By Jennifer Pattison Tuohy , a smart home reporter who’s been testing connected gadgets since 2013. Previously a contributor to Wirecutter, Wired

Here’s the tech that could turn millions of Zigbee light bulbs into motion sensors with a single update

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2025-01-24 09:30:02

By Jennifer Pattison Tuohy , a smart home reporter who’s been testing connected gadgets since 2013. Previously a contributor to Wirecutter, Wired, Dwell, and US News.

Lights that turn on when you walk into a room and turn off when you leave are one of the most desirable smart home features. But you need to buy additional hardware like motion sensors to make this “magic” happen. A new ambient sensing technology called Sensify could make this easier by turning your light bulbs into motion sensors. And it might be landing on a Philips Hue bridge near you very soon.

“There are tens of millions of devices with the base firmware already out there; we’re just working on the final touches to light up the full experience.”

Sensify is a wireless network sensing (WNS) technology developed by Ivani that can turn mains-powered Zigbee devices into motion sensors for controlling your lights with just a firmware update — no additional hardware needed. The best part is that it can work on devices already in most homes. “There are tens of millions of devices with the base firmware already out there; we’re just working on the final touches to light up the full experience,” Ivani cofounder Justin McKinney tells The Verge.

An obvious use case for this is a Zigbee-based smart lighting system such as Philips Hue. There’s been speculation that Hue is working on a Zigbee sensing technology since its sister company Wiz debuted a similar tech called SpaceSense in 2022, which uses WNS over Wi-Fi. The well-informed hueblog.com reports that Zigbee wireless network sensing is the technology Hue will most likely use. The Verge reached out to Signify, which owns Hue, but hasn’t yet received a response.