Smart Home Adoption Likely to Rise as People Cope with Stay-at-Home Orders

The adoption of smart home products and technologies is likely to spike in the wake of the coronavirus outbreak. Telling an Alexa-connected smart thermostat to kick up the heat a few degrees on a chilly evening seems safer than touching the device, even if one is not a germophobe.

Sales of smart home technology could rise 30% by some estimates. For instance, demand for voice-activated products like Delta's high end faucet could rise. Features like voice-activation that once seemed exotic with little added value might not appear so in the near future.

Similarly, a boost is likely for the adoption of wearable products, such as smartwatches that can track a person’s heart rate and monitor other health data, including sleep time, sleep quality, and number of steps taken. COVID-19 is also spurring development of the smart ring. Personal health hardware manufacturer Oura is working with the University of California, San Francisco on a project to see if its ring device can detect early physiological signs that indicate the onset of COVID-19.

Beyond Working from Home

The effects of the pandemic have altered the zeitgeist around working from home. Not only are millions of people getting work done at home in new ways, but students are also completing school through online classes.

Homes are also poised to become more medically astute from a tech perspective. For example, startup Tyto Care offers an at-home exam kit that enables a doctor or healthcare provider to conduct basic diagnostic exams remotely. Through a video-enabled mobile app, a patient and doctor can replicate a face-to-face visit using a handheld device for examining the heart, lungs, skin, throat, ears, and body temperature. Potentially, this is telemedicine for the masses.

New Wireless Sensing

Likewise, new sensing technology being developed at MIT’s Media Lab could one day dramatically change how people’s health is monitored. Instead of having to wear a sensor, MIT researchers can monitor someone’s health by capturing and analyzing wireless signals reflected off of the human body. Researchers can extract breathing and heartbeat information from these reflected signals without any physical contact with the human body. The MIT team is currently exploring ways of remotely sensing additional health metrics, such as blood pressure, oxygen saturation, and glucose levels.

This pandemic won’t last forever, but its effects may alter the way we work and live indoors for a long time. Smart home and similar smart technologies can be helpful tools in the adaptation process.