Lutron Caesta

I have to admit, I am kind of a smart house junkie, even before Apple jumped into the market with their Apple HomeKit. Early on I attempted to use X-10 modules to try and control a couple of electrical plugs or a light switch. While that was an interesting exercise, it was a pain to get working and always seemed to break down at the most inopportune times. With all the code and care it took to make it work, it was making home life more complex rather than simplifying things as I had hoped.

So, when Apple announced HomeKit I was very eager to see where this would go. Whether you like Apple products or not you must admit when they enter a market segment in many cases the result is a more robust ecosystem. With that of course Apple also tends to want to control all aspects which makes it difficult for third-parties to really engage unless they are willing to let Apple dictate how their products should work.

Shortly after the HomeKit announcements partners began announcing plans to support it. One of the first was lighting company Lutron. Their product offering that supported HomeKit is called the Caseta line. It is a series of switches, dimmers, and plug-in modules that allow a user to control electrical devices with their Apple device (iPhone, iPad, iPod, etc).

In order for the Lutron Caseta system to work with HomeKit it requires a bridge which is basically a black box (in this case a white box) that bridges the control statements from the switch or dimmer and translates that to and from what Apple expects from a HomeKit device. It is a small box with an Ethernet jack and a power port.

I started off buying the starter kit which included the above-mentioned hub/bridge along with two dimming switches and two Pico remotes. A Pico remote is basically a wireless remote that will do the same thing the dimmer will. Before the advent of the Apple Home app, the Pico remotes would allow you to turn the switches on and off remotely.

Wiring a Lutron Caseta dimmer or switch is basically the same as replacing a switch on your wall meaning that you will be working with electricity, polarity, and could potentially get shocked if you don’t know what you are doing. But if you follow the directions and make sure the power is off, anyone should be able to do this.

Once the dimmer or switch is installed and power is applied to the device, you use the Lutron app to configure it and give it the appropriate name, place it in the correct room, etc. Programming is quite simple and nearly anyone should be able to do it. The app will connect the switch/dimmer with the hub/bridge to make sure everything is talking properly. The whole set up takes less than a minute after the device has been installed

The switches and dimmers work flawlessly for the most part. There have been times where the device seemed unreachable or was saying the switch was on when it really was not but those behaviors have been happening less frequently.

The problem with these switches is that they become very contagious. If you replace one switch, which one do you want to become smart? No matter which one you choose it soon leads to another and another until finally you have replaced your whole house.

Stop and think about that last sentence then go around your house and count how many light switches there actually are in your house. Each additional dimmer retails for approximately $59 and each switch (simply toggles on and off with no dimming for devices such as ceiling fans) cost about $65. Don’t get me started about why a switch costs more than a dimmer when a dimmer needs to have more intelligence. All I can figure is supply and demand. Everyone wants a dimmer, so economies of scale allow Lutron to price them lower whereas fewer people are looking just for switches hence the cost is higher. Again, that is just my guess.

The Lutron Caseta devices have been the most trustworthy and durable HomeKit devices I have installed. They work the way you expect, and the quality of the product has been first class. There is one caveat you need to be aware of as you expand the Caseta footprint in your home. The bridge/hub is only capable of managing a finite number of devices. The limit is 50 devices. A device is defined as a switch, dimmer, automated window blind, or Pico remote. Unless you have a very small house you will likely run into this limitation.

Lutron expected the Caseta system to be a startup system for home automation and they have other products and ecosystems they want to sell you if you want to automate the whole house. In my case I didn’t really understand the 50-device limitation when I started and completely expected that I would be well within its parameters but as I automated more and more of the house, I ran full speed into that hard stop of 50. And given that I had invested time and effort into creating the services I wanted controlling scenes and incorporating them into HomeKit I wasn’t about to start over with a new product line without this limitation.

While Lutron does not advertise this and in fact do not suggest using a workaround, I found that I could add a second Lutron bridge/hub which gave me address space for another 50 devices. Between the two hubs I had enough for my entire house with growth space. The only downside of this is that if you are using the Lutron app you can only be logged into one bridge at a time. The Apple Home app does not have this limitation so in my case I am using that to control all the devices making that limitation moot. The only issue I ran into was that at one time when we went on vacation I logged into each bridge and set “smart away” that sets lights on and off based on previous usage giving your house a lived-in feel.

When we returned from vacation, I logged in to one bridge and turned off the away mode. I swear I thought I logged into both and did that but clearly, I forgot. Suddenly we had lights going on and off by themselves in some kind of random sequence leading my kids to call screaming that the house was possessed, and I needed to come home and save them. I just logged in remotely and turned off the smart away feature and was a hero.

Overall, I would highly recommend the Lutron Caseta devices despite the 50-device limitation. Just be forewarned, these things are like Lays potato chips, you can’t have just one.