Readers' Choice Awards 2025: Your favorite smart home brands
Mashable's Readers' Choice Awards give you the chance to tell us about the products you use and love. With each survey you take, you're potentially securing a Readers' Choice Award for your favorite gadgets and gear.
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Home products have gotten much "smarter" in recent years. According to Statista, smart home penetration will reach 89.5 percent in 2025, and will hit 99 percent by 2029. That means virtually every household in the U.S. is using some form of smart home device. We've come a long way since the days of The Clapper.
Smart home devices can add a level of convenience to daily life, assuming that they’re set up correctly and genuinely offer seamless integration and a user-friendly experience.
But that leads us to question: Which home devices are actually worthy of being smart?
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Instead of simply answering that ourselves, we put it out to you, our readers. In our first-ever Readers’ Choice Awards, we asked you which smart home brands you use and love across different smart home categories.
Best home security cameras in 2025
First up is security cameras. In a survey conducted by U.S. News & World Report, 62 percent of respondents use outdoor security cameras, while 36 percent use indoor security cameras. Home security cameras can obviously be great for some peace of mind and a sense of safety, or monitoring porch pirates. But your privacy is also an important factor to consider in a device that captures constant footage of you, your home, and your neighborhood.
Blink was the winner here in overall satisfaction with a score of 7.8 out of 10, narrowly beating out Ring and Wyze, which both secured a 7.7 rating. A note from us: We don't endorse Ring in our product recommendations because of a host of privacy issues.
(Make sure to click the arrows on the chart below to cycle through each of the categories from our survey results.)
The three brands were pretty even across the board, but each stood out in some areas. Blink users appreciated the ease of setup and use, budget-friendly pricing, and free cloud storage.
Wyze was rated the best for cost, but rated lowest in audio quality and motion detection, so that could be a potential trade-off. Price was definitely a big factor with survey respondents, with comments such as, "Great products. Reasonably priced," "The cameras work good and the price was within budget," and "Wyze security cameras are decent for the price."
Our readers lauded Ring for its easy setup, with two respondents writing, "I've owned several generations of cameras over 20 years and Ring are the easiest to set up and use," and "I've had security cameras in the past. None were as easy to set up and use as Ring."
A common complaint across all three brands was that the cameras don't record enough time before motion is detected.
Best smart home assistants in 2025
Smart assistants are like the brain of a smart home. They act as a hub to control other devices via voice, schedule, or other triggers. Smart assistant devices can range from small speakers that take up very little room to large screens that sit on your countertop or mount to the wall. Apple's Siri is arguably the most popular among smartphones, while Google Assistant and Amazon Alexa are the big names in smart home devices.
Google was our winner across the board, though Amazon Alexa was a close second. One survey respondent said, "I like Alexa for routine items and integrations, but Google Assistant [is] better [at] answering questions."
Some survey takers had similar experiences in that they like the convenience provided by their smart assistant, but they've had frustrating interactions as well.
One wrote: "I've had a pretty good experience with Amazon Alexa. One of the best moments was when I set up my smart home with Alexa and connected everything from lights to thermostats to smart plugs. It was so easy to control everything with just my voice. For example, I could tell Alexa to turn off the lights or set the temperature, which made life a lot more convenient, especially when my hands were full. However, I did run into some issues. There were times when Alexa misunderstood my commands, especially if there was background noise or if I wasn't very clear. It was a bit frustrating when it didn't respond properly. Sometimes, Alexa also didn't sync correctly with certain smart devices, which required troubleshooting. Overall, though, I've found Alexa to be helpful and a great addition to my home automation."
And a Google user wrote: "Our whole house has Google displays, speakers, TVs integrated with Google TV, and third-party plugs, bulbs, and the like. Just recently, I upgraded to a Google Mesh router. The third-party devices can occasionally be a bit tricky to set up, but once everything is working, it's nice to be able to control everything right in the Google Home app."
Best smart lights in 2025
Smart bulbs and smart plugs are some of the most accessible smart home devices in terms of price and ease of use. Philips Hue, Govee, and TP-Link (Kasa) are some of the big names in smart lights. Each has a smattering of product offerings from basic dimmable white light bulbs to programmable outdoor string lights or TV backlights.
Philips Hue is a more premium brand with a higher price point, and that was apparent in our survey results. Just a note: TP-Link has been under investigation for security vulnerabilities with its routers and predatory pricing.
TP-Link took the cake for most of our survey categories; although, both TP-Link and Philips Hue were rated the same for likelihood to recommend.
One reader wrote, "The only reason I am not 'extremely likely' to recommend Philips Hue is they are relatively expensive compared to other brands." And we saw that reflected in TP-Link users' comments, with one person writing, "I had another brand before and found them so frustrating. I was glad to find these worked to my liking at a lower cost."
Best smart vacuum brands in 2025
Our resident vacuum expert, Leah Stodart, says, "Actual cleaning performance plays a huge role in how spotless your floors will be, of course. But if your vacuum is a pain to clean with, you won't feel like using it — whether it's an upright vacuum that's too clunky to get out of the closet or a robot vacuum that gets stuck more often than not." And these are the types of functions we wanted to ask you all about.
Only two brands made the cut for our readers, but Stodart tests upright vacuums and robot vacuums in her apartment and has some great recommendations from other brands.
iRobot offers different price points, ranging from basic and budget-friendly to high-tech and downright expensive. Our survey participants had some newer models as well as older, simpler models that get the job done without any extras. One wrote, "It's an easy-to-use, simple feature, low-end smart vacuum robot; however, that makes it desirable for a lot of people like me because it's easier to use than complicated systems."
Mashable's Readers' Choice: Smartest Home survey ran from Nov. 16, 2024, to March 20, 2025. Stay tuned for our next survey.
Miller Kern is the Deputy Editor of Shopping and Reviews at Mashable, where she writes and edits reviews, roundups, deals, and news stories about tech products, including headphones, skincare devices, laptops, sex toys, e-readers, robot vacuums, and more. She's been covering all things shopping and tech, including shopping holidays like Prime Day and Black Friday, for Mashable since 2019. Miller can tell you which products are actually worth your money. She also explores trends in the shopping sphere, such as dupes and viral TikTok moments.
