Review – Nest Protect Smoke and Carbon Monoxide Detector

Pretty much every home has a smoke alarm / detector (or should do) – they get fitted and left to languish on the ceiling and wall. Usually an annoyance when you’ve burnt the dinner and it screams at you, or the battery is dying and it’s making an annoying chirping noise. Worse still you disconnect the battery, or let it die, and then it’s just a useless plastic box.

Then, when you really need it, it could end up a melted, useless plastic box, in a burnt out house.

These fabulous inventions are designed to save lives, left unloved, and not maintained you’re screwed.

Step forward Nest Protect Smoke and Carbon Monoxide Detector, the smoke detector for the future, it’s designed to be ‘helpful’ and take the guesswork out of what’s going on with it. It uses a combination of lights, voice prompts and an app / web-based interface to let you know the status of it. It actually connects to you home WiFi to push updates and the unit’s status to the app on your phone. The Nest Protect comes in two variants, a battery-powered unit (with a 5 year battery life) and a 230V mains powered version, I’m looking at the battery-powered variant.

So – let’s start at the beginning, setup and installation.

The Nest comes in a simple and unassuming box, with a little pack of instructions, and the Nest Protect unit itself.

The idea is to get the Nest Protect setup and working on your WiFi before you fix it to the ceiling, this is done quickly and efficiently via the phone app (on Android here and iOS here.) You need a ‘Nest’ web account too, it’s a quick and painless process, with the app, and the calm voice of the Nest Protect guiding you through each step.

Once you’re up and running, it’s a simple case of attaching to the ceiling with the supplied bracket that the Nest Protect twists into. The circular design meant I was able to re-use the screw holes from my old smoke detector, it took less than five minutes to get it installed.

Then it’s time to give it a very quick test by pressing the ‘Nest’ button – here’s a video of it in action.

Once the Nest Protect is configured it will appear in the Nest App, and the Nest Web App with all the history and data of the day-to-day details of how and when your Nest did something.

So – that’s essentially it, you’ve got a working Nest Protect Smoke and Carbon Monoxide Detector.

But, it doesn’t entirely end there – the Nest has a few more tricks in the box.

Firstly is the ‘Nightly Promise’ – when you turn the lights off and go to bed the Nest will glow a reassuring Green to let you know that everything is working correctly on the Nest Protect, any issues, it’ll glow red and you’ll be able to see in the app or web app exactly what the issue is. Also the Nest Protect offers a ‘pathlight’ function, whereby if it detects movement underneath the unit at night it will glow a gentle white light to guide your way. Fantastic for stumbling around in the middle of the night!

The Nest Protect also integrates well with the Nest Thermostat, if the Nest Protect detects any Carbon Monoxide in the air it will ‘notify’ the Nest Thermostat to immediately shut down the boiler and alert you to the issue. Pretty bloody clever! It also can differentiate between steam and smoke, so your shower won’t set this off either, a real bugbear of mine!

I think my favourite feature of the Nest Protect is the fact the Phone App can tell you of problems, if smoke / fire or Carbon Monoxide is detected while you’re away from home your phone will alert you to the problem almost instantly. Hopefully saving your home and possessions by giving you time to notify the your neighbours or emergency services.

Here’s the app in action..

The Nest Protect is expensive compared to other Smoke and Carbon Monoxide Detectors on the market, you can get a pick up a cheap Smoke Detector for a fiver these days, and the Nest Protect retails for around £90. The thing is, the Nest Protect is worth every single penny, and despite the nice people at Nest gifting me this Nest Protect in return for a review, I’m definitely considering getting another unit to replace the smoke detector on the upstairs landing. It is a lot of money in one go for most people, but the technology behind it is incredible and offers peace of mind and protection above anything else.

Nest Protect is an INCREDIBLE product, go – BUY ONE!!