Smart Plugs
The cheapest, least risky way to make an old appliance smart.
A smart plug is the most honest device in the smart home catalog. It does one thing — turn power on and off — and it does it without asking you to rewire anything or replace an appliance that works perfectly well.
They are also the cheapest way to test whether you actually like living with a smart home. If you never open the app after two weeks, you have learned something useful for about the price of lunch.
What smart plugs are genuinely good for
- Lamps and floor lights that are not worth replacing with smart bulbs.
- Holiday lighting on a schedule that you never have to remember.
- Small heaters and fans on timers — with the caveat below.
- Energy monitoring: plug in a space heater, a fridge or a gaming PC and find out what it actually costs to run. This is the most underrated smart home feature and it changes behavior fast.
- Chargers and small electronics you want off overnight.
What smart plugs should not do
Check the plug's maximum load rating before you attach anything that heats. High-draw appliances — space heaters on full power, air conditioners, clothes dryers, electric kettles — can exceed what a plug is rated for, and some manufacturers explicitly exclude them from warranty. If a device draws a lot of current, look for a plug with a high amperage rating and a thermal cut-off, or use a smart switch or relay rated for the load instead.
Also avoid daisy-chaining smart plugs into each other or into extension strips that are already near capacity.
Matter, Wi-Fi, or Zigbee?
Wi-Fi plugs are the simplest: no hub, works out of the box. The downside is that every plug is another device on your router, and some cheaper models drop offline when the network gets busy.
Matter plugs cost a little more and buy you real portability. The same plug can be set up in Apple Home, Google Home, Alexa or SmartThings, so changing your mind about which ecosystem you live in does not mean rebuying hardware. Note that Matter over Thread plugs need a Thread border router; Matter over Wi-Fi plugs do not.
Zigbee plugs make sense if you already own a Zigbee hub, and they often double as network extenders for other Zigbee devices.
Products mentioned in this guide
Products referenced in this guide, shown with the manufacturer's own photography. We do not publish prices or star ratings — both change faster than any article can be kept accurate.
Smart Plugs
Eve Energy (Matter)
- Matter over Thread smart plug with no manufacturer cloud account required
- Energy and power monitoring for whatever is plugged into it
- Compact body that does not block the second wall outlet
Works with
- Matter
- Thread
- Apple Home
- Alexa
- Google Home
- SmartThings
Frequently asked questions
Can a smart plug monitor electricity use?
Some can. Energy-monitoring plugs report watts or kilowatt-hours through their app, which lets you estimate running costs for whatever is plugged in. It is the easiest way to find the appliances in your home that actually cost money to run.
Do smart plugs need Wi-Fi?
Wi-Fi plugs connect directly to your router. Zigbee, Thread and Bluetooth plugs use a hub or border router for remote control. All of them need some network for remote access — none of them work from your phone in another city over Bluetooth alone.
Will a smart plug work with my coffee maker?
Usually yes, but check two things: whether the machine has a physical on/off switch that stays on when power is cut, and whether it needs a button press to start brewing. Many machines resume automatically; some do not.