There’s no doubt in my mind that Philips Hue is the best lighting system available. That’s in terms of quality, range of lights, range of physical controls and reliability.
It’s the one smart home system that I can absolutely rely on to the point where I have Hue bulbs in pretty much every room, with lights controlled exclusively through wireless controls.
As good as Hue is, there’s been one problem holding it back: the Hue Bridge. The 50 light limit (that’s officially, but around 63 lights and 10 to 20 accessories is the real limit) may sound like a lot when you get started, but it’s much easier to exceed this than you might think.
For example, in my office, I have four spotlights, a central lighting strip, an LED strip around my desk, and a floor lamp. Add in the two wireless switches I have and the motion detector, and that’s already 10 devices in one relatively small room.
A Bridge too far
Extend this out to your entire home, and 50 devices is nothing. Currently, the solution is to add a second Bridge to your home. Originally, multiple Bridges appeared as separate homes, which was just frustrating.
More recently, Hue has upgraded its multi-Bridge support, so that you can have two Bridges in one home. But, devices connected to the first Bridge can’t be controlled via accessories connected to the second, and only one Bridge is connected to your Hue account for remote control, and the second one has local control only.
Not only that, but if you’ve already got a Hue Bridge, you’d need to move devices from one to the other, strategically planning where everything is connected. That’s a real faff and something that’s time-consuming, and it takes away from the simplicity and quality of the existing system.
With a single Hue Bridge inside my house, and lights spread throughout my home and out into the garden, I get full Hue coverage right to the bottom of the garden into my garden office.
Hue Bridge Pro
Thanks to Hue accidentally leaking its upcoming product schedule, we now appear to have a solution to that problem: the Philips Hue Bridge Pro. This new device is said to support up 150+ lights and 50+ controls. That’s three times the light limit of the existing Bridge and allows for far larger setups.
This device is also supposed to support up to 500 scenes, which is also a big improvement; I’ve previously had to delete Scenes from rooms and devices, after getting a warning that no mode could be added.
The Hue Bridge Pro is also said to support Hue MotionAware, which can turn lights into motion sensors. I guess, that’s similar to the technology in the WiZ smart lights, via Wi-Fi.
What hasn’t been said is how you move from one Bridge to the Bridge Pro. I’d hope that Philips could release a tool to automate the job, but even if it’s manual, it would be a one-time job to do and well worth it.
We might be moving to a world with Matter where hubs and bridges are largely redundant, but that’s not the case with Hue. The Bridge provides offline control, so even if your internet is down, the lights will respond to wireless controls. For something as important as lighting, that’s vital, so the Bridge is vital. Improving this may not seem the most exciting announcement, but the Bridge Pro is long past due.
