Face to face: Nanoleaf Skylight versus Aqara Ceiling Mild T1M — which is the perfect sensible ceiling gentle?

For too lengthy, color-changing sensible lighting has been caught inside bulbs and lightweight strips, limiting its use to desk lamps, the occasional recessed can gentle, and possibly lighting up the underside of your cupboards. However with these two new sensible ceiling lights from Aqara and Nanoleaf, we lastly have extra decisions past Philips Hue’s line of ceiling lights for bringing related, colourful gentle to our ceilings.

Good fixtures — that are hardwired to your private home’s electrical wiring — allow you to add tunable white and color-changing lighting to areas the place there aren’t any lamps or recessed lighting for sensible bulbs or simple spots to stay sensible gentle strips. As with all sensible lights, you possibly can set schedules and join them to movement sensors and different sensible residence units to robotically flip them on and off.

These new lights from Nanoleaf and Aqara add dynamic lighting, one thing even Hue hasn’t provided in its ceiling fixtures so far. These are among the many first sensible ceiling fixtures to convey addressable lighting to the ceiling, permitting management of shade, temperature, hue, and brightness, plus the power to show a number of colours concurrently. 

The $149.99 Aqara Ceiling Mild T1M is a tunable white gentle fixture with a color-changing LED ring that includes 26 individually addressable zones. The $249.99 Nanoleaf Skylight are tunable white and full-color modular ceiling LED gentle panels, every able to displaying completely different colours and tunable white gentle.

I put these two new ceiling lights to the check, pitting them towards one another to see who got here out on high. I assessed their design, price, and choices for sensible residence management, in addition to how simple they had been to put in. I examined their gentle high quality and the way nicely they every executed their distinctive capability to supply dynamic lighting results.

After testing them concurrently for 2 weeks, I liked how every product lit up darkish areas of my home the place I beforehand relied on a single sensible bulb in an historic ceiling fixture. However it is a head-to-head, so there needed to be a winner. Learn on to search out out which one got here out on high.

The Aqara T1M has a extra conventional design — it seems to be like a pleasant, high-end ceiling gentle. However the Nanoleaf brings one thing very distinctive to the ceiling. Designed to really feel like a bodily skylight in your ceiling, the Nanoleaf has a flush-mounted sq. design. It’s modular so it may be as huge as you need it to be — able to lighting up something from a small hall to a ballroom.

The Nanoleaf is available in a starter equipment with three panels for $249.99, and you may organize these to your liking. Just one panel must be wired, and you may add as much as 99 extra panels to create a ceiling full of sunshine. (Be warned: a single panel prices $70, in order that may very well be a $7,000 ceiling.)

I had a three-pack to play with, so I created a geometrical design with two panels aspect by aspect and the opposite centered within the center. Initially, I wished to place them in a row, like a skylight, however my paramedic husband stated it could seem like a hospital. 

He wasn’t mistaken. When tuned to full white, the hallway did resemble an OR. However once I modified it to one of many firm’s beautiful lighting results, the Nanoleaf was lovely, resembling an precise skylight. Nonetheless, when the sunshine is off, the white plastic design of the panels isn’t enticing; every one is chunky and plain with particular hospital vibes. 

The Aqara Ceiling Mild T1M is much less colourful, smaller, and extra traditional-looking than the Nanoleaf Skylight. It’s 20 inches spherical and three inches deep and sits flush to the ceiling. It’s comprised of two lights: a important gentle and a hoop gentle, and its measurement makes it good for rooms as much as about 200 sq. ft.

Whereas the Nanoleaf makes a a lot greater assertion, the Aqara will slot in higher in additional areas. 

Each lights give off 1400 lumens, however for the Nanoleaf, that’s per panel, that means you’re getting 4200 lumens — that’s a lotta gentle.

The Nanoleaf additionally affords full shade and tunable white gentle on every panel. Whereas the Aqara’s important gentle is restricted to tunable white gentle, the colour comes from the individually controllable ring gentle with 26 individually addressable zones that includes full-color LEDs (however no tunable white). 

Each lights dim all the way down to virtually imperceptible ranges and ramp as much as super-bright white gentle and acceptably brilliant colours. The Nanoleaf Skylight is noticeably brighter, due to its three panels, however the T1M offers off a softer, extra diffuse gentle from its important and ring gentle. You don’t see any pinprick LEDs or shadows, whereas the Skylight has some seen darker areas that may seem like black spots. (This is a matter with the corporate’s Shapes and Canvas panels, too.) 

Aqara’s gentle additionally works with Apple’s HomeKit Adaptive lighting, a function of Apple House (so iPhone solely) that robotically adjusts the white hue of suitable lights all through the day, going from cool bluish whites within the early morning to heat orangey whites within the night. (Solely the principle gentle responds to adaptive lighting; the ring gentle doesn’t have tunable white gentle.)

The Nanoleaf Skylight doesn’t work with adaptive lighting and even with the Nanoleaf app’s Circadian lighting function (which is restricted to its Necessities vary). Nonetheless, it does have the choice of scheduling its varied daylight-mimicking scenes, like “Blue Skies” and “Golden Hour,” to create an identical impact to Adaptive Lighting.

I set schedules within the Nanoleaf app to have these scenes ramp up brightness over an hour to simulate pure gentle, and this labored nicely. Nevertheless it’s not as simple as utilizing HomeKit’s possibility — the place you simply choose adaptive lighting as soon as, and it adjusts robotically all through the day. Setting schedules within the Nanoleaf app is fiddly, with the app consuming mine a number of instances. The dynamic scenes are additionally extra impactful than common gentle bulbs adjusting their hue, and at instances, I discovered them a bit distracting.

Nanoleaf principally invented dynamic lighting results, and it blows Aqara out of the water in terms of the sheer quantity and impressiveness of its preset results. A lot of which may additionally sync in time to ambient music or sound, one thing Aqara’s can’t.

Nanoleaf launched some new Scenes with the Skylight, together with “Mild Rain,” “Solar Bathe,” and “Blue Skies,” that are designed to imitate the outside and make the Skylight really feel like a skylight. Most of those are dynamic in that they shift colours to completely different flows, and this could be a bit distracting. The panels don’t have addressable LEDS, so your complete panel modifications shade to create the impact.

In distinction, Aqara’s tunable white results paired with the ring gentle and its six individually addressable zones had been total calmer and extra appropriate for a family not obsessive about RGB lighting. It additionally affords extra performance with the choice to arrange automations to make use of the ring gentle as a notification gentle — for instance, flash purple when an Aqara alarm system is triggered or when the Aqara G4 video doorbell rings.

Each apps allow you to design your individual lighting results, however Nanoleaf’s AI-powered Magic Scene creator made this very easy. I simply typed in “Sunday Morning,” and it conjured up a soothing palette of heat pinks and beiges intermingled with white, and “Tropical Paradise” created a enjoyable sea of turquoise, blues, and greens. Very Little Mermaid. 

The Aqara T1M is the extra reasonably priced possibility at $150. The Nanoleaf begins at $250, however you get thrice the sunshine in comparison with the T1M. The value escalates rapidly — a four-pack prices $420, to a 12-pack that prices $880.

Nonetheless, as a result of the T1M makes use of the Zigbee wi-fi protocol, it requires an Aqara Hub. The most cost effective suitable Aqara Hub is the $30 E1 — bringing the whole value to $180. However the TM1 works with any Zigbee 3.0 Aqara Hub, together with the upcoming Hub M3, which can also be a Thread border router and Matter controller for Aqara’s platform. 

Nanoleaf makes use of 2.4GHz Wi-Fi, so it doesn’t want a further hub. It might someday be a hub. It has a Thread radio on board and could be a Thread border router, which might enable Nanoleaf’s Thread merchandise, akin to its Necessities line, to connect with it. Nanoleaf hasn’t turned this functionality on but; the corporate tells me it would are available in an replace later this 12 months. 

Wi-Fi can nonetheless be an unreliable protocol for lights, and in testing, whereas the Skylight by no means dropped offline, I had frequent bother controlling it with the Nanoleaf app, which is sluggish and buggy and crashes always or requires restarts. In distinction, Aqara’s Zigbee connectivity was rock strong, and its app was crash-free.

Each lights are suitable with all main sensible residence platforms, together with Amazon Alexa, Google House, and Apple HomeKit. Solely the T1M helps Matter (with an Aqara hub). Nanoleaf says it plans to convey Matter assist to all its panel merchandise “quickly.” 

Anytime you are messing with electrical energy in a ceiling, I’d extremely suggest hiring a professional. Nonetheless, if you’re going for it, then putting in the T1M was the best.

It’s primarily the identical as putting in a normal ceiling fixture; after turning the ability off on the breaker, I pulled the wires in my ceiling by way of a small gap in the principle lamp and connected it to the ceiling with three screws utilizing a drill. The three wires (reside wire, floor, and impartial) then slot into {an electrical} connector within the lamp. Lastly, I put the glass diffuser over the lamp, twisting it into place.  

Putting in the Skylight was rather more arduous; lining up the panels wasn’t simple — and there’s no template to comply with. With 4 screws for every panel, I ended up with loads of holes in my ceiling, and connecting the 2 wires required between every panel was actually fiddly to do whereas standing on a ladder.

If you happen to set up a sensible gentle fixture on an everyday gentle swap, it would lose all performance when that swap is off. Whereas sensible lights typically don’t play nicely with most sensible switches, Aqara and Nanoleaf have each discovered methods round this.

The T1M may be paired with a $35 wired Aqara Good Change, set to its wi-fi swap mode. This retains energy flowing to the sunshine even when somebody turns the swap off, leaving it controllable within the app or with voice. Nonetheless, it doesn’t enable for dimming; that needs to be completed within the app or with voice. Nanoleaf’s new Sense Plus sensible switches will work with the Skylight and permit for dimming, however they aren’t out there but. (Nanoleaf says they’re coming later this 12 months.) 

For each lights, a sensible button or scene controller that works in your chosen platform might be the best possibility for bodily management, particularly when you don’t need to mess with extra wiring. However Aqara wins right here for now as a result of you possibly can really purchase its bodily controller.

The Aqara is the winner when you’re on the lookout for an reasonably priced, easy-to-install sensible ceiling gentle that works with all the main sensible residence platforms. Its reliability and bodily management possibility additionally make it a more sensible choice.

However the Nanoleaf is the splashier, fancier gentle, with lots of of scenes, the choice of music sync, and the power to pair with Nanoleaf’s different dynamic lighting merchandise to essentially RGB-up your life. (Aqara’s solely different dynamic lighting product is its T1 Mild Strip).

The Nanoleaf can also be the higher possibility for filling a big room with gentle, due to its modular, expandable design. Whereas it could look nice over an extended eating desk or kitchen counter, it’s probably not a substitute for a conventional ceiling gentle — it has a really completely different aesthetic, one which may be too completely different for lots of people. However when you just like the look, you’ll love this gentle.

When you’ve got a much bigger house to light up or are on the lookout for one thing extra distinctive with brighter gentle and higher dynamic shade results, go for the Nanoleaf Skylight. For each different use case, decide the Aqara T1M.