Installation

Installation is quite simple. The answer to the question of how many tech writers it takes to screw in a light bulb is just one. It’s literally the same as installing a standard light bulb. After it’s installed, turn on the light as you normally would.

The difference comes in digitally. You have to pair the light bulb with your device, but this is not done through Bluetooth. Instead, the light bulb is on its own network, and you have to switch from your usual WiFi network to the bulb’s network. And now that you have switched networks, you have to remember that with other tasks you do on your phone that you are no longer using WiFi.

In order to be able to control the light bulb, you need the app. This can be downloaded from the App Store for iOS users. It requires iOS 8 and higher and an iPhone 4S and later. It is also available for Android, requiring Android 4.2 or higher. Once you open the app and click “Local Control” found on the left, it will give you the Global Control screen where you will see the light bulb you installed listed. You will also see the Power icon in the upper right. Tapping this icon will turn the light bulb on and off.

If you would like to be able to use your phone with WiFi while also controlling the light bulb, you can set up the bulb to be on the same network as your phone instead of the one that it was installed with. Simply choose the “Config” option in the lower right, then choose the WLAN option. Click the pencil icon next to it and add in your WiFi credentials. I was not able to get the WiFi option to work on my iPhone 7 running iOS 10.1.1; however, I was able to get it to work on my iPad Air running iOS 10.2 Public Beta 4. However, I have been assured by the manufacturer that the WiFi option does work with iPhone 7 and iOS 10.1.1.

Usage

Once you have the bulb selected in Global Control, you can control the color and brightness of the LOFTEK light bulb. Click on the icon on the bottom left for “RGB,” and you will see both a color picker and a brightness slider. You can either pick one of the small outside circles for red, green, blue, or yellow, or you can click anywhere inside the larger circle to choose the exact blended color that you desire.

You can slide the brightness from 5% to 100% underneath the larger circle. Notice the four squares underneath the slider. These depict the last four colors you have chosen.

Are you looking to turn the room into a party atmosphere? You can even make it look like Christmas!

You can add a blinking or transitioning effect by heading to the “Scene” icon on the bottom. Here you can choose to Transition from one color to another or Blink one color. Select the verbage in the middle of the screen and slide it up or down until you reach your choice. You can also set the speed of the transition or blink with the slider towards the bottom.

Options

There are also a few options that you can do along with your LOFTEK light bulb. The first is that you can have multiple light bulbs on your network. You’re not confined to just one. They can then all be controlled on the app. There is also an option to remotely control the light bulbs, but since you can already do that on your phone, the option seems more appropriate for multiple bulbs. There is an option to play your music through the app and have the light change along with the music. However, I found that it wasn’t possible to use the option with my setup. I use Apple Music on my iPhone, and it doesn’t work with the bulb, assumably because it’s streamed music.

Final Thoughts

By the time all is said and done, the LOFTEK Light Bulb is still a fun smart home accessory, even without the music. I really wouldn’t want to have the light changing along with my music anyway. That would be a bit annoying. And setting up the bulb on WiFi isn’t a necessity for the bulb to work, but it would make things easier to be able to leave it on your network and not have to switch back and forth. The changing colors help set the tone for the room, and the option to turn the light on and off via your phone, the reason behind having this type of light bulb, just adds to that even more. Those options all worked perfectly on all devices I tried it on. LOFTEK SANSI 10W Wifi LED Light Bulb