Ikea is expanding its smart home offering. A new hub should now simplify the integration of new devices.
Since the start of the Tradfri series, Ikea has continued to expand its smart home offering. However, a hub is required to use the smart lamps, light switches, motion detectors and shortcut buttons. The first Tradfri hub from 2014 is now obsolete. Ikea’s Dirigera hub is supposed to have more functions and be easier to use. However, this has its price.
New app and more functionality
With Dirigera, Ikea wants to correct a shortcoming of its previous smart home hub. By integrating the new Matter standard, the hub should be compatible with far more smart home devices. There is also a new app that is intended to simplify use and enable more home automation. In combination with the new app, integrating smart home devices into the hub system is much easier, according to Ikea. According to Rebecca Töreman, business manager at Ikea, the app also allows users to “create different scenes with preset functions of the smart products for all your different activities and moments in the home.”
Ikea has announced another new function of the Dirigera hub for 2023. In the first half of 2023, access to the smart home network while on the go is to be provided. This allows smart devices to be controlled from the smartphone, even if it is not connected to the home WiFi. If the light was left on, you can easily switch it off again remotely.
Above all, the possibility of controlling individual smart home devices individually and setting certain scenes was previously missing with Ikea’s Tradfri hub. Owners of the older hub can continue to use it together with the older app indefinitely.
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Ikea makes Dirigera pay well
Ikea lists the Dirigera hub on its website for 59.99 euros. That’s 20 euros more than the company last charged for its Tradfri hub. Originally it was already available for 30 euros, in 2020 the price was reduced to only 20 euros, only to be doubled to 40 euros in 2022. According to this, Dirigera is twice as expensive as Tradfri to start with, which could be misunderstood by many customers. Mainly because the Swedish furniture store no longer offers the cheaper Tradfri hub. After all, Ikea does a lot better with the Dirigera hub, so that the price can be justified by the larger range of functions.
The new Dirigera hub is already on the Ikea site in Germany and other countries listed. Ikea has announced that sales will start in October, but so far the hub is not available online or in the stores themselves.