Geeni Smart Bulb Review: $10 Designer-Approved Light Bulbs

Smart light bulbs can really improve the ambiance of your home, not to mention make your life easier (who doesn’t love just asking Alexa to turn on the lights?). But despite their tons of cool features, your standard LED smart light bulbs aren’t exactly pretty. They all look the same: a dull white bulb with a thick strip of white plastic covered in brand names and technical information. They’re okay in a lamp where you can’t see the bulb itself, but in a crystal ball? Definitely not.

Since many of the lights in my apartment are in hard-to-reach places with a switch that isn’t easy to reach, I set out to automate my lights without sacrificing style (I am an interior designer, after all!). During my search, I found these bulbs from Geeni that look like old-school glass filament bulbs but have all the features of today’s typical smart bulbs. So if you’ve been on the hunt for smart bulbs that will look really nice in semi-transparent and transparent lamps, look no further.

First, let’s be clear: these bulbs are pretty. The G25’s round globe shape and visible filament make them look nice enough that you don’t mind showing them off. So in the mid-century-inspired glass globe floor lamp in my bedroom, the bulb doesn’t stick out like a sore thumb, like others certainly do. I use them in all the lights in my house that have visible bulbs, and you’d never guess they’re smart LEDs.

While they do require a bit more setup time than a standard non-smart bulb, the Geeni smart bulbs are fairly easy to install. All I had to do was download the Geeni app, screw in the bulb, turn on the light, and follow the instructions in the app to connect it to my Wi-Fi network.

Then I opened the Amazon Alexa app to download the Geeni skill, which allowed me to control the bulbs with my voice. It took five minutes at most, and that was it. Once I had the app set up with the first bulb and connected it to my Alexa devices, the others didn’t take long. Each subsequent bulb had to be screwed in, turned on, and discovered (and then connected) in the app.

Brightness and temperature can be easily adjusted

Aside from the ability to automate my lighting and use voice control, another big reason I wanted smart light bulbs in my apartment was so I could dim and fine-tune the lights as needed to create the perfect atmosphere in the room, whether I was reading in bed, watching a movie, or hosting a party.

While some of the bulbs in my house can change colors like pink, blue, and orange (fun!), these Geeni bulbs only give off white light, but I can adjust the temperature of the light to be cool like daylight, warm like candlelight, and everything in between. I can also dim or brighten the lights as much as I want.

With just a few taps in the app, I can adjust the exact shade of white light or find the desired brightness level. Or I can simply ask Alexa to “turn bedroom lights to 50%” for a hands-free option.

I love that these smart bulbs have built-in scheduling features, although I don’t usually schedule my lights unless I’m traveling. The scheduling feature means that when I’m out of town, I can set my lights to automatically turn on and off at specific times so no one ever knows I’m away from home — just as an added security measure.

Occasionally, the Geeni bulbs won’t respond to my Amazon Echo when I ask them to turn them on or off, and I either have to open the Geeni app to set them to the desired setting or flip a switch on the bulb itself to restart it. That said, I’ve been using these smart bulbs for almost a year now, along with other smart bulbs from different brands, and this is something that happens with All of them. And honestly, this happens much less often with Geeni bulbs than with any other in my house, so it doesn’t bother me that much. Other than that, I really have no other complaints.

These smart bulbs from Geeni combine the functionality of a dimmable white smart light with the style of a more vintage glass bulb. I love that I can brighten and dim the lights and change the temperature from cool to warm with a few taps — or with my voice via smart home devices with Amazon Alexa or Google Assistant. They only take a few minutes to set up, and while they don’t always work perfectly, they’re usually reliable and easy to fix if the connection breaks.

So if you’re looking for smart light bulbs that won’t break the bank, Or If you want to enhance the style of your home, be sure to check out these Geeni light bulbs, recommended by interior designers.