Wemo

I have been a Wemo customer for several years. Began with one light switch and, although getting the switch detected and connected was wonky, the light worked great with rules. Over time I added more switches and currently there are 6 Wemo devices at my residence. The advertised benefit of Wemo items is to (1) set up rules for devices to turn on/off automatically and (2) for remote access. (1) For the last year+ the “rules” do not work if I am not home. Forget having your home appear like someone is home when you are not. (2) Remote access also does not work if I am not home. What good is having a remote access function if it does not allow you to access your devices remotely? I have started from scratch and followed every trouble shooting method Belkin suggests any I have to now advise that Wemo is a failure. This was not always the case. Historically remote access worked flawlessly. No more. If I’m at the corner or on the Indian continent Wemo doesn’t work. I have earnestly tried to be a devoted, long term customer, but that has changed. Last night I tried to turn on the front door light from a nearby restaurant and the app updated to show each 6 Wemo devices “not detected.” Simply said, the Wemo app does not work remotely, which means these expensive Wemo light switches and plugs are worthless. Thankfully I have still have old fashioned timers to plug lights in to because these expensive Wemo gadgets don’t work.

I bought several outlet switches in 2015. I did have some difficulty getting them to program and function well. But I really liked the idea of not having to purchase a main hub or controller. And once programmed, they worked very well. In 2017, I built a new home. I have twenty Wemo devices. They were east to install and program. My biggest problem was poor internet connectivity. Once I resolved my internet issues, they have worked well. I have all the features active, from schedules to sunset to sunrise and connected to Alexa. I do keep my firmware updated too. I have noticed that on some occasions, I don’t see a few devices. In the app, top left corner, there is a refresh or check button. Once I hit that button, it checks all devices and they all appear. Is it a flawless product? No, but what it does do and how it actually works is so very cool. Just think about the automation control via Alexa. I control lights, ceiling fans and shop tools. I did discover that my router did not cover my House well. I added a range extender and that solved all my connectivity issues. I would recommend this product. I have a lot invested in the Wemo products now. I will be adding more.

Can you increase the maximum power on threshold? Right now the max is 99 watts. I want my air conditioner to be considered “on” if it’s drawing more than 150 watts. The fan uses 130 watts. When the compressor kicks in the wattage goes up to 340 watts. I’d like to set the threshold to 150. What’s the reason behind limiting it to 99 watts? If it’s not a technical limitation it would be great to give us that additional control/flexibility. Can you add a rule, perhaps in the automation category in the wemo app, that allows a Wemo insight switch to turn on another wemo insight switch when the “master” insight switch detects a load greater than the power on threshold? And then the opposite (turn off the other wemo insight switch when the load drops below the threshold)? Use case: Air conditioner is plugged into the master insight switch. A circulator fan is plugged into the slave insight switch. When the master insight switch detects that the air conditioner compressor has turned on (via on/standby threshold setting) the slave insight switch is turned on via the new rule. When the A/C turns off the fan is commanded to turn off. Can you make use of the HomeKit protocol specification “outlet in use”? Right now in the Apple home app all of my insight switches always say “no” when reading the “outlet in use” property found by force pressing/long pressing on the insight switch and then tapping on “settings”. There is a read only field “Outlet In Use”, and it always says “no”.

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I don’t know what to say more than do not purchase the WeMo Mini Switch. I’ve never written a review before, but this device made me so angry; and I’m very tech savvy, This product never worked from the get go. I bought a pack of 2 mini switches and could not get either to work and the app is a complete joke!! It doesn’t find your WiFi network (which is the strongest signal around me) until it has refreshed the page about 4 times. It continually gives me networks though that have one or no bars. Then if I’m successful in getting my network, as soon as I put in my password it tried connecting for about 20 seconds and then the app crashes. Every single time!!!!! Good luck getting the app to reload after that. It just keeps saying connecting. I bought these the same day as I bought a Nest thermometer for my house. I had the Nest wired into where my existing thermostat was, set up and connected to my WiFi, and working with Alexa for voice temperature control seamlessly in about 30 minutes. I worked with these “smart” switches for about an hour and a half before I gave up, raging that something that simple could be so poorly made and not work a single time I tried. There are many more reviews on here like mine and my hope is that someone reads these before purchasing them and wasting their time with this product and company. I promise it will save you hours if you go with a different brand!!

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I work for a major electronics company, and these things are getting returned everyday, I’ve had this light switch for a year and it’s worked for about 2 months out of that year. When I call wemo they try to tell me that there is something wrong with my internet and blame everything under the sun except their product.. let me just tell you that I’ve been a tech for about 10 years, have a gigabit connection, did a speed test and it came up at 896mbps and my wemo switch is 12 feet from my router, I told the wemo this and they blew it off. Recently they put out a new update that has made ALL of their products cease to work. This is something wemo acknowledges, this is something that in my major chain technology company got confirmation of.. this is the worst product I’ve ever seen in my 16 years of working in the technology company. They basically stole my money and if I don’t get a full refund on these products I am calling my personal friend at foxnews consumer reports to run a story on this scam of a product.. expected better from Belkin. I’ll never purchase another one of their products again, not because their product doesn’t work right but because of the way I was treated trying to find a solution. DO NOT BUY, PLEASE READ, PLEASE TAKE MY ADVICE, SAVE YOUR MONEY AND GET TP Link or Samsung, got a TP link light switch, took 30 seconds to set up and hasn’t disconnected once. PLEASE READ!!!!!