How to Use IFTTT in Your Home

You might have read that title and thought, “Oh great, another acronym to remember!” Although you are correct to think that the modern world demands a lot of letter combinations to remember (i.e. LOL, YOLO, OMG, and all the rest), IFTTT is a useful phrase to have in mind. It is also an online service that features “channels,” anyone can use to create “recipes”.

As the team at Digital Trends explained, “our digital lives are expansive, taking into account many devices, platforms, and services. What makes it frustrating is that these devices occasionally overlap in what they do — i.e. Twitter and Facebook — or seem like they’d just work well together …Thankfully, there is a way to do this, and it’s called IFTTT. Short for ‘If This, Then That,’ IFTTT is an easy way to automate tasks that might otherwise be repetitive or unable to talk to each other.”

If you read that and wondered if it is something you might use with home automation, you are on the right track. You can download the IFTTT app (which works on both Android and iOS) and use your home’s WiFi network, along with all smart home products on that network, to begin creating (or even using existing recipes that others have shared) to begin streamlining your life via smarter and more customized home automation.

As the simplest example: You can use IFTTT and integrate it with something like Google Assistant to arm or disarm security cameras. You can use the service to link a security camera’s features to your smart lighting (i.e. If this security camera detects movement, then that lighting array is triggered).

Keep in mind that home automation does NOT have to be limited to issues like security. It can be about efficiency and entertainment, too. For example, a smart climate control system may be able to interact or cue smart switches or plugs. For instance, you may be able to tell the smart climate control system to turn on at a specific time of day, and if that happens, then an array of interior or exterior lights are cued.

Looking at it this way, IFTTT is a remarkable tool and can be used in scores of creative ways to control smart home products. If you use smart switches and plugs, they can enable even an array of “dumb” devices to get to work. At iZone, you can find an array of home automation products that work well with IFTTT recipes to make life easier and your home more efficient than ever.