Take Matter[s] Into Your Own Hands: Design Solutions For The Ever-Evolving Smart Home

When it comes to the smart home, we all have come to expect reliable, high-performing wireless connectivity. How can evolving connectivity technologies support easy use for the consumer while delivering the throughput and coverage necessary for the growing number of personal and IoT devices in a smart home? Let’s review some of the technologies providing this extensive level of support.

Complexity and Demand for Performance are Expanding

Designing for Wi-Fi used to be simple: you only needed a single router that provided enough connectivity for browsing and email. Today, it’s become complicated and expensive to optimize wireless networking services. There’s the need to reach greater distances using extenders to meet the edge of the home; there’s a demand for more bandwidth to accommodate simultaneous high-resolution streaming and gaming; and low power, low bandwidth connectivity to more things—smart lightbulbs, smart switches, wireless thermostats, speakers and more. The smart home is a veritable trove of connected devices today with varying performance demands—and it will scale as more innovative IoT devices populate the home.