I’ve had this remote for less than 24 hours and I already love it. I’ve been a Switchbot fan for about 6 months now after buying their curtain bots, hub mini, and original switch bot. This is a great device to add to my collection! When paired with the hub mini, the experience is even better. You can use the hub mini to add ir signals from most any remote. You can even combine two remotes into one. For example, I have a receiver for my sound system and was able to combine my receiver’s vol up/down and mute functions with my TV’s remote so now, I just need the universal remote! Highly recommend

This is a requirement if you want your switch bot products to be able to be controlled by services such as Alexa. But set up was easy to do integrated well with Alexa.

First the good bits. This device is well made, (not necessarily, well designed - get to that shortly), easy to set up and integrates with other Switchbot products easily. However when used as a IR Blaster, it leaves a lot to be desired. I have a dumb Sony TV. Seeing I had a Switchbot Temperature Meter in the same room though I would use the Mini Hub with Alexa to control my TV. This is where things got sad. The Switchbot App allows you to set up a remote for the Mini Hub. Proceeded to do exactly that. After set up, it would not perform all the functions as it should. For instance, one remote setting would not allow volume change another might not allow channel selection. Decided to do the TV remote learning choice. Did this, it appears to work but it can select no channel higher than nine. Say you want Channel 12, you can not say to Alexa select Channel 12, the Mini Hub will go two channel 2. Only way to make it work properly is to select Channel 9 then go up one at a time. The actual TV Remote has no problems which means the Switchbot Mini Hub is not copying the ir signal correctly. In my view, Switchbot should be on to this and fix it. Selecting the right Remote Layout gets even worse. Volume increase/decrease is painfully slow. If you asking for a volume increase to say, 15, it does it but it is incredibly painful to watch. Would I recommend this to someone else. Yes, with the provision, you stick to Switchbot products or are happy with a lame duck TV remote system.

I attached a switchbot to a remote control for my LiftMaster gate - a heck of a lot cheaper than buying the real thing. Put the remote with the bot stuck to it in a front window sill in range of the gate, and placed the hub right next to it. Works perfectly. Hooked into Alexa so I can open the gate from anywhere for deliveries and guests. No interest in trying out the RF capabilities - happy with just being able to open my gate through Alexa.

This is the necessary tool to add to your switchbot collection. I only several switchbots that I use to make "tranditional" switch smart. However, the switchbot itself does not have built in wifi function. With this hub, I was able to control the switch thru phone app when I am not at home. This mini hub is cheap and easy to set up.

05/19/2023: 1 star I haven't needed to make any mods for a long while, so have had no reason to go into the app. Now I got a new fan I wan to add, and I find that there's a new version of the app installed which is apparently VERY broken, and will not allow me to access any of the devices I've already got set up. Period. It keeps claiming a network error, but when I try to run existing routines, they work fine. So it's the app. No question. At least the device still works, so it's not completely useless. But it does mean I'll have to research, find, and purchase replacement devices of some type. I'm sure these guys aren't the only option - not if this is how they treat their customers! I'll try to remember to come back and tell you what I went with, when I make that transition. It may be a while though. SEVERELY crippled - Dropping from 4 stars to 1 --- 01/18/2021: 4 stars The second Hub Mini is now working fine, after I changed to a different power supply. Support was slow to respond, figured it out on my own. Since that's not mentioned in the troubleshooting instructions and Support was so slow to respond, I'm keeping it at 4 stars. --- 01/10/2021: 3 stars Bought a second one of these to control devices in another room. The first one works great, but the second has been nothing but trouble. Have contacted support (today) using app feedback option. Will be returning, may or may not replace. --- 01/02/2021: 5 stars Make a few "scenes", which are basically programs where you tell it to do something and it carries out a series of actions. These can be activated manually, by timer, or by Alexa. These scenes work well, but a great improvement would be to be able to set the time between commands. It's about two seconds, so if I want to say, turn up the volume 5 clicks, it hits volume up, waits 2 sec, hits it again, waits again, etc. If they could make it a user-adjustable delay that would be awesome. The other thing about the scenes are that you get to name them, but they are activated in Alexa with "Turn On". So if your scene is to do something else, like, for example, turn off the fan, you'd have to say "Alexa, Turn On Turn Off the Fan". I'd rather the activation phrase be something like "Play Scene" or "Do Routine" or something generic like that. In the initial review, I mentioned that I added some additional buttons, but they didn't take, and I couldn't figure out how to go back to that screen and try again. I figured it out. And you CAN re-name your devices. However, when you make Scenes, they do not automatically rename, so get your names right before you make scenes. One nice perk. Working with another home automation thing, I accidentally deleted this app. I thought I'd have to re-do everything, but when I re-installed and logged back into my account, all my commands were right there once again. Whew! Raising from 4 to 5 stars. ===== 12/30/2020 Wifi setup was about usual for IOT devices. Create an account, connect to your router, etc. Device setup was unclear. You have to manually choose the device type (TV, etc.) then the manufacturer (Sony, etc.) before you get to the "Learn" button. From there, you tap the learn button, then a button on your remote, and it guesses what it is. Then it will walk you through several screens, where you try the buttons to find out what version works with your device. Not onerous, but the instructions are unclear that you have to manually choose type and manufacturer first. Allows creating custom buttons, but I haven't got those custom buttons to work with Alexa yet. It would help a lot if you could re-name them, but you cannot. You have to delete and re-add to change their name. Most of the buttons on my TV remote are not available. At one point, I did end up in a screen that had my TV remote and an ADD button, where I added a few missing ones, like Back, Input, and QMenu. But then when I went back in, those mods were gone, and I've been unable to find a way back into that edit mode to try again. That would be REALLY helpful if I could add those three buttons! The main screen buttons (choosing your device) seems a bit non-responsive, requiring me to press several times before it takes. Fortunately, after setup I shouldn't have to use the phone app much. Alexa can now turn on/off/up/down both my TV and sound bar, and so on, so I'm mostly happy with it. Have not tried with Google yet, but expect similar results. With the aforementioned editing & button-adding capabilities, this would be a five-star device. Hopefully the app will be updated to include them later.

So far so good it's a bit tricky setting up but once you get the hang of it it works well! If there is no code for the remote you can learn just about every button from the remote but I will say this this item blows away that crappy atomi device that thing is such garbage I would never recommend it but this device yes I would!

I recently purchased the Switchbot Universal Remote with high expectations, but unfortunately, I encountered numerous issues right from the start. As someone who loves all things tech and automated tech, I expected a smoother setup process from Switchbot, but I found myself struggling at every step. First off, adding devices was far from straightforward. The process of manually adding devices and learning the action buttons was confusing and cumbersome. Integrating the devices from the Switchbot home screen to the remote was a headache. It was unclear whether I should add devices through the universal remote app or add them to the home screen first, then to the universal remote. Each method seemed to offer different functionality and customization options, adding to the confusion. Moreover, there were constant errors regarding the number of IR devices I could add. The remote claims to support up to 10 IR devices, but with only 8 added, I kept receiving error messages stating I had maxed out the limit. This inconsistency was frustrating and hindered the overall experience. The home screen interface of the remote is another major letdown. It feels outdated and lacks the sleek, user-friendly design typical of Switchbot products. The interface is bland and unappealing, making it a chore to navigate. What’s even more disappointing is the lack of detailed instructions. The package includes only a small pamphlet, which assumes you are already familiar with the Switchbot ecosystem and know how to set up Matter devices. There were no demos or thorough guidelines provided, which is unusual for Switchbot. This release feels rushed and poorly thought out, unlike their usually well-executed products. In summary, the Switchbot Universal Remote feels like a beta version rather than a polished product. It’s not user-friendly, even for tech enthusiasts, and it clearly needed more rounds of user feedback and testing before hitting the market. I hope Switchbot addresses these issues soon, but as it stands, I cannot recommend this product. If you’re not tech-savvy, steer clear of this remote – it’s simply not worth the hassle.

I used these to integrate two infra-red (IR) remote controlled devices into our SmartHome landscape. The app at first didn’t connect the hubs to our mesh wi-fi using 2g and 5g protocols but a recent patch to the app resolved that. Yay! The first hub was for our bidet which has a signal receiver that was obfuscated from receiving its remote’s signals by the tight quarters of that bathroom. This hub gave me a work around that allows me to control the bidet over wifi using my phone. As I had to build a custom in-app controller for the bidet there’s no voice command integration with Alexa but I’m sure the rest of the house is as relieved as I am that there’s no chance we’re going to be overhearing the intimate hygiene steps others are taking as they interface with the bidet. That said the custom controller building interface in the app could use improvements such as displaying the signal learned from the physical remote so I could work out if certain sequential buttons were sending different signals with each press or the same signal. Also there’s currently no layout or icon customization on the custom controllers - just a container of row-wrapped generic button tiles with the name you give them. The other hub I used to integrate our old Panasonic TV into our smart-home setup so we could voice control the TV without having to hunt down the remote. The template remote config integrates with Alexa easily enough once I stopped naming the remote `xyz TV` and used the suggested `bedroom television` naming in coordination with training myself to use the verbal term television instead of TV. The template however didn’t match our remotes button options and I had to train it for each button with no obvious options for channel recall beyond using one of the template buttons our remote didn’t have a corresponding match for. Also, I couldn’t figure out the verbal syntax for Alexa to get it to change to a specific channel using the number buttons. Telling it go to channel 24 would cause it to inset a delay between the number button activations which resulted in channel 2 being selected, and then channel 4. I worked around this by using one of the color buttons from the template and learning it against my button presses of 24 on our remote. I then setup an accordingly named scene which Alexa picked up from the app. I can now say “Alexa - please activate `scene-name`” and it will change to channel 24. Overall these are very promising products for integrating IR controlled devices into SmartHome actions. App just needs some recognition of its strategic potential for the product and to implement some quality of life (layout and customization options) and feedback improvements on what code signals it’s learning and how users can share them.

This is my 3rd SwitchBot Device and I love it. I have one SwitchBot Bots and to Hubmini’s. My original purchase was the Bot and I got the Hubmini ONLY to be able to have WiFi/cloud control of the Bot to be able to use with Alexa. However, it ended up working even better than I hoped. I have the Bot in my room controlling the device I intended it for, but after some tinkering I discovered the Range for the Bluetooth to the hub was good enough, that I could move the hub mini to another room that’s approximately 30ft+ away and use that to control a fan that had a IR remote. So I could pair it with the fan for control over WiFi and IT still controls my Bot two rooms away. Amazing. I loved it so much, I bought a second hubmini to turn my 15 year old Non-smart TV smart’ish. Between the humming IR function and a firestick, it’s entirely controllable by Alexa. I think my only critique that tripped me up when trying to establish the cloud link between Alexa and Switchbot was the account linking was Case/capitalization Specific. So when you create your SwitchBot account, if you had any lowercase/uppercase letters in your email address, when you go to link it to Alexa, the login needs to be exactly the same case specific (where in 99% of most websites apps, your username capitalization is irrelevant) I thought maybe it was broken process, but once I made sure I had the capitalization mirrored it worked great.