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Best Smart String Lights
Twinkly String Lights
Best Upgrade
Philips Hue Festavia
Best on a Budget
Govee Christmas Lights
A Smart Garland
Waldorf Fir Pre-Lit LED Garland Powered by Hubspace (9 ft)
Every year, the only smart device my husband asks about is something for the Christmas tree. But instead of grabbing whatever smart plug I had on hand, I came back with an armload of smart string lights we could use instead of our fake tree’s built-in lights—and for decorating all over the house too. It was overkill, judging by his look of horror, but all in the name of research!
That armload of lights has been covering the inside and outside of my home for the past few weeks, which has made holiday decorating easier. Whether you’re celebrating Christmas or Hanukkah, or you just love getting into the holiday decorating spirit, these are my favorite smart Christmas lights and smart home solutions for the most wonderful time of the year.
Be sure to read our other smart lighting guides, including the Best Smart Lighting, Best Philips Hue Lights, Best Nanoleaf Light Kits, Best Govee Lights, and Best Smart Bulbs.
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Photograph: Twinkly
Twinkly String Lights
I tested three different string lights designed to go on a Christmas tree, and Twinkly’s were easily my favorite. They’re beautiful and easy to set up, and the black cord blends in nicely into the tree (the cord also comes in green). The app’s Gallery tab has tons of premade light combinations to choose from, and you can also make custom effects in the app. It lets you design a light pattern by using an existing pattern, drawing with your fingers, or even uploading a GIF. The arrangement of lights on the tree works best for gradient and stripe-style patterns though—I love how the candy cane stripe effect looks.
I tested the shortest length, 26 feet, and it was surprisingly the perfect size on my super-slim, apartment-friendly tree (similar to this style). The string lights come in three more sizes, from 66 feet to 158 feet, though the former is what you’ll likely need for most Christmas trees. The cord has a controller at the end—these vary slightly based on generation. I tested the newer Generation II, which has a single button you’ll need to be able to access during setup for Bluetooth pairing, and you can use it to switch between effects manually. Once you name the lights, you can sync them with Amazon Alexa using the Twinkly Skill or Apple HomeKit to voice-command the string lights. (There’s Google Assistant support, but it’s not as easy to find and set up in the app.) These lights can also be used outdoors, and the controller box has a weatherproof IP44 rating.
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Photograph: Philips
Best Upgrade
Philips Hue Festavia
For folks with existing Philips Hue lighting, the Festavia String Lights are the best way to smarten up your tree. They come in 65-foot or 130-foot lengths and are weatherproof (IP44 rating), but we tested them indoors. The compact and relatively lightweight 65-foot string was easy to drape on the tree and has 250 tiny LEDs. The LEDs can turn any color and animate with different effects, or “scenes,” as Philips Hue calls them. What sets the Festavia apart from most strings is the option to tune white, so you can set your preferred color temperature. We defaulted to a warm white that makes the room feel extra cozy and classy.
Dig into the Hue app and, alongside palettes for selecting precise colors or tuning the white, you’ll find scenes like candlelight, sparkle, and prism. The string can display five different colors simultaneously. You can also add scenes from the Hue gallery, which has a special winter holidays section with options like Snow Sparkle and Under the Tree. There’s support for voice commands via Alexa, Google Assistant, and HomeKit, plus automatic scheduling, and even setting different colors or scenes for different times of the day. You can also link Spotify or Samsung SmartThings to have your tree sync to the music you are playing, though it can feel a bit too busy.
Because I (Simon) already have Philips Hue spotlights and a TV lightstrip, the Festavia was simple to add, and we can turn it on or off using the switch for the room. We can also play scenes or match colors across the whole room, which ties things together, enabling you to create a party vibe or a cozy experience for a Christmas movie. Downsides? The large power adapter could be a problem with some outdoor sockets, and the cable is black when green might have been better, but there’s little else to complain about, beyond the eye-watering price.
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Photograph: Govee
Best on a Budget
Govee Christmas Lights
If budget is top of mind, Govee’s lights are often the best value in smart lighting. Its Christmas lights are easy to install thanks to the large spool the lights are wrapped around, so no worrying about tangled cords as you set up the tree. The Govee app has a lot of scenes to choose from, and there are plenty of color choices you can cycle through to customize the tree.
I set them up around my small tree, and while the 66-foot length was much too long, you’re able to control the cord in segments, so I was able to switch off the parts of the lights I wasn’t using. It comes in a smaller, cheaper size too (33 feet for $60), which is great for anyone with a small tree. Govee’s string lights have an IP65 waterproof rating and can be used outside, though I only tested them on my tree indoors. There’s a built-in mic to detect music, allowing the lights to sync up to tunes, and the Govee app works with Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant for smart home control. The only downside is that the cord is a bright silver, so it was easy to notice on the tree. But if that goes with your aesthetic, then it’s not an issue.
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Photograph: Home Depot
A Smart Garland
Waldorf Fir Pre-Lit LED Garland Powered by Hubspace (9 ft)
I had my doubts about a product with such a long name (powered by a smart home platform I haven’t tested before). But it’s no startup—Hubspace is Home Depot’s smart home platform, and it powers a variety of different smart home products from the retailer. There’s a QR code on the (quite large) power adapter on the Garland, and I was able to scan it and add it to the app faster than any other smart device in this guide.
The Garland is positively massive. Nine feet is no joke, plus it’s thick and heavy to maneuver. I have it lying across three Ikea Billy bookshelves, but if you had the arm strength, you could certainly weave it around a banister or hang it from the wall with some well-placed nails. The LED lights have a warmth to them that feels more like classic Christmas lights than the paler shades of the smart string lights, and there are plenty of colors in the app to choose from. I love that the Hubspace app lets me make complex schedules that can turn the Garland off multiple times a day and based on a day of the week. It works with both Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant.
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Photograph: Govee
Outdoor Lights You Can Leave Up All Year
Govee Permanent Outdoor Lights Pro
Sick of climbing that ladder every year to put your lights up? Consider a permanent set of smart lights. This weatherproof model from Govee scores an IP67 rating (IP65 for the control box) and can handle temperatures of –4 to 140 degrees Fahrenheit. They are designed to be up year-round. I (Simon) tested the 100-foot string (200-foot is also an option), which comes divided into six sections, with an extension cord to branch from the lower level to your roof line. Each bulb is around an inch and a half square and juts out an inch. A flat cable joins them together at 18-inch intervals. Installation was fairly easy for the most part, with the adhesive sticking well to the plastic underhang of my home. I used the supplied screw clips to tidy up some cables and fix them more securely. You can cut them, and connectors are included, but this task is not for the faint of heart.
Govee offers everything but the kitchen sink in its busy companion app. You can set colors in zones (two per section), tweak the color temperature, and choose from a frankly bewildering array of lighting effects, called Scenes. Christmas is well represented in the Festival section of the Scenes, but there are also some nice effects in there for other holidays like Halloween. Depending on your home, they can serve as feature lights. The white looks quite classy, and they can get pretty bright (up to 50 lumens a bulb). There is Matter support for easy setup, and you can use voice commands with Alexa or Google Assistant.
If you already have other Govee lights, you will enjoy the ability to group them for shared effects, and you can schedule them, create effects, and even sync them to music or sound, though this feels gimmicky. They seem pricey until you compare them to other permanent lighting. If you don’t have much of an overhang, the lights will cast shadows and make shapes on the wall (Govee suggests installing 1 to 3 inches out, and I would recommend further if you can). My house is fairly small, so I only needed four sections. I wish the lights were closer together, and a little more subtle. If visible bulbs and cables annoy you, these aren’t for you.
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Photograph: Nanoleaf
A Few More Outdoor Options
More Outdoor Christmas Lights
Twinkly Icicle Lights (18 feet) for $100): These lights are just as easy to use as Twinkly’s String Lights. However, you need to map them out in your space using your camera via the app, so it might be tricky to get them all in a single frame, depending on where you place them. The lights come in a few different color sets: multicolor, gold and silver, and multicolor + white. The price doesn’t change between the sets, but I recommend the multicolor + white option if you think you’ll want a shade of white at any point. Without the white option, you’ll have to try to find the perfect shade of orange and yellow to try to replicate a nice white Christmas light shade.
Govee Outdoor String Lights (48 feet) for $70: I love the look of big-bulb outdoor lights for the holidays. These lights from Govee have a little too much space between each bulb to be the perfect outdoor Christmas light, but they’re great for hanging off a fence or pergola. I like that you can combine ropes of these to make them longer or shorter, depending on your needs.
Nanoleaf Essentials Smart Holiday String Lights for $120: These lights work with Google Assistant, Alexa, and HomeKit, and they’re similar in look, style, and price to our top pick. The only major difference is that the cord splits in two—the idea is you start from the middle of the tree, not the bottom, and wrap one cord to the top and the other down to the bottom. It’s a little disorienting, and the cords might be more of an eyesore depending on your tree placement.
