Ever wished you could use your smartphone to control your smart home, beyond just pulling up an app to turn something on or off? We’re now starting to see companies create actual functionality around the Matter initiative. Fluid, a relative newcomer to the smart home field, is building a service on top of Matter to allow you to control smart devices around your home simply by pointing your phone at the device.
Fluid calls this new service Fluid One. You can point your phone at a device, and it will automatically and immediately show you options to control said device. The service also allows for location-based automation and gesture controls. For example, imagine walking around your home and having lights automatically turning on or off depending on how close you are to them.
This new smart home system’s brains are contained within the Fluid Hub. The hub uses the same Apple ultra wideband chip available from Apple’s iPhone 11 onward to connect to all devices in your home. Once you set up the hub within your home and place four smart nodes on your walls to help with integration and automation, you’ll be able to control your devices with just a click, flick, or step.
The Fluid One system will also build an AR rendering of your home floor plan to help with location-based automation. You can see this floor plan, a list, and a graphic of all your smart home devices in a dashboard view on your phone. The view will allow you to monitor and manipulate all of your devices in one area.
With Fluid One, Fluid claims that you no longer have to deal with different menu systems, separate dedicated apps, and microphone usage. It seems that once in “Fluid” mode, your iPhone becomes a remote that can control whatever it’s pointed at. Not only will you be able to do basic on-off commands but you can also change colors, brightness, and volume levels.
The Fluid One system will be compatible with over 20,000 devices from various companies, including Apple, Google, Amazon, and Philips Hue, among others, upon release. Additionally, the company is garnering money and interest for its product through Kickstarter. As such, we don’t have an exact date for when the Fluid One will be released. However, it could be a smart home game-changer if it works properly.
Outdoor security cameras are not always practical if you live in an apartment or rental. Drilling into an exterior wall may be off-limits, while pointing a regular indoor camera through a window can create another problem once reflections start showing up after dark.
Baseus is trying to solve both issues with the new PrimeSentinel W1, a $69.99 security camera designed specifically to monitor the outdoors through glass. It mounts directly to a window without drilling and uses a 4K Starlight sensor with an F1.0 aperture for full-color monitoring during the day and at night.
This post is brought to you in paid partnership with Best Buy.
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With AI progressing so fast, it's only a matter of time before we start getting AI companions like the ones we used to see in movies like R2-D2, Wall-E, or Baymax. Now, Singapore-based OKA Technology has unveiled Mori, a cute little AI companion that looks less like a conventional home robot and more like someone turned the Pokémon Foongus into a table lamp.
Mori isn't meant to clean your house or control your smart home, but to serve as what OKA calls a "Nature Companion." It uses subtle movements, warm lighting, nature-inspired sounds, and small reactions to make its presence around the house feel calming rather than distracting. Mori can sit quietly while you read, sway along to music, welcome you when you enter a room, or encourage you to slow down for a moment without requiring a screen or a conversation.