CES 2022: Smart dashboard will be globally available this year
Samsung has used CES 2022 to launch a shed-load of new TVs, natch… but there was also an encouraging announcement or two on the smart home front.
Most notably, the new Samsung Home Hub, an 8.4-inch tablet that effectively acts as a SmartThings dashboard and a control panel for all your connected Samsung appliances.
Under the categories of Cooking, Clothing Care, Pet, Air, Energy and Home Care Wizard, it all looks a lot like the big display you get on the Family Hub smart fridge range, with panels and widgets to control your smart home devices and to dive into things like recipes and wash-load breakdowns.
It comes with a charging dock but has a battery on board for portability and there’s also a voice assistant on board too.
Sadly, that voice assistant is Bixby; there’s no mention of Google Assistant or Alexa being part of the setup. There is a mention though that AI is used to determine the things you’ll want to see on the display.
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The press release for the Home Hub also mentions: “Soon, you will also have direct connectivity to other devices in your smart home system, such as your lights and door lock system.”
This could well be a nod to Samsung’s involvement in the Matter smart home initiative.
Back in October at the Samsung Developer Conference, the Korean company revealed that users will be able to control Matter-enabled devices using not only SmartThings hubs, but through smart TVs and the Family Hub smart fridge line-up.
For example, a HomeKit only brand such as Eve would never be compatible with SmartThings but Matter will make that possible.
It’s encouraging that Samsung is clearly trying to make it easier than ever to control a SmartThings smart home setup; a setup that will be more versatile than ever with Matter on board.
It expanded on that at CES 2022, where it was revealed that SmartThings Hub software will be included in select 2022 Samsung Smart TVs, Smart Monitors and Family Hub refrigerators.
Currently you need a dedicated SmartThings smart home hub, such as the discontinued Samsung one, or the newer Aeotec one to create a SmartThings smart home system.
There’s no word yet on when we’ll see the Samsung Home Hub go on sale, or indeed how much it will cost but it is set to launch in Korea in March.
Obviously the idea of a smart display to control your smart home isn’t new; the likes of Creston and Control4 have offered dedicated, bespoke, panels for years and, in the last couple of years, we’ve seen smart speakers with screens launched that offer touchscreen controls for Alexa and Google Home smart homes.
Whether SmartThings users need a dedicated panel, rather than just a regular Android or iOS tablet running an app, will be interesting to see.
If the Home Hub itself is a SmartThings Hub (i.e. it has Zigbee / Z-Wave / Matter radios) and doesn’t need a separate hub to connect to SmartThings devices, we can certainly see the appeal.
We’ve asked Samsung for clarification on that point.
