Review - Ecobee Smart Thermostat Premium & Enhanced! The Best HomeKit Thermostat

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enjoin me as I review the ecobe smart thermostat premium and the smart thermostat enhanced welcome everybody to Apple Insider it is Andrew here and you can find me on Twitter at Andrew OSU if you haven't done so already please go ahead and subscribe and enable those notifications so you don't miss a single video eco's lineup has changed today as it introduced two new thermostats replacing the existing smart thermostat with voice control but keeping the light model in its rotation now there are three different Eco thermostats that you can choose from the light with the previous design the enhanced with an updated UI a bigger screen and a few other improvements and then the premium which sits on the top that replaces the smart thermostat with voice control and add several new features including an air quality monitor so let's go ahead and discuss both of these and why you may want to pick one up the model that I've been using is primarily the smart thermostat premium the high-end version of the EOB smart thermostat that'll run you $250 so this is the new ecoe smart thermostat premium has a 540 X540 display which is up from the 360 by 480 display that it had in the past this premium version has this zinc body which looks great and can even reflect a little bit of the body of your room so if you have a blue room it'll give it a little bit of a blue look if you have a pink room it'll give it a little bit of a pink look so I like that it reflects the body it's very similar to what Nest did with some of its thermostats you can see on the back we still have the built-in speaker now they does have a different mounting PL so if you have a previous generation eccoe thermostat you will have to upgrade the mounting plate for the new thermostats the existing ones will not work so upgraded mounting plate to work with the new models of the ecoe smart thermostat ecoe has been a longtime homek kid supporter and that support continues with both of its new thermostats out of the box both the smart thermostat premium and smart thermostat enhanced work with homekit they can be added to the home app where you can control your temperature from the home app with your voice or included in any automations or scenes you may have for example when you tell Siri good night it'll close your blinds lock your door turn off your lights and set your thermostat to the proper temperature additionally the smart thermostat premium can use that blue Bluetooth or that built-in speaker with homekit it can act as an airplay speaker so you can cast audio to it to listen to music it'll work with multi-room audio since it is airPlay 2 so I can cast audio to my homod my ecob speaker as well as my safe and sound in the ceiling all at the same time it's a pretty awesome trick beyond that the smart thermostat can also use Siri and I mean Siri is actually on the device you do have to have a homepod or homepod mini in your home to enable this functionality but it's pretty cool my smart thermostat is located in the hallway so usually I just walk to the bedroom and as I walk past the bedroom I'll just say good night to Siri and that's when it'll run my good night scene and it'll pick it up right here on the thermostat instead of my home pod that's in the kitchen depending on the layout of your house it can be super useful to have an additional uh smart assistant around your house it's effectively another homepod that you can use to play music ask queries anything like that if you don't like Siri you can use uh Amazon's assistant on here as well but I'm not going to get into that one of the biggest changes is the display it looks phenomenal and ecobe has done a great job of making it more Visual and easier to understand the temperature air quality and even from all the way across the room from far away you can see when it is actively heating or actively cooling your home and you can see its current temperature below that you can see the target temperatures and if you're on auto mode both the low and high of what it's trying to cool or heat to the old UI wasn't bad but I know a lot of people struggled with adjusting the temperature and touching and holding and sliding around on the screen I can confirm that it is much easier to adjust the temperature on the new ecobe smart thermostat premium and smart thermostat enhanced the larger screen the better UI all of it make for a better user experience it's very easy to adjust the temperature whenever you need to Eco still has a bunch of great features I'm not going to get into all of them but there is a subscription service that can help monitor your home basically as a security system you can use these smart sensors that are included with the premium version or and available as an additional purchase for the enhanced version place these around your home and it'll heat or cool the room that you are in or to the room that you're in versus elsewhere in your home so that way wherever you are it is the proper temperature you can also use the smart sensors for doors and windows whenever a door or window is then opened it can turn off your AC or heat to stop unnecessarily heating or cooling your house because you have a window or door open it's awesome and just another way that ecobe can help save you money on your utility bills the only downside I have is with the air quality monitor it's really handy don't get me wrong I like that you can see your air quality right on the screen the face of the uh smart thermostat you can tap into it and see a scale on your air quality you can also see the voccs and CO2 in your home all of that is great but I wish it was available in homekit right now it's just available through ecobe and not through homekit as a homekit supporter I really would have liked to see that information available in the home app as well as through the EOB app as I mentioned there's not just one but two new ecobe smart thermostats the one on the left is is the ecob Smart thermostat premium while the one on the right is the EOB smart thermostat enhanced both have a refreshed UI and new larger screens but the premium still has a few features that are a little bit better so for one it has a zinc alloy body you can see we have a plastic body here on the enhanced version but the premium version has metal all around the edges additionally both have the new radar scanner built in which gives that kind of uni front there's no longer the P sensor in the lower corner the radar sensor is improved and can even detect motion and occupancy around corners whereas the previous Pi sensor could not but the premium version does have the built-in air quality monitor so air quality monitor does air quality VOC and CO2 the other difference with the premium version is that it has a built-in speaker so that built-in speaker allows you to communicate with Apple Siri or Amazon Alexa there's a microphone for those inputs and you can use it as a Bluetooth speaker or as an AirPlay 2 speaker and the last difference is that the premium version has a smart sensor included in the Box whereas the enhanced version still works with these little smart sensors but you have to purchase them separately these will run you $100 for two comes out to about 50 bucks a piece one more time to summarize the new ecob smart thermostat premium and and smart thermostat enhanced have updated designs that look much better while still staying true to eco's Roots the smart thermostat premium has a awesome metal body they both have improved uis that have greatly improved the user experience the premium version has built an air quality monitor that can tell you how the air is in your home including voccs and CO2 and the smart thermostat premium still works with Siri has an onboard speaker that you can use with AirPlay and all of these work with home cam which as an Apple user I absolutely adore let me know what you guys think of the updated EOB smart thermostat premium and smart thermostat enhanced there are links Down Below in the description if you want to pick them up otherwise stay tuned follow me on Twitter and I'll see you next timejoin me as I review the ecobe smart thermostat premium and the smart thermostat enhanced welcome everybody to Apple Insider it is Andrew here and you can find me on Twitter at Andrew OSU if you haven't done so already please go ahead and subscribe and enable those notifications so you don't miss a single video eco's lineup has changed today as it introduced two new thermostats replacing the existing smart thermostat with voice control but keeping the light model in its rotation now there are three different Eco thermostats that you can choose from the light with the previous design the enhanced with an updated UI a bigger screen and a few other improvements and then the premium which sits on the top that replaces the smart thermostat with voice control and add several new features including an air quality monitor so let's go ahead and discuss both of these and why you may want to pick one up the model that I've been using is primarily the smart thermostat premium the high-end version of the EOB smart thermostat that'll run you $250 so this is the new ecoe smart thermostat premium has a 540 X540 display which is up from the 360 by 480 display that it had in the past this premium version has this zinc body which looks great and can even reflect a little bit of the body of your room so if you have a blue room it'll give it a little bit of a blue look if you have a pink room it'll give it a little bit of a pink look so I like that it reflects the body it's very similar to what Nest did with some of its thermostats you can see on the back we still have the built-in speaker now they does have a different mounting PL so if you have a previous generation eccoe thermostat you will have to upgrade the mounting plate for the new thermostats the existing ones will not work so upgraded mounting plate to work with the new models of the ecoe smart thermostat ecoe has been a longtime homek kid supporter and that support continues with both of its new thermostats out of the box both the smart thermostat premium and smart thermostat enhanced work with homekit they can be added to the home app where you can control your temperature from the home app with your voice or included in any automations or scenes you may have for example when you tell Siri good night it'll close your blinds lock your door turn off your lights and set your thermostat to the proper temperature additionally the smart thermostat premium can use that blue Bluetooth or that built-in speaker with homekit it can act as an airplay speaker so you can cast audio to it to listen to music it'll work with multi-room audio since it is airPlay 2 so I can cast audio to my homod my ecob speaker as well as my safe and sound in the ceiling all at the same time it's a pretty awesome trick beyond that the smart thermostat can also use Siri and I mean Siri is actually on the device you do have to have a homepod or homepod mini in your home to enable this functionality but it's pretty cool my smart thermostat is located in the hallway so usually I just walk to the bedroom and as I walk past the bedroom I'll just say good night to Siri and that's when it'll run my good night scene and it'll pick it up right here on the thermostat instead of my home pod that's in the kitchen depending on the layout of your house it can be super useful to have an additional uh smart assistant around your house it's effectively another homepod that you can use to play music ask queries anything like that if you don't like Siri you can use uh Amazon's assistant on here as well but I'm not going to get into that one of the biggest changes is the display it looks phenomenal and ecobe has done a great job of making it more Visual and easier to understand the temperature air quality and even from all the way across the room from far away you can see when it is actively heating or actively cooling your home and you can see its current temperature below that you can see the target temperatures and if you're on auto mode both the low and high of what it's trying to cool or heat to the old UI wasn't bad but I know a lot of people struggled with adjusting the temperature and touching and holding and sliding around on the screen I can confirm that it is much easier to adjust the temperature on the new ecobe smart thermostat premium and smart thermostat enhanced the larger screen the better UI all of it make for a better user experience it's very easy to adjust the temperature whenever you need to Eco still has a bunch of great features I'm not going to get into all of them but there is a subscription service that can help monitor your home basically as a security system you can use these smart sensors that are included with the premium version or and available as an additional purchase for the enhanced version place these around your home and it'll heat or cool the room that you are in or to the room that you're in versus elsewhere in your home so that way wherever you are it is the proper temperature you can also use the smart sensors for doors and windows whenever a door or window is then opened it can turn off your AC or heat to stop unnecessarily heating or cooling your house because you have a window or door open it's awesome and just another way that ecobe can help save you money on your utility bills the only downside I have is with the air quality monitor it's really handy don't get me wrong I like that you can see your air quality right on the screen the face of the uh smart thermostat you can tap into it and see a scale on your air quality you can also see the voccs and CO2 in your home all of that is great but I wish it was available in homekit right now it's just available through ecobe and not through homekit as a homekit supporter I really would have liked to see that information available in the home app as well as through the EOB app as I mentioned there's not just one but two new ecobe smart thermostats the one on the left is is the ecob Smart thermostat premium while the one on the right is the EOB smart thermostat enhanced both have a refreshed UI and new larger screens but the premium still has a few features that are a little bit better so for one it has a zinc alloy body you can see we have a plastic body here on the enhanced version but the premium version has metal all around the edges additionally both have the new radar scanner built in which gives that kind of uni front there's no longer the P sensor in the lower corner the radar sensor is improved and can even detect motion and occupancy around corners whereas the previous Pi sensor could not but the premium version does have the built-in air quality monitor so air quality monitor does air quality VOC and CO2 the other difference with the premium version is that it has a built-in speaker so that built-in speaker allows you to communicate with Apple Siri or Amazon Alexa there's a microphone for those inputs and you can use it as a Bluetooth speaker or as an AirPlay 2 speaker and the last difference is that the premium version has a smart sensor included in the Box whereas the enhanced version still works with these little smart sensors but you have to purchase them separately these will run you $100 for two comes out to about 50 bucks a piece one more time to summarize the new ecob smart thermostat premium and and smart thermostat enhanced have updated designs that look much better while still staying true to eco's Roots the smart thermostat premium has a awesome metal body they both have improved uis that have greatly improved the user experience the premium version has built an air quality monitor that can tell you how the air is in your home including voccs and CO2 and the smart thermostat premium still works with Siri has an onboard speaker that you can use with AirPlay and all of these work with home cam which as an Apple user I absolutely adore let me know what you guys think of the updated EOB smart thermostat premium and smart thermostat enhanced there are links Down Below in the description if you want to pick them up otherwise stay tuned follow me on Twitter and I'll see you next time\n"