Smart Plug ESICOO, WiFi Plugs That Work with Alexa, Echo, Google Home, Surge Protector & Timer & Group Controller, ETL & FCC Certified, No Hub Required, 2.4G WiFi Only, 4 Pack

Don’t buy these, even in the perfect conditions they don’t connect. Right next to the router on 2.4 signal.

I’ll get right to the point. These plugs are cheap. Initial set up was cumbersome and took numerous attempts to initially connect. Once it was connected it worked fairly well until it would inevitably disconnect (device offline) and you’d have to just wait (hours or days) to reconnect or initialize set up again. I even have a WiFi extender which did nothing to address the issue. I replaced with another brand and I have had zero issues. Don’t waste your money. Also - the app is a JOKE. cloud intelligence is the name of it and it is horrendous.

I got a four pack of these to install around the house. The idea was to make a smart home with Alexa to get voice control for my MIL. She has muscle degradation so getting up to turn things on and off can be difficult. These were used around the house and the shed. One was attached to a heater, another two in the shed. Ive had them for several weeks and have had only Alexa related problems. For example the shed lights (controlled by this plug) turned on seemingly randomly. This turned out to be my naivety with the best practices in naming conventions for devices. An Alexa issue combined with my ignorance. Changing the names fixed the problems. I noticed several other reviews mentioned these randomly turned on and off. I suspect that they may also be attributing the same problem to these devices instead of fixing the actual problem. I took one star off because I dont like having so many apps. While the CloudIntelligence App appears good, I would prefer to just use the Alexa app. Same with light bulbs. Programming was easy. Plug in, hold the button till the blue light flashes and connect with the app. You will need to make an account and have your router PW available. If you are new to the smart home and can afford the devices that connect without requiring a new app, go down that path. If you dont mind another app or already have the CloudIntelligence app, then these are a good cheap solution. Just research Alexa naming conventions and study groups before you setup your home on the fly like I did. You will probably have to redo it all and that is a pita. WiFi rage was impressive, but it needed a good signal to program. Once programmed I could reliably control them in the shed (100ft away) from anywhere in the house. I could not however get them to program from the shed. Life is better now that I can say, Alexa, turn on shed heater, and it gets warm without me having to go there to turn it on. Great when you know you will be working in the shed soon. I will put another on the AC in prep for Summer!

Great product, just as described

I bought this product in the past and left a bad review. I rarely do that so that gives you an idea how frustrated I was. However, after posting the bad review I was contacted by the company. I did not have a bad experience with their communication like some people have reported. I was polite with them and they were polite with me. It was simply important to them that their product does well. I can respect that. They offered several solutions and the one I agreed to was a do over to give them another chance. They claimed to have redesigned the electronics and addressed the things in my negative review. I received the replacement outlets free. Even though they looked the same, they worked very differently. I was able to join one to my existing network without any adjustments or problems. It worked just like it was supposed to and automatically joined with Alexa from their Cloud Intelligence app. I do wish all these smart appliance makers would just integrate with one id and password but right now that part is unavoidable. So, in summary, you do need a 2.4 gigahertz wireless network for these just like you do for all the lower priced smart appliances. It works with Alexa just fine and setup is a breeze. The company will stand behind their product if you have a problem and the lady I dealt with was excellent at email communication in english. I would recomment this cost effective solution.

I’m using this to turn on/off a grow light in my indoor garden. Scheduling is pretty easy as is setup. Make sure whatever device you’re using to set this up (phone, tablet…) is already on a 2.4ghz network. I was hoping it would work with another smart app I was currently using but no such luck… Needs another app. I wish these manufacturers would come up with 1-2 apps for these smart devices. Other than that, setup took about 2 mins. Super easy and works well. -1 star due to having to use another app.

This was so easy to install and use. I did have to download the app, but after syncing it with Alexa, I just use the Alexa app to run. But you can use the app to run schedules if you don’t have Alexa. We have the lights turn on and off automatically on a schedule. We can also turn on the lights by saying, “Alexa, turn on living room lights.” You have to set the devices up in Alexa and put them in the living room to do this. If not, you just say, “Alexa, turn on [name of plug] smart plug.” You can use the same words to turn the lights off. This works really well for plugs that are hard to reach. But if you can easily reach the plug, you can manually turn the plug on and off with the button on the side. Also, in the Alexa app, you can create a routine that turns on/off according to when the sun sets or rises. You can set it for the sunrise/sunset or minutes before/after the sunrise/sunset. We have the schedule running even when we are home! And when we leave, it continues to turn on and off as if we are home. It’s fantastic.

Keeps constantly disconnecting, convoluted process to connect to Alexa, requiring an email address just to use… these plugs are pretty much worthless. Unless you need something quick, to hold you until you purchase decent ones, don’t bother. The other issues are workable, but no… constantly disconnecting is a no-no for a smart device. I only gave the extra star because its responsive at least 45-50% of the time.

This is an updated review - after a year I pulled them out and tried to configure them again. It was still not as easy as some, but I was able to complete the process now and have it all working. One issue seems to be in using an iPhone and connecting to the wifi of the plugs themselves. The phone wants to switch back to a network with Internet access, so you must work quickly to connect to the plug and add it to the app. I did find that when I tried a second one, it would time out and fail. I could not get past this last time. The secret was to configure one, then force close the Cloud Intelligence app, launch and do the next one. Once they are all added, they all seemed to work fine. Note that when you add them, the app tries to give them all the same name - its easiest at this point to rename them as you go. If you do not rename them, including the first one, a bug will cause them to appear in Chinese characters when you are later programming them. I had to reset that one and start over, so rename them as you add them. It is difficult to move them from whatever group you join them to into another group - I found simply renaming the groups and rooms to be easier, then deleting what I did not want. Connecting to Alexa in the app was fairly easy following the directions in the package. Click the person, then services, then bind with either Alexa or Home. At that point, my Alexa app saw all four of the plugs and I was able to easily group them and use voice control. My new assessment is that I suspect something has changed, perhaps due to the negative reviews, or perhaps even iOS is giving another second or two of time when you connect to unconnected APs. The seller did contact me multiple times asking me to take my 2-star review down when it was first posted in exchange for a refund, and I refused. Since I have now made them work, and I see that others are posting that they do not understand the bad reviews it seems appropriate to come back and update my original review with details and a better rating. These are still not the easiest smart plugs I have set up (those use a Bluetooth connection so you do not have to connect to the plug via wifi) but once they are set up and working they seem to do the trick and work. As such I have increased my rating to 4 stars because I do believe the customer service team did listen and try to fix things in the past year. My original review follows - but is no longer valid... ---------------------------------------------------------- These are similar to plugs I bought maybe 4 years ago. Setup requires a series of complex steps including setting up each plug as a separate access point. Modern iPhone software doesn’t like staying connected to APs without internet, so you need to disconnect and rejoin your network multiple times including forcing the phone to stay connected to the plug. Unfortunately it still repeatedly failed during installation after fussing with 2 of the 4 plugs for an hour, I’m giving up. They do not provide any actual diagnostic information, they simply fail to work. The Cloud Intelligence app is similar to the Smart Life app used by BN Link devices. However those devices use Bluetooth to connect to the app making it far easier to further connect to the network. I suspect these are old stock returns getting recycled, hence the number that simply don’t work.

it’s a good product, but you need an app for use it