This smart bathroom exhaust fan is great for parties

My old fan was loud and cranky, but the new one on its highest fan setting offers a reasonable record. (It’s rated for 80 or 110 cubic feet per minute, or CFM.) It’s powered by Home Depot’s smart home platform, Hubspace, which I previously didn’t have a good experience with (I’ve never been able to add a Smart lock challenge I tried the Hubspace app). Fortunately, this fan immediately connected to my phone via Bluetooth and my Wi-Fi network. Better yet, it also works with Google Assistant and Amazon Alexa.

I have not installed this fan in a bathroom with a shower, but I tested the humidity sensor using my clothes steamer to get rid of wrinkles on a shirt. It works and automatically! But my favorite feature, albeit passive, is the motion sensor. Having a room light up automatically without pressing a single button still feels magical, and now I want to put motion sensors all over my house.

Motion sensing has some drawbacks. First, you cannot customize how sensitive this sensor is. In my bathroom, I have a mirror that looks out into the hallway outside, so every time someone walks by past the bathroom, the light comes on. Not a big deal (my wife says otherwise), but something to keep in mind. The good news is that you can set how long you want the light to be on via the app, and I set it to one minute.

Yes, if you’re in the bathroom for that long and don’t move much (ugh, you know why), then the light will go out and you’ll have to frantically wave your arms for a few seconds before you come. back on A small price to pay, but you can also disable the motion sensor.

Physical controls

Photography: Julian Chokkattu

Wall switch controls can be intimidating; I recommend it first read the manual. The power button turns the fan and light on and off, but you can also press the individual fan and light buttons to turn them off. (Press and hold the fan button for three seconds to turn the Bluetooth speaker on and off too.) You can press the plus and minus signs to change the brightness of the light, or press and hold the color button to cycle the colors-I . I prefer to use the app for this.