My Leviton

So we have a home that had a sophisticated Lutron Radio RA system. It was great for its time but as switches wore out you really couldn’t find replacement parts. After testing different brands (tried halo recessed replacements and other Wifi smart bulbs) I landed on Leviton switches and their My Leviton App. This app made it easy to setup and then connect to Alexa. As for “Smart bulbs”... they are actually pretty dumb for lights with switches. You can tell Alexa to turn on the lights all you want, but if someone turned off the switch, you are out of luck. We can now control every room, scene or routine with Alexa, yet if someone wants to manually turn the light on or off or dim them manually, they can. This is perfect for guests or dog sitters. On a side note, I also reached out to Leviton support (Barry) team when I was getting started and they were very helpful. They emailed me a list of the best dimmable bulbs. (Big fan of the 65w Philips soft white w warm glow effect. Others I tried were not a warm enough color.) A great routine using our Leviton Switches is... Alexa, Dogs Out (switches turn on back porch and floods). “Alexa, Dogs In” turns them back off. Enjoying my smart home thanks to Leviton.

Setup is simple and straightforward, but making interim adjustments to the brightness of lights connected to a Leviton dimmer can be arduous. It doesn’t remember my password, so each time the app has timed out you have to manually re-type the password. Touch ID or facial ID are not supported. Then, it opens to a general info page and you have to click again to load the menu of connected devices. There is a slider bar adjust brightness, but the slider bar does not always respond accurately to touch, especially on a small screen like an iPhone, and getting the slide to make small adjustments like from 20% to 25% is tricky. And there is a slight delay for the light to respond to the change in setting, so any adjustments require a bit of trial and error. It would be easier if the connected devices appeared on the home page, and — without needing to open another window — a percentage could be keyed in, instead of having to open another window and fiddle with the slider.

I have bought wall switches throughout my house and love the ease that it works with my google home nest ecosystem. The my Leviton app is feature rich to give me lots of control over the functionality of the switches for some super moods. If Leviton as a company stops support for these devices in the future it would be another devastating blow to the trust of all iot devices as a whole. I would prefer a limited support or an open source solution if Leviton felt they could no longer support these devices in the future. I think all iot hardware users should support legislation that requires companies to provide the expected lifespan or expiration date of a product including sections for their software support for legacy devices on the box so adoption of devices can grow. It would also mean newcomers to smart home devices could make purchases with confidence knowing companies are being held accountable to make business decisions to encourage costumer success in the long run. Upvote this review if you think something like this would encourage you to pick on company over another.

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This app is complete junk. I added a Decora smart dimmer last month. Used the Leviton app to set it up. I have tried every button in the app to set a schedule, doesn’t exist. Doesn’t exist in Apples Home app either (STUPID STUPID stupid). I go to Leviton webpage, find out schedules are in this app instead. This app FORCES you to create an account with Leviton, and use a better password then any bank does. For controlling lights???? Then it DEMANDS your location. Why???? What does that have to do with the price of ice in Alaska?? Must be normal mega Corp greed wanting to sell you personal and private info. But all that is in vain since this app refuses to even try to find the dimmer. If I want to even try to set a schedule it looks like I would have to search how to factory reset the dimmer and have Apple home forget it too. STUPID and STUPIDIER.

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This app is used to control poorly engineered and terribly supported devices. I own 19 Leviton Decora WiFi switches, and any any given time 50% of them do not connect. They will randomly stop responding, and require flipping the circuit breaker to reset. When in their unresponsive state a soft reset does not work, nor does a hard factory reset. Only flipping the circuit breaker will bring them back online - for maybe a few days. I own other brands of HomeKit enabled WiFi devices, and none of them ever disconnect, yet with Leviton failure is the norm as opposed to the exception. I wish I spent my money of a better product. Replacing all of these switches with another brand is a considerable investment but one I am willing to make because the Leviton are just terrible. A quick internet search shows I am far from alone in my sentiment.