With over 52 million smart homes in the U.S., smart bathroom technology is becoming increasingly popular. Consumers are learning and adopting new technologies for more convenience, lowering bills, and increasing safety and security. Smart home devices usually connect AI with the Internet of Things, making home devices anticipate users’ needs and deliver accordingly.
There are already many devices available to provide a personalized bathroom experience. For example, you can use smart showerheads to preset the water fill and temperature levels for your tub. Add in other devices like integrated smart speakers to pump in soothing music and heated floors to keep your toes comfortable, and your bathroom is just a few upgrades away from providing a total spa experience.
Let’s look at a few top smart bathroom trends.
Top Smart Bathroom Devices
1. Smart Toilets
Smart toilets are one of the most wanted devices for renovating a bathroom. Smart toilets’ most popular features often include speakers, seat warmers, touch-free automatic lids, night lights, and remote control. Consumers love that they feel cleaner and more hygienic, as the toilets are touch-free and self-cleaning.
2. Interactive LED Mirrors
An interactive LED mirror has a built-in display that can show reminders, the time and date, weather, traffic reports, and more. Like an Alexa® device or other AI-powered personal assistants, the interactive mirror is connected to the cloud to respond to questions and answers with the users. They can also control other smart devices throughout the home. This can be really helpful if the user wants to start their morning pot of coffee while still in the bathroom.
3. Adjustable Privacy Glass
Smart privacy glass allows the user to change between transparency and opacity in your bathroom windows. The glass can block total vision from the outside but still let natural light pass through. It’s much more hygienic than curtains and still enables the user to soak up all that Vitamin D! It is easy to change the window setting from clear to frosted with a smartphone or through voice control.
The most advanced glass feature introduced recently is the ability to project TV shows on the opaque glass directly from a smartphone or a smartwatch via Bluetooth.
4. Smart Shower
A smart shower lets the user set the ideal water flow and keep a consistent, preferred temperature throughout their shower at the touch of a button or voice command. A smart shower is a huge safety feature, as it can prevent the water from getting too hot or too cold to cause any harm or discomfort.
5. Chromatherapy Lights
Color plays a huge role in a person’s thoughts and feelings. Chromatherapy is the use of colored lighting in a bathroom to potentially influence the user’s feelings. These high-intensity LED lights can be controlled by a voice-activated remote or an IoT device. They often have many different colors, brightness, and intensity settings to create their ideal bathroom experience.
6. Floor Heating System
Floor heating systems use thermal radiation to keep bathroom floors warm. The homeowner will feel the heat sooner with a floor heating system than with a traditional heating system. A floor heating system can also keep a controlled and comfortable temperature based on the user’s preferences. Imagine talking to your wearable device, such as a smartwatch, to turn on the heating system a few minutes before you step into the bathroom.
7. Smart Scale
Smart scales are a simple bathroom upgrade and perfect for those who are making it a priority to focus on their health. Smart scales can track and store health data, then directly send the data to other personal devices like smartphones or smartwatches for tracking, collection, and analysis. In the near future, more complex analyses can be conducted on your devices to generate personal insights to help you improve your habits and wellbeing.
8. Smart Faucets
Smart faucets allow homeowners to control water usage in their bathrooms, preheat or pre-cool their water, and have an overall hands-free sink experience. These settings can be set on a smartphone or via voice control, depending on the brand of the faucet.
9. Floatation Tub
This light proof and soundproof tank is filled with saltwater heated to skin temperature allowing people to float completely, thanks to epsom salts. The experience is known to bring stress relief, detoxification, and relief from aches and pains. This is a spa-like addition to any smart bathroom.
10. Smart Water Assistant
A smart water assistant is a great investment for the frugal homeowner as it can make a key difference in water bills. This smart system can help homeowners to prevent and detect leaks and identify other hidden flaws. It will send regular notifications of water usage and emergency messages to a smartphone to let users know of any leaks.
11. Water Recycler
Water recyclers recycle up to 95% of showers, baths, washing machines, and air conditioners and reuse the water for toilets, garden irrigation, and swimming pools. This provides enormous environmental benefits as well as keeps homeowners’ water bills low.
12. Smart Washer and Dryer
An internet-connected washer and dryer make for the ultimate laundry experience. Users can start and stop their laundry with the press of a button or voice command. Push notifications are sent to the user’s smartphone and smartwatch when a load of laundry is complete or maintenance is needed on the washer or dryer.
Smart washers and dryers also automatically sense how much detergent is needed, monitor energy consumption, and have the ability to auto-run cycles during off-peak hours.
13. Aromatherapy Diffuser
Aromatherapy uses natural plant extracts to improve a person’s physical and mental health. Aromatherapy diffusers can be placed in a home’s bathroom to create a spa-like experience. These smart diffusers provide a deep and consistent experience and its features can be controlled via other smart devices or voice commands.
14. Smart Thermostat
A smart thermostat allows the user to remotely adjust the temperature, set automatic preferences, and maximize energy consumption efficiency. Eventually, this smart device will learn what times the user is home and analyze a user’s preferences to begin working on its own.
15. Soaking Tubs
A soaking tub is a freestanding tub that fully submerges the user’s body in water. Bath therapy has been proven to have many benefits, such as relief from chronic pain, skin detoxification, and improved heart health.
Smart bathroom features will only become more common in the years to come. These features are proven to benefit users’ health and wellbeing as an easy upgrade to daily life.
How Ambiq Contributes
Ambiq’s ultra-low power multi-protocol Bluetooth® wireless microcontrollers are enabling millions of edge devices shape the building blocks of a smart home and the IoT world.
Ambiq’s ultra-low power SoCs can support key technologies required by connected homes and smart buildings such as Bluetooth Low Energy. Future generations will include additional multi-protocol communications such as Bluetooth® Mesh, ANT+, RF4CE, and Zigbee®. Built on our patented Subthreshold Power Optimized Technology (SPOT®) platform, Ambiq’s products reduce the total system power consumption on the order of nanoamps for all battery-powered edge devices.
Simply put, our solutions enable edge intelligence everywhere.
