so that's a definite bonus.
You can control and monitor your heating anytime and anywhere using the app and after you have answered a few initial questions at setup, the company claims it will adapt to your lifestyle by observing your habits to create a program based on them.
The Netatmo Smart Thermostat is compatible with Amazon Alexa, Google Assistant and Apple HomeKit.
GLAS smart thermostat by Johnson Controls
A thermostat and air quality sensor, but comes at a price.
Supported smart assistants: Amazon Alexa, Google Home
Price: ~220€
The GLAS Smart Thermostat does a lot of the wireless thermostat things you're used to, like keeping schedules and working with a mobile app. It even has built-in sensors that tell whether you're home or away and an air quality sensor, something most other smart thermostats lack.
GLAS’ transparent touchscreen practically disappears when the display is inactive, blending with your walls. If you're looking for something that looks different, but still has a lot of the smart options of other thermostats, GLAS is an interesting option. Please keep in mind that great room temperature control as well as air quality sensors come at a price with GLAS.
You can also control the GLAS via both Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant.
With a proper thermostat in your Loxone or KNX smart home, you'll never have to come home to an icebox in the winter — or a sauna in the summer — again. And you can voice control it, just say “Alexa, I’m cold” and it will adjust the temperature accordingly. Seamlessly integrated with 1Home, a smart thermostat can be integrated with any smart home device to enhance your heating system.
If you have any additional questions on the integration of the wireless smart thermostat into your Loxone or KNX wired smart home, our support team is happy to answer them (support@1home.io).