Skip to main content

Xfinity talks about its surprising smart home announcements at CES 2018

Xfinity is getting into the smart home game, but it’s going about it in a surprising way. Daniel Herscovici, senior vice president and general manager of Xfinity Home and Comcast, talked with Digital Trends about that foray at CES 2018 in Las Vegas this week.

In order to give its users easy access to their own internet of things (IoT), Xfinity is turning its wireless gateways into an IoT hub at no additional cost. That mean 15 million advanced cable Xfinity subscribers are about to have an IOT-ready smart home for free, and with no extra equipment necessary.

Recommended Videos

That’s a very different strategy for creating a smart home ecosystem than what virtually every other company attempting to do the same is doing. At CES 2018, you can’t go more than a few feet before encountering another IOT hub or gateway, but you have to pay for them. Xfinity on the other hand, is simply giving IoT away. Talk about a way to get people into your system.

The benefit to having your smart home devices connected through Xfinity is that you’ll have a singular interface, regardless of the smart home gadgets in your home. By using either your Xfinity remote or voice commands, you’ll be able to do everything from turning lights on and off to changing the thermostat settings to checking on your home security cameras — all directly on the TV screen.

Providing a free IOT hub is just the first step in Xfinity’s smart home plans. Right now, the company is focusing on security and access control capabilities — things like security cameras, opening garage doors, locking or unlocking your doors — but in the future it intends to expand into other uses, such as entertainment, health and fitness, and energy-saving smart home solutions.

We’ve seen a lot of great smart home and IOT tech at CES 2018, as well as tons of other exciting new gadgets, so be sure to check out our entire CES coverage.

Brendan Hesse
Former Digital Trends Contributor
Brendan has written about a wide swath of topics, including music, fitness and nutrition, and pop culture, but tech was…
Nanoleaf upgrades its music-syncing skills, launches new lighting products at CES 2024
The Nanoleaf Skylight lighting up a room various shades of purple.

Nanoleaf lit up the stage at CES 2024, pulling back the curtain on a variety of new lighting products arriving later this year. Along with the Essentials Matter Smart Multicolor Lightstrip, Outdoor String Lights, and Permanent Outdoor Lights, the company gave fans a closer look at the upcoming Skylight Modular Ceiling Light and the Orchestrator software -- with the latter bringing massive improvements to Nanoleaf's music syncing abilities.

Orchestrator is arguably the most exciting innovation of the bunch, as it connects directly to your computer's sound source to create a highly accurate lighting performance. This allows your Nanoleaf products to create a light show that's more robust than most other products on the market, which rely on sound alone.

Read more
Samsung SmartThings learns a bunch of useful new tricks at CES 2024
A person sitting on a couch with SmartThings products in the foreground.

Samsung SmartThings -- an application designed to connect and control your smart home devices -- doesn't quite get the same attention as platforms like Google Home or Apple HomeKit. However, it made some big announcements at CES 2024, and it's shaping up to be a big year for Samsung's first-party platform. Along with enhanced support for TVs and new uses for QR codes, SmartThings is rolling out a brilliant Map View feature, which creates a digital map of your home and shows you exactly where all your connected devices are located.

Here's how it works. Instead of scrolling through a list of all your devices or jumping between groups in your smartphone app, Map View lets you see a 3D representation of your home on your smartphone. Inside this map, you'll find icons for all your smart home gadgets corresponding to their actual physical location. That means you can quickly find exactly which device you want to control without needing to scroll through a long list.

Read more
Samsung goes all-in with AI, reveals several new smart home appliances at CES 2024
The Samsung Bespoke AI Fridge from CES 2024.

Samsung unleashed a flurry of announcements at CES 2024, including several upcoming smart home appliances powered by AI. The lineup features an induction cooktop, washer and dryer combo, slide-in range, and refrigerator, all of which use new A.I. features to streamline your daily chores.

The Samsung Bespoke 4-Door Flex Refrigerator was among the first reveals, debuting ahead of CES 2024. Featuring the premium AI Family Hub+ and AI Vision Inside, the futuristic fridge can scan and identify 33 different types of food items and send you alerts before they expire.

Read more