Homey Bridge available for 69 euros

Homey has been developed since 2014 to make smart home simple and fun for everyone. Homey wants to do this by merging all devices at home into a single app, regardless of brand or technology. Homey works with 50,000+ devices from more than 1,000 brands, and enables users to shape their home experience based on their own habits. In addition to the Homey app and the Homey Pro, there is now the Homey Bridge.

Homey Bridge
Homey Bridge is a so-called smart home hub that contains several wireless technologies. Homey Bridge contains wireless antennas for Zigbee, Z-Wave Plus, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, 433MHz (including KlikAanKlikUit and Somfy RTS) and a powerful Infrared LED. This allows Homey Bridge to connect to an incredibly wide range of devices: from Fibaro sensors on Z-Wave to Zigbee lamps from IKEA and, for example, TVs via infrared. This allows you to easily combine products from different brands and on different technologies in the Homey app for iOS and Android, and in Homey’s Web app for desktops including features such as Homey Flow and Homey Energy, and has many of the same integrations, such as with Siri Shortcuts , Alexa and Google Assistant. This way you can easily operate, monitor and automate your entire home in one system.

Differences with Homey Pro
You may already know Homey from the Homey Pro. Homey Bridge includes many of the same smart home technologies as Homey Pro and uses the same mobile and web apps and integrations, such as Google Home and Alexa. However, there are a few differences between Homey Bridge and Homey Pro:
1. Price
First of all, the price differs: € 69 for Homey Bridge is much less than the € 399 that Homey Pro costs. Homey Bridge can be so much cheaper because it doesn’t contain very powerful computer hardware. Instead, Homey Bridge connects to the online, cloud-based Homey environment. All intelligence of the system, and the execution of Flow automations, therefore takes place in the Homey cloud. This differs from Homey Pro, which does everything locally.
2. Homey Apps
Another difference is the availability of Homey Apps. The cloud-based Homey and Homey Bridge also work with an open app model, comparable to a smartphone, in which Homey Apps form the connection between Homey and devices. Usually there is a Homey App per brand. While apps made by an enthusiastic community of hobbyists are also allowed on Homey Pro, this does not happen on the cloud-based Homey and Homey Bridge. The Homey Apps are available for this, which have been developed by official, verified partners. In this way, the quality and user experience of Homey Bridge as a more mainstream system is guaranteed.

Start for free
Because Homey Bridge has the intelligence running online, there is also more dependence on the internet, just like Netflix, Spotify, Alexa and Google Home are. An advantage of this is that from now on you can start using Homey for free – you don’t even need a Homey Bridge. Devices that are already cloud-connected, such as those from Tado, Nest, Philips Hue (via the Philips Hue bridge), Sonos and many more brands, can be connected directly to Homey via the Homey app. You can then add Homey Bridge when you want to connect to devices such as KlikAanKlikUit (433MHz), IKEA (Zigbee), Aqara (Zigbee), Fibaro (Z-Wave), or your TV (Infrared).

Homey Premium
Naturally, maintaining Homey and cloud services costs money. The Dutch Athom (the company behind Homey) does not really earn anything from a free service and a € 69 hub. Athom does not sell or use data for advertising profiles: they believe in offering good products at a fair price and that is why they have Homey Premium.
Homey Premium costs € 2.99 per month and is necessary if you want to connect more than 5 devices to Homey (with or without Homey Bridge – Homey Bridge itself does not count as a device of course). It also gives you access to Homey Insights for historical insights into everything your smart home measures – from temperature and energy consumption to humidity, light intensity and ppm CO2 (provided you have connected a meter to Homey, of course).
Homey Bridge comes with a 3-month free trial of Homey Premium as standard. Good to know is that even with Homey Bridge you don’t need Homey Premium if you want to control up to 5 devices. Then your setup costs nothing every month. Only the ‘owner’ of the Homey environment needs to close Homey Premium, and then everyone who has access can enjoy it! For more information, see https://homey.app/premium.

Price and availability
Homey Bridge can be purchased from today and has a suggested retail price of € 69 at Coolblue, MediaMarkt, BCC, ROBBshop and Gamma, among others, and at https://homey.app/bridge.