Z-Wave Wireless for Smart Homes

Z-Wave is a smart wireless network tailor-made for smart homes.

20:54 31 March 2019

Z-wave is a wireless radio system used by many smart home devices. Originally designed as a simple general-purpose alternative to proprietary home automation systems in 1999, it is an always-on system that allows every device to reach one end of your home to the other. It connects smart home devices to smart hubs that manage them. You can find it in thermostats, sensors and smart switches, among others.

 

The system is supports over 700 home electronics companies and brands, including Samsung SmartThings, Silicon Labs, General Electric and Huawei. Z-wave supported devices can relay packets of data back and forth among themselves allowing signal to hop through sensors and appliances where it needs to go.

 

Z-Wave is a clever technology but there is more to it than this: all products that use the technology must be certified to work together. This process provides assurance that regardless of who manufactured the devices, they can be controlled from one place. This allows you to (for example) simultaneously set the lightning, heating and security using a single routine when you leave the house.