Smart Plug WiFi Outlet Teckin Smart Sockets 13A Works with Amazon Alexa Google Home and SmartThings Mini Plug Wireless Remote Control Timer Plug Switch, No Hub Required (4 Pack)

So, after seeing these on a deal I decided to purchase them to swap out some from another brand that quite frankly didn’t match up to my expectations & was a waste of not only my money, but time.Now given that the bar had been set pretty low by their predecessor, this was an easy feat for Teckin - literally all they have to do is work and I’ll be happy as I can’t even get that with the previous brand.Luckily I had read enough reviews to realise that the chances are I would have a bit of a job setting them up. I wasn’t to be dissuaded however.I tried setting them up straight out the box initially as I had seen someone else with a dual channel router had gotten lucky, however that was not to be my destiny.So, next thing to do was see how to turn off the 5ghz channel on my EE Smart Hub router. A quick google returned the results from EE directly telling me to open a new web browser on a device connected to my Hub (so my phone was ideal) and type 192.168.1.254 in the address bar which opened the Hub Manager.Choose Advanced Settings > Wireless& entered my admin password off the settings card on the back of my Hub (I haven’t changed it from factory settings).I selected the option where the bands are treated as one & turned off the 5ghz channel.I then opened my Smart Life App (for those asking it’s the top result, which is a blue house logo)(ideally download this first & register to save messing about waiting for a confirmation email/text to come through when trying to set the sockets up).When ready, plug your new socket in to a power socket you can easily access for the sake of setting it up. It should blink blue, which means it’s ready to be paired.On the app itself you can then search for the sockets (top left icon) labelled electrical outlet. Press the “Confirm Indicator Rapidly Blink” button (yeah, the English isn’t the best but it works) and it should search for your plug. It’ll ask you for the wi-fi password, so enter that & wait whilst it confirms & registers. The first one took about 40 seconds, before it promoted me to choose a name. Because I was setting 8 sockets up, I literally picked Smart Socket 1 & wrote the number 1 on the back of the socket in pen so i knew which one it was & saved it.Alexa immediately sent me a notification that it had detected the new socket & had also added it. Happy days.I repeated the process for all 8 sockets, the last 7 of which took about 20 seconds each to set up.Once I had done that and got my sockets 1-8 installed, I switched my 5ghz channel back on via my phone & set about replacing my now redundant sockets with these ones. I added them all to the same groups as the originals and asked Alexa to switch my Lounge lights on. They responded before she had even confirmed “ok” back to me. That’s a vast improvement over their predecessors where I could be waiting for anything up to 15 minutes for a reaction & still have at least one Light in the group not respond.I am very impressed with these and assuming they all work & don’t break on me then I will be more than satisfied.Several of you were asking in the questions section, so I will confirm you can unplug these and put them anywhere you like & they won’t deregister. I simply used one wall socket to install them all then moved them around the house as I wanted.I was able to change the names of the sockets easily enough in both the Smart Life app and also Alexa (tbh I’ve left Smart Life with them listed 1-8 but changed them in Alexa to reflect their current locations purely so I can control them by voice).They are smaller in design than the square ones and some sockets may have the issue of an overlap of the switch, however I can’t personally think of any time I would need to switch the power off to these sockets where that would be an issue. If I wanted to switch the power off and the switch was covered - simply unplug them. I don’t get what the fuss is with people wanting to turn them off at the wall socket - that seems to defeat the object of a smart socket in my opinion, but others might have a different set up to me.I highly recommend these sockets. Assuming you have a router that supports 2.4ghz channels (and know how to change the settings if needed) then these are brilliant for the price and don’t need another separate hub, unlike the previous model.I will buy even more if I see them back on deal.UPDATE: after using these for a few weeks now I am pleased to report we have had no issues with them. They are still working perfectly and quickly. They respond instantly to Alexa, even before she’s confirmed my request.We had a power cut which seemed to cause chaos with everything however once the router had been reset, everything was detected and working as normal - brilliant! Saved me having to reset everything!The app still works fine (not that I really use it now everything is set up through Alexa) & we really can’t find a fault with these sockets. We still can’t get over the response speed a few months on, after suffering their awful predecessors for what now feels like an eternity!MORE RECENT UPDATE: we’ve had a few power cuts recently and when I ask Alexa to turn the lights on she tells me they aren’t responding. Turns out however resetting the router actually resolves that every time, which given the alternative of trying to reset all these sockets, is a God send.All are still working as should be and even the ones down the Garden work just fine with Alexa or IFTTT on schedules.IF YOU FOUND MY REVIEW HELPFUL please hit the button below. This encourages me to keep writing reviews as then I know people are reading them and finding them of use. Many thanks for your time.

Once up and running these are very good.However, they connect to the 2.4gz band on your router. If you have a dual band router as surely most people do they will not connect until you have gone into your router settings, switched off the 5ghz band and rebooted. Once connected you can then go back to your router settings and switch the 5ghz back on.This would of been handy to put in the instructions. Would of saved me a couple of hours worth of stomping around swearing!

I wanted to have some smart lighting so that table lamps came on at night and were controllable from my phone. I almost spent a fortune on Phillips Hue hub and bulbs before I discovered these plugs. I was sceptical at first because they are less than half the price of my current smart plug.Within 5 mins of unboxing them, I had grouped 2 plugs to control my kitchen lamps and 2 for living room lamps. The smartlife app is pretty good for setup and pairing took 10 seconds per plug. You can turn the plugs on and off here and it also has voice control which is TERRIBLE!! It’s actually quite comical how bad it is. I would ask it to turn on the kitchen lights and it said “I dont understand turn on long johns” !!I was about to buy a google home mini but after watching some YouTube video I realised that I could use Siri on my iPhone to control them by setting up a shortcut to the ‘google home’ app. So now I just hold my iPhone home button down and say “turn on the kitchen lights” and they come on. Perfect.I have also set the plugs with lamps in to come on automatically at sunset.Fantastic value for money, I’ve just bought another 2 fornrhe bedroom lamps!

Having just started with Alexa, I needed a few plugs to make things happen. These, and the older square plugs, get good reviews, with these round ones being less likely to impede access to the switch. They really are small, pretty much the same width as a plug, only round, and there's no problem at all with the switch.As directed in the instructions, I downloaded the Smart Life app and named the plugs on there. I had no issues with dual band wifi, and despite not switching off 5GHz, the app went straight to the 2.4GHz band for set-up. Then I switched on the Alexa app, which quickly recognised the plugs, and started setting up routines from there.The four-pack is a good deal, and this would be my choice for any new plugs, should I need them.

Deliberated for ages about whether or not to buy these plugs. I wasn't sure they'd be any good as they are so reasonably priced compared to other smart plugs, and I was worried by a few negative reviews.However, I'm super glad I bought them. Setup took minutes, and there were absolutely no issues whatsoever with my router (Sky).You have to set up initially through the Smart Life app, rather than directly through the Alexa app. But it's really simple, and again I experienced none of the issues with the app that I'd read about in some of the negative reviews. The Smart Life app actually seems to have more functionality than the Alexa app anyway, as it lets you set timer schedules so you can set lamps to switch on and off while you're away.Once the plugs are set up in Smart Life, you just link it to the Alexa app by enabling the Smart Life skill, and then you can control them as you would with any other Alexa enabled device.They look great too. I don't understand why Amazon's own smart plugs aren't as small and stylish.I wholeheartedly recommend these Teckin smart plugs.