Featured posts
Philips Hue has once again not been very careful about keeping its products secret. A successor to the Philips Hue Play Lightbar has appeared on amazon.co.uk: Significantly better, but also more expensive than before. I have gathered the first information for you. The new Philips Hue Play Smart Wall Washer is 15.7 centimeters high, 9.1 centimeters wide, and 7.6 centimeters deep.
Last October, I was able to announce that Philips Hue was working on AI-generated scenes for its lighting system. The feature was officially announced in early 2025, and at least the icon has already appeared in the Hue app. Now the official rollout is beginning, albeit with some limitations. “Earlier this week, we started an initial rollout of the Hue AI assistant to our English-speaking users in the Benelux”, explains Hue inventor George Yianni.
In April 2019, Signify, formerly Philips Lighting, acquired the French company WiZ. Since then, it has been operating as a low-budget brand with WiFi connectivity right next to the top dog Philips Hue. Now I ask myself: could the products of the two brands WiZ and Philips Hue soon be compatible with each other?
It’s incredible how quickly time flies. Almost exactly ten years ago, Philips Hue introduced its still current Bridge (see header image). Back then, it was a modern piece of technology that was even made compatible with Apple HomeKit shortly afterwards. But one limit has never changed since then: The maximum number of connected lamps.
Until May 25, Philips Hue is offering many of its products at a big discount so that you can end the longest days of the year with the right lighting. The promotion applies around the globe and in many different countries, with slight differences in some cases. However, I’ll try to summarize the whole thing briefly for the largest groups of visitors to my blog.
Equipping a second TV in the house with a Philips Hue HDMI Sync Box is not as easy as it might sound. The big problem is not even the price, after all, even the “old” Sync Box costs at least 200 euros and then there’s a good 150 to 200 euros for the Play Lightstrip on top of that.
In my last published list of the five oldest Hue products that are still being sold, the Hue Smart Button did not appear. The small switch was released on October 21, 2019 – so it’s already five years old. While the Hue Dimmer Switch and Hue Tap have received updates in the meantime, the Hue Smart Button shown in the cover image above has so far been left empty-handed.
Philips Hue was one of the first partners to offer official Matter integration. Since November 2022, it has been possible to connect the Hue Bridge to the Matter smart home standard, at that time still as a beta. The official launch followed in September 2023. Now it seems that something is happening again with Philips Hue and Matter.
This issue is not entirely new and has been with us for several years. However, as the gardening season gets underway, I would like to draw your attention to the issue once again – and maybe the manufacturer will do something about it at some point. What exactly is it about?
The Philips Hue Play HDMI Sync Box 8K has now been on the market for around six months and is particularly pleasing to console fans, who can now finally use 120 hertz at a 4K resolution. I don’t use a Hue Sync Box myself, but in recent weeks I have repeatedly read on social media about problems with it suddenly switching off.
Fabian