One other day, one other good gadget bites the mud — or, on this case, a full lineup of good dwelling gadgets.
On Thursday, the buyer electronics firm Belkin mentioned it should finish technical help for its older Wemo products as of January 31, 2026, and that the app used to manage the gadgets will now not be supported. The choice will influence a variety of gadgets, together with good plugs, mild switches, good bulbs, child screens, kitchen home equipment, heaters, air purifiers, movement sensors, and extra.
In an electronic mail to clients, the outfit defined its choice, saying it wanted to shift its focus elsewhere.
“This choice was not made calmly,” the e-mail reads. “Over the past decade, since Belkin first launched Wemo in 2011, we’ve been dedicated to offering customers with progressive, simple-to-use equipment for a seamless good dwelling expertise. Nonetheless, as know-how evolves, we should focus our sources on completely different elements of the Belkin enterprise.”
“We perceive this transformation could disrupt your routines, and we sincerely apologize for the inconvenience,” the corporate added.
Belkin says that merchandise nonetheless below guarantee by the end-of-life date may be eligible for a partial refund and that its merchandise configured to be used with Apple’s HomeKit will proceed to perform even with out Wemo’s cloud companies and the Wemo app. The app may even now not be supported after January 31, 2026, and any gadget options that depend on cloud connectivity, like distant entry or voice integrations, will now not work.
The corporate received’t supply technical help, firmware, software program updates, or troubleshooting help after January 31, both.
The transfer to terminate a line of good dwelling merchandise leaves customers with out entry to know-how that has turn out to be built-in into their day by day lives — this isn’t only a baby’s toy going offline; it’s extra important. (In fact, toys going offline could be devastating, too. See, for instance, the unhappy farewells for the robot companion Moxie.)
It’s changing into more and more widespread for firms to easily finish help for his or her older good dwelling merchandise with none technical purpose to take action. As an alternative, these strikes enable firms — as Belkin alludes to — to refocus their efforts on extra worthwhile areas of their companies.
Google lately introduced the same transfer with its choice to close down its older Nest gadgets, as an illustration.
In April, the tech large mentioned it would no longer support its earliest technology of Nest Studying Thermostats. As of October 25, 2025, Nest’s first- and second-generation fashions will see their related options shut off, cease receiving updates, now not work with the Nest or Google House app, and basically turn out to be “dumb” gadgets.
As an alternative of dedicating sources to help its buyer base, it’s simpler to electronic mail a suggestion to assist them improve to a more recent model. In Nest’s case, that’s $130 off the Nest 4th-gen thermostat, which is often $279.99. Whereas that could be a great deal, being compelled to improve as a result of obsolescence doesn’t go over nicely with many purchasers whose gadgets nonetheless work simply nice, regardless of their age.
Nonetheless, this course of does defend Google from dealing with class motion lawsuits, which might consequence if it simply shut down this many good gadgets and the Nest app directly. By pushing these clients off the Nest app and incentivizing them to improve to newer gadgets, Google might argue that utilization of the older gadgets was really pretty low if a lawsuit have been raised. That might cut back any fines or compensation that such a go well with might end in and make it simpler for Google and, maybe, finally shut down the Nest app.
As well as, providing clients superior discover of a majority of these strikes reduces the corporate’s authorized danger.
In Belkin’s case, clients who went all in on Wemo for his or her good dwelling will probably be closely impacted and presumably fairly offended, too, in the event that they’re not eligible for the partial refund.
Belkin supplied a full record of affected gadgets, which incorporates a variety of good dwelling merchandise spanning a number of classes.
Belkin notes that its choice doesn’t have an effect on Wemo’s Thread-based merchandise (SKUs WLS0503, WDC010, WSC010, WSP100), which is able to proceed to perform as they do right this moment by means of Apple’s HomeKit.