Google's new Nest WiFi Pro will help fix one of the worst things about smart homes

August 2024 · 4 minute read
2022-10-04T19:24:24Z

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Google's smart home brand Nest has announced the Nest WiFi Pro 6E, and beyond the glossy new design and support for faster WiFi 6E speeds, the most exciting development is the mesh router system will act as a hub for the Matter smart home standard.  

The Matter hub built into the Nest WiFi Pro will help fix the biggst annyances about smart home systems, where smart home devices from different brands often need their own hubs, as they use different standards, like Z-Wave, Zigbee, or Samsung's Smart Things. 

The various smart home standards are a point of confusion and frustration for many who want to smarten their homes with smart bulbs, smart locks, smart thermostats, smart security systems, smart cameras and doorbells, and so on. It meant smart home users were limited in their device choices to ensure they all supported the same standard. And if you didn't want your choice of devices to be limited, you'd potentially need several hubs. 

The Matter smart home standard has the support from several companies that make smart home products, including behemoths like Amazon, Google, and Apple. Matter was officially released on October 4, so it hopefully means that future smart home devices, and even existing models, from supporting companies will function under a single hub, and can be controlled through a single app, like Google Home, Amazon's Alexa app, or Apple's Home app.

The Nest WiFi Pro brings the latest and fastest WiFi 6E standard at a more affordable price

Google's Nest WiFi Pro 6E includes the latest WiFi 6E standard that uses the 6Ghz band for more reliability and WiFi speeds. Google Nest

The New Nest WiFi Pro 6E is a mesh WiFi system that supports the latest WiFi 6E (6 Extended) standard for devices to connect to — that is, if those devices also support WiFi 6E.

Compared to previous WiFi standards, WiFi 6E introduces a new 6GHz band for supporting devices to connect to, which delivers incredibly fast speeds. More importantly, the 6GHz band is less congested than the incumbent 2.4GHz and 5GHz bands, which also lends to faster and more reliable WiFi connectivity.

Google's Nest WiFi Pro 6E starts at $400 for a three-pack, which is incredibly affordable compared to the competition, like Netgear's $1,600 Orbi 960 three-pack, or even Amazon's typically affordable Eero mesh WiFi systems — the Eero Pro 6E costs almost double at $699 for a three-pack. 

Google Nest WiFi Pro Check price at Google

Google also announced the second-generation Nest Doorbell with 24/7 recording

The wired version of the second-generation Google Nest Doorbell brings back the popular 24/7 video recording option. Google Nest

The new wired version of Google's second-generation Nest Doorbell marks the return of the popular 24/7 video recording for up to 10 days that existed in the original Nest Hello doorbell. You'll need a Nest Aware subscription ($12 a month or $120 a year) for 24/7 video recording. 

Without Nest Aware, the new Nest Doorbell includes three hours of motion event history. 

As it's a wired model, you'll need existing doorbell wiring outside your door. The second-generation Nest Doorbell has a 145-degree field-of-view, 950 x 1,280 video resolution at 30 frames-per-second, night vision up to 10-feet away, and includes two-way voice communication.

Google Nest Doorbell (Wired, 2nd Gen) Check price at Amazon Check price at Google spanAntonio is a senior tech reporter for Insider's Reviews team, where he helps lead coverage, reviews, and guides of smartphones, tablets, accessories, wearables, smart home products, as well as audio devices from Apple, Google, Samsung, OnePlus, and other major tech companies. Before joining Business Insider, Antonio was a consumer-electronics analyst at PCMag. He graduated from Colgate University in 2009 with a bachelor's degree in history./span spanYou can contact Antonio with tips and cool tech via email at: avillasboas@businessinsider.com/span spana href="https://www.businessinsider.com/insider-reviews-expertise-in-product-reviews"Learn more about how our team of experts tests and reviews products at Insider here/a./span spana href="https://www.businessinsider.com/our-expertise-in-tech-insider-tech-product-reviews"Learn more about how we test tech and electronics/a./span Senior Tech Reporter Antonio is a senior tech reporter for Insider's Reviews team, where he helps lead coverage, reviews, and guides of smartphones, tablets, accessories, wearables, smart home products, as well as audio devices from Apple, Google, Samsung, OnePlus, and other major tech companies. Before joining Business Insider, Antonio was a consumer-electronics analyst at PCMag. He graduated from Colgate University in 2009 with a bachelor's degree in history. You can contact Antonio with tips and cool tech via email at: avillasboas@businessinsider.com Learn more about how our team of experts tests and reviews products at Insider here. Learn more about how we test tech and electronics. Read more Read less

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