Aqara Roller Shade Driver E1 Plus Aqara Smart Hub E1, with Schedule and Voice Control, Rechargeable with Long Battery Life, Compatible with Apple HomeKit, Alexa, Google Assistant, and IFTTT

I was a bit miffed at first that I had to get a hub so I could use this, but im so glad I did. The product works brilliantly, very easy to set up and it opens and closes the blind each day. I hardly ever charge it. Works through the Aqara app and with Google Home routines etc. I use it to help wake me up in the morning by opening my blind with the alarm. I then have it automatically close the blind at sunset. It's got a little motor noise but hardly noticeable. I didn't screw it to the wall, I simply used the sticky pads and it's been up for a number of months.

Have been looking for an easy to install roller blind driver for some time. Got this recommendation from a friend who had installed a few. It was simple to install and works like a dream. Blind is up in the morning to let sun in and closes at a scheduled time at night. App is easy use and both Google/Alexa integration are easy use.

This blind driver is fantastic! It links to alexa (a few others such as home kit too) which we did, it responds quickly and quietly to the open and closed parameters that we set. It's extremely easy to fit, and comes with numerous different fixtures depending on the size of chain on your blinds. It comes with wall fixings and you can choose either to mount with screws (provided) or with a 3M sticky pad which I did and its very secure. You can use either in conjunction with alexa, home kit etc and command by voice which is great, but be aware you can only have the blind open or closed, no partial opening, unless you control it through the app, in which case you can control by percentages of open or closed. The battery life is amazing, just charge up the unit when you recieve it( took less than 2 hours ) and link it to the app and fix in place. I have been using it about 5 or 6 weeks now and the battery is still 86% full. Ideal for use, if you set a routine on alexa, for when on holiday/ out at work and can be controlled by the app or alexa when away from home ( small hub required for away from home use) the ub we bought was inexpensive and also works as a wifi hotshot in your home I believe it was the E1 hub. The unit uses 2.4ghz wifi, if your router has both 2.4 and 5 ghz, its very simple to seperate the two wavelenths (if i can do it anyone can, i just googled it) I would thoroughly recommend

After a holiday where our room had automatic blinds - I just had to add to my smart home set up. I ordered one as a trial in the bedroom, we have it set up through Home Assistant to shut at a certain time along with change the lighting scene ready for bed. In the morning the blind opens at small increments over 30 minutes to allow natural light to enter our room. We have since installed 2 more to cover our living room (where we had one awkward blind to reach and would rarely shut because of this). I'll start with the bad points - but plenty of good points further down. 1. Noisy, it certainly isn't the quietest device. With our set up in the morning to open slowly with lots of small increments it isn't too noticeable but when operating for the whole length of the blind the noise starts to irritate. 2. Slow, it is definitely far quicker by hand! However, the appeal of just setting to open/close and then leave to do whatever else means the speed isn't too much of an issue. The blind shuts before we sit down in the evening in the living room and before we go the bed is already closed so means we don't need to worry about waiting to close in the evenings - and opening in the morning is not important that it happens instantly. 3. The plastic cover that covers the blind cord gearing keeps coming off. All 3 devices we have are installed in slightly different ways - and all 3 kick the plastic protector off all the time. We wish there was a slightly stronger mechanism to hold in place. It's a slight annoyance. The good points: 1. Life is definitely that little bit easier, no longer do we have to spend a minute everyday opening and closing blinds. That is 6 hours every year! Slight joking aside, we have a blind that was very difficult to get to in one of our rooms so we would usually leave open, since installing we have been able to close and open with ease. Timed closing means the house is ready for the evening and sets a relaxed mode in the evening. 2. Connects with Zigbee, though I bought the Aqara hub initially, I have since connected directly to Home Assistant through a Zigbee receiver installed on Home Assistant. This means we have full local control over all the blinds along with being able to easily integrate with our Home Assistant automations. We have linked the blinds in with our Hue wall switches (through an automation) so we can open and close the blinds from the light switch (as well as control the lighting). 3. Good battery life. We installed our first blind controller 5 weeks ago and used about 50% battery. At first we used it quite a bit to open/close and definitely more than once a day. The blind itself is quite heavy. It doesn't take too long to charge and takes USB C so a readily available cable. I have just a long USB C cable that I can plug in and charge the units in-situ to make life a bit easier rather than having to take off the wall and try to line the blind cord back up again. 4. For those who are less mobile this would be a massive benefit, the buttons on the unit themselves are big enough to make good contact, and far enough apart to not accidentally push the wrong button. They have their own mobile app, and with external tools it is possible to link to physical switches, but it would be nice for Aqara to offer their own switch that could talk locally to the blind controllers. We don't need this but others might.

I've been interested in smart home tech for quite some time now, but never really branched out further than the odd light bulbs pr smart plugs, like most people. I purchased this item back in March, along with some other items to expand our, smart home, home and was really excited to get it up and running. I've had my eye on Aqara products for some time and this was a great item to get started with. The E1 Hub is small and unobtrusive, running off a USB port in a twin socket in our living room. Once you work out what adapter you need for your particular blind cord, the install and setup process are rally easy. I chose to use the adhesive method of install, meaning I didn't need to get any additional tools out the garage. Adding both the E1 Hub and Roller shade driver to the Aqara app were really easy, and then its a simple case of following the instructions to get it set up with the open and closed settings. Using the buttons on the driver itself is simple, and you can press once to open in that direction, which will fully open or close the blind to its furthest point you set up earlier, or you can press it a second time to stop it in a position that suits you. If you integrate to be used with Alexa, she only has the capabilities to fully open or close the blind, so it would be a really good update if you were able to ask her to stop opening/closing the blind at some point, the same way you can with the driver remote itself. Another upgrade within the Aqara app itself would be an addition of more locations, as the nearest location setting to me is roughly 15-20 miles away, so when it comes to setting particular routines within the Aqara app, like wanting the blinds close when the temperature reaches a certain point in the day, its currently going off the temperature or an area a fare distance away from myself. This could obviously be worked around by using additional smart home products on a more advanced system to work better, but I'm not quite at that point yet. I also purchased a small window solar panel, which has meant I have not had to charge the device at all, and so as I write this review, it is still at 100% battery (the app tells me every few days that the battery is low, but it is not. Again, this could be an issue with the firmware and may change in future). Overall, I am extremely pleased with this system and plan on adding more around the house in future to control all our blinds. If you are interested in the solar panel I purchased as well, this is the link: https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B08HLRH32B/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o07_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Really great idea quite well executed. Bought with the e1 hub. Rock solid connectivity and by far the most reliable iot device I own. The only critique I would make is that there wasn't an obvious way to handle a connector with the joiner piece in it, but I was able to replace the cord entirely with a continuous one to get around that

Developed a fault after three months: the blind is no longer fully closed i.e. the device loses its reference point. I suspect internal slippage of the motor. It is only lightly loaded, operating a vertical blind. I have twice raised a ticket with Agara's support, following the Amazon link to the manufacturer. Both requests have been ignored.

Very easy to connect and setup with either screws or sticky adhesive will be purchasing more in future! Would make sure you are choosing only the smart blinds I accidentally bought the usb hub with it also when I have another hub out for delivery 😅