Hive or Nest?

[GeX]

House has an old combi boiler, there is a timer on the boiler but no thermostat. It needs updating. All rooms have thermostatic valves.

Hive is currently £140 and Nest is £200.

Is Nest worth £60 more?

Nest Plus Points.

• Learning / sensor
• Google / Android eco system
• Accessories

Hive Plus Points

• Cheaper

It's my understanding that Hive doesn't really *need* the activity sensor that the Nest has you can install the app on your phone and let it decide if you're at home and want the heating on or not. To me this seems more useful (it can come on when it knows I've left work for example).

I like that there are things that can added to Nest (smoke alarms, cameras etc) but then I wonder if there's an actual benefit to being tied to that. As with most people on here, I would say I'm much more techy minded than the average user and I don't need to have 'approved by Nest' stamped on an IP camera before I'll buy it.

What do you lot reckon?

edit: I had 'can be battery powered' for Hive, but I believe Nest can be too.

 

[Psycho Sonny]

I doubt many have used both tbh. Mostly everyone on here has nest due to it being so well integrated with other stuff. it's future proofed quite well too.

I have Nest Thermostat now as the honeywell system was too expensive and payback would be 10-20 years on their system. I also got 3 Nest protects as the old smoke alarms looked terrible. Plus they integrate into the app very well and so do their sensors.

 

[robj20]

I just don't get the love for Nest it just automates scheduling doesn't it. If you already have a unit that turns the boiler on only when you're home start else does it do.
Personally I'm going for Evohome for full control of each room.

 

[Semple]

I just don't get the love for Nest it just automates scheduling doesn't it. If you already have a unit that turns the boiler on only when you're home start else does it do.
Personally I'm going for Evohome for full control of each room.

From what i've been reading recently, Nest has more of a learning approach to your needs. And they claim it only takes a week to learn. Hive i believe just has the scheduling etc.

 

[Psycho Sonny]

I just don't get the love for Nest it just automates scheduling doesn't it. If you already have a unit that turns the boiler on only when you're home start else does it do.
Personally I'm going for Evohome for full control of each room.

Well I have it set to a target temperature in the morning at 7am I want it to be 16.5 C.

It learns how long it takes to heat up your house so then it will switch on at the time needed so that at 7 am it is 16.5 C and it uses the current temperature of your home, outside conditions and how effective the heating within your home is to calculate what time to switch on every day. So every day it will turn on at a different time to reach the target temperature for the time you have set it for.

I then have it set at a target temperature for 5pm when I will be going home. So it may switch on at 2, 3 or even 4 so it hits the target temperature for 5pm again depending on all the variable conditions it knows and learns.

It also has a lot of other stuff it can do. auto away, it senses when you have left and then turns into eco mode (heating off and will only come on if it gets dangerously low or a set temperature which is much lower than normal if you have pets / plants to keep them comfy).

I guess you don't realise how good it is until you have one. Leaving work early. No issue just send a signal to it to turn on so home is warmer earlier. No more going back to a freezing home.

When I get into work I quickly log into the app and press a button and boom heating turns off until either my set schedule or I go home. Mine was only installed 2 days ago so it's still learning.

 

[robj20]

I don't see how it would save money then. It can only do this fancy stuff in the room you locate it, so how does it learn how long the bedrooms take to warm or the bathroom?

I have mine come on at 4am until 7am, then 5pm until 9pm.

If it suddenly started coming on early to reach the temp by 4am it would use more gas wouldn't it.

I want something that each room has its own schedule and temps totally independent of each other. For instance i dont need bedrooms heated during the day or the bathroom. During the night i don't need the whole downstairs heated.

Does Nest or Hive do opentherm? It just seems a lazy version of what we have had for ages.

 

[Psycho Sonny]

I don't see how it would save money then. It can only do this fancy stuff in the room you locate it, so how does it learn how long the bedrooms take to warm or the bathroom?

I have mine come on at 4am until 7am, then 5pm until 9pm.

If it suddenly started coming on early to reach the temp by 4am it would use more gas wouldn't it.

I want something that each room has its own schedule and temps totally independent of each other. For instance i dont need bedrooms heated during the day or the bathroom. During the night i don't need the whole downstairs heated.

Does Nest or Hive do opentherm? It just seems a lazy version of what we have had for ages.

You can install it anywhere or even take it around the house with you if your that way inclined. It plugs into a USB charger and uses wifi to communicate with the heat link. It doesn't need to be installed in 1 location but mine is. it's just easier for people to do that than walk about with it.

Also I have mine located in the coldest part of the house. That way I set it at the temperature I want in that location rather than what I want in the bedroom and I then have TRV's all set manually to suit each room.

Well your putting your heating on at 4am, it may calculate that it only needs to come on a 5am therefore saving you money

It's more about how efficient it is that saves you money. It only uses what you need. Yes it heats up the whole house but if you don't use certain parts you can buy energenie wireless TRV's. However I looked into it and they are expensive like £150 for 4 of them it's the same for the honeywell system.

My gas usage is roughly £20-£60 a month depending on the time of year. Spending £1000 to save £20 a year makes zero sense. Wireless TRV's payback time is ridiculously high I wouldn't bother. It's cheaper to heat your whole house than buy wireless TRV's.

If your that way inclined you can always walk around your house turning them on/off manually to save yourself £10 a year.

The nest saves money by efficient scheduling. A standard schedule isn't efficient. it does this whilst keeping you as comfortable as possible too.

I looked at all the systems and I also looked at wireless TRV's. Just don't make any sense unless you have a very large and very old (therefore inefficient) home.

if your gas bill is £100-200+ a month then yeah get wireless TRV's.

 

[A.N.Other]

Neither. Get Tado.

The geofencing on mobiles makes it hands-down better than both.

 

[Psycho Sonny]

Neither. Get Tado.

The geofencing on mobiles makes it hands-down better than both.

Nest also turns on and off when you leave / go home, etc using your mobiles location.

 

[robj20]

You can install it anywhere or even take it around the house with you if your that way inclined. It plugs into a USB charger and uses wifi to communicate with the heat link. It doesn't need to be installed in 1 location but mine is. it's just easier for people to do that than walk about with it.

Also I have mine located in the coldest part of the house. That way I set it at the temperature I want in that location rather than what I want in the bedroom and I then have TRV's all set manually to suit each room.

Well your putting your heating on at 4am, it may calculate that it only needs to come on a 5am therefore saving you money

If it did that I would have already been up for an hour. Lol I get up at 4am or there abouts.

 

[Psycho Sonny]

If it did that I would have already been up for an hour. Lol I get up at 4am or there abouts.

Well if your getting up at 4 it should be coming on earlier.

I'll give you my example.

Say I get up at 7 leave at 8.30. It comes on at 6 so the temperature at 7 is what I want it to be. It then turns on and off until at 7.45 it turns off permanently and starts to cool down for when i leave at 8.30


The way your doing it your waking up when it's cold, it comes on, by the time it's heated up your home you have left. Therefore you heated it up for zero reason unless your making it comfortable for others in your home. Still it makes sense for it to come on well before you wake up so your comfortable.

You ideally want the heating to turn on well before you wake up so it's at temperature by the time you wake and you want it to turn off well before you leave so it's started to cool down.

 

[Buffman]

FYI hive is batteries only (much to my surprise)

I got a hive installed and I'm impressed with it. Think nest is good if you want the tie ins with hue etc. I got hive bulbs coming for Xmas too which are a lot cheaper than hue bulbs.

I'd also say they mostly have very similar features so just depends on which Eco system you want. I actually had ended up buying both but sold the nest as I got a free install with hive.

Only main difference is one has hot water tank temperature settings (I can't remember which however)

 

[GeX]

I just don't get the love for Nest it just automates scheduling doesn't it. If you already have a unit that turns the boiler on only when you're home start else does it do.
Personally I'm going for Evohome for full control of each room.

I don't have a thermostat currently, as I said in the first post - and I'm not going to fit a wired one when I can buy and fit a Nest / Hive for not much more / around the same.

I've looked into fully zoned heating and the it's often suggested that there's no real benefit to it for a normal house. 2013 building regs say any new house over 150m2 must have a dual zone heating system but it's not split down to each room level.

As internal walls aren't insulated if you heat one room and not another then you're going to end up heating the room you don't want heating anyway.

Does Nest or Hive do opentherm? It just seems a lazy version of what we have had for ages.

Nest V3 does support opentherm. I don't know what you mean by 'a lazy way of what we have had for ages'.

Neither. Get Tado.

The geofencing on mobiles makes it hands-down better than both.

If this supports multiple users, then it does make it better - but I'm weary of spending similar money on a smaller brand as I've no idea what support will be like in the future. I will look into it though.

FYI hive is batteries only (much to my surprise)

Only main difference is one has hot water tank temperature settings (I can't remember which however)

What happens if the batteries run out, does the heating go into a preset schedule or do you lose heating totally?

afaik Hive has already supported water control, but the Nest hasn't until the latest version (revision 3)

 

[Buffman]

Not sure on if the batteries run out, I would presume (and hope!) it supports the current schedule but it's worth googling

 

[Em3bbs]

I've not had the batteries run out yet on Hive, had it for a year in my old house and coming up for a year in the new house.

If I was buying again I'd probably get the Nest due to the smoke detector availability but with regards to a thermostat I use Alexa and IFTTT so I doubt I'd notice the difference between a Nest, Tado or Hive thermostat.

 

[Ekim]

I recently got a Tado. I liked the geofencing concept (although I wasn't aware that Nest can do the same). I liked that it runs from batteries so we can move it around easily, or mount it on the wall (we didn't have an existing thermostat).

Also they have recently released TRVs which can work with the whole system so will be potentially adding them to the system later to control the temperature on a per room basis more easily.

Finally I liked the design of the Tado, it's just a small white box, fades in to the background nicely.

 

[Teknobry]

Got hive, no complaints. manage it all from your phone, nice and easy. it can be set to turn off when it detects you've left the house and turn back on when you're within a certain distance away.
i honestly don't think you'll be disappointed with whichever you get.

 

[Amp34]

I recently got a Tado. I liked the geofencing concept (although I wasn't aware that Nest can do the same). I liked that it runs from batteries so we can move it around easily, or mount it on the wall (we didn't have an existing thermostat).

Also they have recently released TRVs which can work with the whole system so will be potentially adding them to the system later to control the temperature on a per room basis more easily.

Finally I liked the design of the Tado, it's just a small white box, fades in to the background nicely.

With nest there are three options for On or Eco mode.

1. You leave the house with your phone - turns to Eco Mode
2. Your phone is uncontactable/out of the house and you walk past the thermostat - it turns the heating on/keeps it on.
3. You connect Protects to the system and any time you go past a Protect it ntokfies the system there is a presence in the house and keeps the heat on.

There may be more but they are they three I know about.

The Protects if installed will also call to the thermostat to turn the boiler off if any CO is detected.

 

[eviled]

for me the Hive was the best option, can make pretty complicated schedules, easy self-install, relatively cheap and decent app.

I don't need a thermostat that knows when I'm home, I always have my phone on me so can put the heating on if I'm home outside of the usual times

 

[alx]

I recently got a Tado. I liked the geofencing concept (although I wasn't aware that Nest can do the same). I liked that it runs from batteries so we can move it around easily, or mount it on the wall (we didn't have an existing thermostat).

Also they have recently released TRVs which can work with the whole system so will be potentially adding them to the system later to control the temperature on a per room basis more easily.

Finally I liked the design of the Tado, it's just a small white box, fades in to the background nicely.

This. Was also pretty easy to install - replace my old thermostat with the tado, set the boiler to permanently on and plug the small tado wifi box into the router. Away you go!