The Homey Bridge is the latest smart hub in the Homey family. It features Zigbee, Z-Wave Plus, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, 433MHz and infrared, and it uses the loved Homey app for control and automation. Sounds like Homey Pro, but there’s some major differences. That starts with the design, which is completely different. It’s now glossy black, combined with aluminium. Of course, the signature RGD LEDring is still present, but it's more subtle. What makes Homey Bridge a real game-changer though, is its price: Homey Bridge retails with an MSRP of 69 EUR! That’s right, that’s less than one-fifth of Homey Pro.
Key differences between Homey Bridge and Homey Pro:
- The Homey App Store for Homey Bridge is more controlled. This means that Homey Apps for Homey Bridge will be of higher quality, but there may be less, especially for pro / niche devices and use-cases. There’s still tens of thousands of products supported, though!
- Homey Bridge runs its logic and intelligence in the cloud. The main reason why the Homey Bridge is so much cheaper is because the processing power of Homey moved, which is a LOT, to the cloud. This means Homey Bridge depends on a working internet connection to operate, just like smart thermostats, voice assistants and Chromecasts do. NOTE: This does NOT mean there are any compromises made on privacy. Personal data of users is still off-limits, and Homey don’t use any personal data for reselling, profiling or other shady causes.
- Homey Bridge includes three months of Homey Premium. An active Homey Premium subscription of 2.99 EUR/month is required to connect more than five devices to Homey. Users can always use up to five devices for free, without any subscription and including an unlimited amount of Homey Flows.
The user experience for Homey Bridge and Pro are mostly similar. Most devices are supported by both products, and they share the same Homey app for control and automation.
Please note that Homey Bridge is currently only available for users with a beta invitation from Homey. To get a beta invitation and an early activation to use the Bridge please contact Homey directly.