The Tado Smart Thermostat system is one of the few options available to UK homeowners looking to upgrade their heating to smart home control. I have been using it for almost a year and am generally very satisfied with it. The Tado system consists of a central controller, an internet bridge, and optional radiator valves.

I have been using it for almost a year and am generally very satisfied with it. Here are some steps to install Tado system.

Installation Steps:

The exact installation steps vary depending on the type of boiler and existing thermostat. The Tado app will guide you through the process of screwing the Tado controller onto the wall near your boiler and switching out a few wires. It is not difficult to do yourself, but if you're nervous about electrical wiring, you may want to have a contractor do it.

Next, for each room where you want fine-grained control, you will want to replace the TRV valve on the radiator with the Tado one. A sensor in the valve measures the ambient temperature and communicates this back to the home base.

Finally, a rectangular dongle plugs into your Wi-Fi router to allow the Tado system to access the Internet and connect to HomeKit.

You will have the option to remotely control whether the Tado unit requires heat from the boiler, from your phone. This turns on the overall heating of your home. Additionally, for each room where you have placed a smart valve on the radiator, you can view the currently detected room temperature and set a target temperature for that room.

In the Home app, this is neatly displayed with a tile for each radiator, plus one more for the base unit. You can view all your thermostats using the Climate filter in the Home app, which provides an overview of the temperature of the entire house.

The Tado app gives you even more features, like special home and away schedules, a shortcut for boosting your entire home, historical graphs, and access to premium features like open window detection.

The biggest drawback to the Tado system is the price. I wish it was cheaper. Smart heating of your home is a convenience, but it comes at a cost. The other negative is that you can't rely on HomeKit for a complete whole-house heating experience. Tado expects you to set your daily temperature schedule through their Smart Schedule feature.

In conclusion, I wish more of this would be exposed directly through HomeKit, but I understand the reasons why this isn't the case. Nevertheless, the Tado system is a solid way to make a smart heating system a reality.