Twinkly Festoon Lights: Smart light chain for the summer

I am still a little surprised when I think back to your feedback and interest in the Twinkly lights. During the Christmas season, the smart tree decoration was an absolute hit – and will probably continue to delight all buyers in the following Christmas seasons. But the Italian manufacturer also offers products for the warmer seasons: the Twinkly Festoon Lights.

The Festoon Lights from Twinkly are a garland of 20 LED lamps. They can be expanded to 40 lamps with an extension set. Of course the RGB lights are weatherproof and suitable for outdoor use. Functionally, there is no difference to the classic light chain, only the design is different: instead of many small LED lamps there are 20 to 40 larger bulbs.

The installation is no problem and can be done by any layman: the Twinkly Festoon Lights are simply plugged into a power outlet and start glowing immediately. Afterwards, you only have to pair them with the Twinkly app. Here, you can connect the lamp to your own WiFi or create a local ad hoc network if you are out of range of your home WiFi.

But the biggest highlight is yet to come: just like the lights for the Christmas tree, the Festoon Lights can also be scanned and mapped with the Twinkly app. This allows the position of each individual lamp to be recorded, which is particularly important for the animations and effects. This is done very easily within a minute with the help of the smartphone camera.

How to attach the Twinkly Festoon Lights

Beforehand, the Twinkly Festoon Lights should of course be mounted – basically, there are no limits to creativity. The cable length from the socket to the controller is 90 cm, from the controller it is then 360 cm to the first lamp. The distance between the individual lamps is 50 cm.

Each of the small lamps hangs upside down and is equipped with a small ring on the upper side for fastening. The ring is open at one point so that the chain of lights can be attached to a rod or string, for example. The diameter of the plastic ring for fastening is about 0.8 cm.

As soon as everything is mounted, it's time for the effects and animations. There are different templates to choose from, such as a colourful rainbow, where you can freely determine the colour intensity and speed. For other effects, the colours can also be adjusted. Additionally, there is the Twinkly Store where you can view and download additional effects.

Create your own designs easily via app

If all this is too colourful for you, that's no problem either: you can also create your own designs. Of course you have the possibility to give each LED its own colour. And even though the Twinkly Festoon Lights can only do RGB, there are still some pleasantly warm white tones. There are also some global settings, for example for brightness or a timer to switch on and off at certain times.

Unfortunately, the manufacturer does not provide any precise information about the brightness of the 4.5 cm lamps. You will not be able to light up your whole garden with the Twinkly Festoon Lights as bright as day – it is clearly a mood light.

When it comes to smart home, Twinkly also offers a connection to Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant for the party light chain. The Apple connection stays behind: HomeKit or Siri shortcuts are unfortunately not yet supported.