GoKawiil“Flame effects” is not something I’d used before in a smart bulb, so this was a super interesting concept to me. Linkind’s Smart Light Stick aims to bring the idea of a “live flame” to a smart bulb, and it works with Apple Home out of the box thanks to Matter.
HomeKit Weekly is a series focused on smart home accessories, automation tips and tricks, and everything to do with Apple’s smart home framework.
The Light Stick is an E26 bulb, so it screws into a standard light socket, just like any other bulb in your lamp or ceiling fan. The pitch for the Linkind Smart Light Stick here isn’t just “another color bulb.” It’s a bulb built specifically around dynamic lighting effects, with flame simulation as the main feature.
The flame effects
Instead of a single flicker pattern, Linkind lets you independently adjust flame size, brightness, flicker speed, and motion type. You can dial it down to something closer to soft candlelight, or push it toward a more intense, fiery look, depending on the room and the mood you’re aiming for.
Beyond flame effects, the bulb ships with more than 120 presets, including sunset glows, lava-inspired motion, and Christmas scenes. I kinda always take preset counts with a grain of salt, since these numbers are often padded with minor variations to inflate them, but the range described here at least covers many of your most varied use cases rather than just 120 shades of slightly different color effects.
Where Apple Home fits in
The bulb works with Amazon Alexa, Apple Home, and Google Home via Matter. That gets you the core functionality, on and off, brightness, and color in the Home app, alongside the rest of your Apple Home gear.
It’s worth being clear about what Matter does and doesn’t cover here, though. The deeper customization options, like the flame control, will live in Linkind’s own AiDot app rather than being fully exposed through Apple Home’s interface. That’s not the fault of Linkind, but rather the limitations of this category of Matter accessory at the moment. You get basic on/off control and automation integration through Apple Home, and you use the manufacturer’s app to actually design a scene.
Wrap up on the Linkind Smart Light Stick
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