tado‪°‬ 4+

Amazing

I like several other people did a lot of research before opting for Tado. Hive and Nest apps get pretty poor reviews in the App Store and I was keen to understand why. I wanted a robust geofenced solution with the option to integrate with HomeKit if necessary. Tado was the only option that fits the bill. I was also keen to avoid overly ‘clever’ learning systems that would try to anticipate movements invariably getting things wrong. Tado provide a logical approach to heating based on a schedule combined with (multiple) device locations and manual overrides providing an extremely flexible solution.

I have no experience in central heating systems and have an elderly system with two independent underfloor heating zones. The system is over 20 years old. Needless to say Tado support was excellent in identifying the old thermostats and providing the necessary installation instructions. It was super simple to install, in fact the Extension Kit simply pushed on to the existing programmer backplate without any rewriring.

Geofencing seems to work like magic ensuring the house is warm on arrival but heating is turned off when we go out. The various graph views are indispensable for a getting a temperature profile throughout the day. 10/10.

A great start but room for improvement

I really enjoy using the Tado system since I installed it 2 years ago, halving our oil usage! It has made a huge difference to our family heating costs by selecting radiators in the rooms we are using at any specific time. I used the timed function the first year but now just switch on manually for the rooms we’re in as some days even in winter we don’t need the heating on.
My main two improvements requests are;
1) Group Boost - a programmable boost icon that can be setup to link a number of radiators together and set specific temperatures for each and simply boost that area with one command, currently our main living area has 6 radiators and I have to set them manually each time every day! Up to 5 Group boost options would be a huge enhancement.
2) Backward comparability with Tado X. I invested over £1,500 just 2 years ago as we have 19 radiators in our home and I would like to link an annex that is 15m away from the main building but the signal will not carry to it. Therefore the features of Tado X would be perfect but I would have to replace the entire system, why is Tado punishing the very customers who have made them successful? I have other properties that could benefit from Tado X but I feel Tado have not thought through the potential negative impact of restricting Tado X features for existing loyal customers who have recommended the solution to many others!

Developer Response ,

Hello,
Thank you for taking the time to write a review,

If you want to suggest developments of features we don’t offer, you can visit our Community Forum where we have a section for suggestions and ideas.

Best regards,

Your tadoº team

Not bad but app not really thought through for real life!

Have been using Tado for 1 year. Mainly very impressed indeed. Best feature is undoubtedly Tado's ability to maintain constant temperature throughout house. Still, I am surprised that the following 2 things do not make it to the list of things needing attention.
1) There is no scope for creating 2 or more timing set ups for the whole house. For example I have one timing programme for the whole house during a normal working week, but then need a totally different set up for holiday periods. I also ideally need a further set up for when my kids are home from uni but I am still at work. What happens in practice is that I dare not lose all my timings for the most common set up, so I keep that set-up but then end up manually controlling the whole house during holiday times! I think you will agree that is a very bizarre scenario given how easy it would be for you to add several more programmable schedules to the app. In our case it isn't possible to use the GEO location option for a family because in practice you can't rely on teenagers having their phones (a) with them and (b) charged.
2) The noise of the thermostats is enough to wake a light sleeper. This never gets mentioned in your literature. For some this renders thermostats pointless in a bedroom, and for other such as myself means that I have to artificially work round the problem by setting switch on times to later than desired.