In-home review: Wiz Edison/filament smart bulbs and Motion Sensor

I recently installed permanent smart potlights in my home following a renovation. The lighting, which you can see in my review here is by a company called Liteline and it uses the Wiz smart home platform. To complement the installed pot lights, or downlights, I opted to add a few accessories. I picked up two Wiz Edison bulbs to use in pendant fixtures in my kitchen, as well as a Wiz motion sensor, which should trigger lights to turn on when someone approaches.

Wiz Accessories: Edison/filament smart bulbs and Motion Sensor review

I’ll tell you about how these lights and accessories integrate with my new smart home lighting system, how well they work, or don’t— and whether I think these would be a good addition to your Wiz smart home.

Installation & set up of Wiz Filament/Edison Bulbs

Installing these Edison bulbs is as simple as screwing in a lightbulb. So there’s not a whole lot of installation to worry about. What you will have to do is get the lights discovered on the Wiz app. Once you screw the bulbs in and turn them on, you’ll open up the Wiz app, go into the room you want to add them in (or create that room if it’s new) then ask the app to search for new lights. In my case the app found my Edison bulbs right away and I was able to add them to my home. Unfortunately, almost immediately, I realized the bulbs had a wicked flicker. Watch my review video here to see exactly what I mean… and how brutal it was.

Using Wiz Filament/Edison bulbs

Assuming this was simply because the bulbs were on a setting that is not compatible with the Edison feel, I use the app to change the colour of the lighting and tried a few different presets in order to reduce the flicker. I was pretty disappointed when I realized that no matter the colour temperature setting, or brightness, the lights would not stop flickering. This was not a minor annoyance, or even a charming hearkening back to the era when incandescent bulbs did have a very subtle flicker to them. This was a seizure-inducing flash that became unbearable after a very short time.

Wiz Filament bulbs: unbearable flashing

Thinking it could simply be these fixtures, I swapped the bulbs into another brand new light and—same story. I tried numerous things to get the bulbs to stop, but there was absolutely nothing that would rain in the flickering. After doing a little web searching, I was unable to find any type of fix for this, so I assume these Edison or filament bulbs are designed to do this, which is pretty disappointing. I’m looking simply for the warm glow and cool effect that an Edison bulb provides, not for a flashing. After less than an hour inside our pendant fixtures I had to remove the bulbs and return them to the store.

Installing Wiz Motion Sensor

Next up, I hoped I would have better luck using the Wiz motion sensor to trigger the lights on my walk in closet when I approach. Motion sensor technology is pretty standard and many other lighting manufacturers offer smart motion sensors so I was confident this device would work exactly as it should. Unfortunately it wasn’t that easy. The motion sensor does not come with the needed 2 x AA batteries, so you’ll need to find and install them yourself. Getting the batteries in will require a look at the instructions, since the unit is screwed together, and you will have to disassemble it to add the batteries — a minor annoyance. With batteries installed, I was ready to add the motion sensor to my room. You do this by going to the Wiz app, choosing your room, selecting add device and selecting Motion Sensor. Fortunately this was added to my app in seconds. Next, you can choose what the light will do once it detects motion: you can have it turn on to a certain colour or brightness and this is customizable inside the app. You can also add a timeout feature where if no further motion is detected, the lights will shut off automatically until the next motion event is detected.

Using Wiz Motion Sensor: too sensitive, no adjustments possible

When it came time to actually use the motion sensor, I realized it was far too sensitive for a lot of applications. The motion sensor unit has a range of a full 360° around, as well as 3 metres distance whether its installed on a wall or ceiling. That meant it was extraordinarily difficult to place this sensor because any type of motion anywhere around it within that 3 m or 10 feet radius will trigger the unit. There is no way to shorten the motion detection distance, or to skew it to one side or the other. With this unit it is all or nothing.

How to adjust Wiz Motion Sensor

I tried various placements around my room and closet, and even tried hiding the unit partially behind objects like vases or furniture. No matter where I seemed to place it, it was tripping the lights on anytime someone entered the room, let alone got close to the closet.

How Wiz Motion sensor works: sensitivity and range

After studying the diagram included in the instructions (I couldn’t find any helpful tips or this same information online, by the way) I measured out the distance, and tried placing the motion sensor at the very back of my closet, which is just over 10 feet or 3 M deep. After setting it on a shelf, I tried to trip the sensor to get the lights to come one. But oddly, after many attempts, no go. Feeling frustrated, I left the sensor for a bit. When I walked in an hour later—boom! On went the lights. Finally! Now I was able to fine tune the distance, At first I placed the sensor at the edge of the recommended 10 foot distance so it would trip when I entered the doorway, but it wasn’t activating. I moved the sensor closer to the door; to within about 3 feet. Oddly this seemed to be the sweet spot and I was able to get the lights to turn on as soon as I entered the doorway. Bottom line for me is that this motion sensor will work, but you should prepare for a lot of trial and error in placement so that you’re not getting it triggered on constantly. And oddly, in a wide open room it seems to detect everything, but in my tiny closet I had to shorted it up substantially. Like I said, prepare for trial and error.

Wiz Motion Sensor: ghost triggers?

One last thing… I did find that sometimes the sensor would go crazy, all on its own and turn the lights on repeatedly with no motion happening anywhere nearby… I could turn the lights off at the switch or with the app but they’d keep coming on and staying on I found by going into the app and disabling then re-enabling the motion sensor after a short time, that seemed to fix it. For now this is intermittent enough I’m not worried but I will be keeping an eye on this Wiz accessory…

Overall review: Wiz Motion Sensor and Edison Bulbs

Overall, I’m not thrilled with how finicky these accessories are, but in the end, I’m one for two: I’ll be keeping the motion sensor but the Filament bulbs are going back to the store: they’re just too unstable in the location where I’d like to use them.