Heating systems that keep the house at a constant temperature. Lights that turn on automatically at night. A robot vacuum cleaner that cleans dirt. Roller blinds that rise and fall in the morning and evening.

The smart home concept offers all of these advantages. However, for this to work, you need to make sure that all devices can communicate with each other and be integrated into the same network.

“Radio systems are an option for most homes because they can be easily installed and extended if needed,” says Sebastian Kloess of Bitkom, an IT association in Germany.

However, problems can arise if the devices use different radio networks. “If the customer integrates devices from different manufacturers into their smart home, they may not understand each other,” he says.

The most common communication standard used by smart home devices is WLAN, which is the standard way for wireless networks to connect to the Internet.

“Everyone has this at home, many devices are addressed directly via WLAN,” says Kloess.

However, for smart home use, the WLAN is typically oversized and therefore power consuming and prone to outages.

The radio standards specially developed for the smart home are more suitable. These include ZigBee, which is supported by many manufacturers and has low power consumption.

There’s also Z-Wave, a manufacturer-independent wireless standard used by many smart home devices.

Another factor is whether a system is open or closed. In the case of a closed system from a single manufacturer, customers generally cannot integrate devices from other manufacturers into their network.

This is different with open systems. “They have a standard supported by various smart home solution providers, for example Bluetooth LE, EnOcean, WLAN, Z-Wave and ZigBee,” says consumer consultant Reinhard Loch.

This allows products from different manufacturers to be integrated into a single network. However, if you want to keep it simple, you can rely on a smart home supplier that uses components that all come from one source.

Before you do that, you need to make sure that this provider has all the apps you want, advises Loch.

In the future, it might become easier to use smart home devices without being tied to individual manufacturers. Amazon, Apple and Google are working with other smart home providers to prepare a new open standard called Connected Home over IP.

Digital voice assistants also make it easier. “They play the role of interpreter and central control point in the smart home,” says Kloess. Usually this also works for individual devices with different radio standards.

In a few years, thanks to artificial intelligence, technology will be able to react to people’s behavior and automatically know what inhabitants need.

“In this case, the smart home will be a self-learning home that recognizes the needs of residents and manages processes independently,” says Alexander Matheus of the VDE Testing and Certification Institute in Germany. – dpa