Mashable Readers' Choice Awards 2025: Your favorite smart home devices

Home products have become much smarter in recent years. According to StatesmanThe smart home penetration rate will reach 89.5 percent in 2025 and reach 99 percent by 2029. This means that virtually every household in the United States uses some form of smart home device. We've come a long way since The Clapper.

Smart home devices can improve the level of convenience in everyday life, provided they are configured correctly and truly provide seamless integration and ease of use.

But this makes us wonder: Which home devices are truly worthy of being smart?

Instead of simply answering this question ourselves, we present it to you, our readers. At our first Readers' Choice Awards, we asked you which smart home brands you use and love across the various smart home categories.

Best Home Security Cameras in 2025

First of all, these are CCTV cameras. IN poll conducted by US News & World Report62 percent of respondents use outdoor surveillance cameras, and 36 percent use indoor surveillance cameras. Home security cameras can obviously be useful for peace of mind and a sense of security or for keeping an eye out for porch pirates. But your privacy is also an important factor to consider when choosing a device that constantly films you, your home, and your surroundings.

Blink was the winner here for overall satisfaction with a score of 7.8 out of 10, narrowly beating out Ring and Wyze, which both received a 7.7 rating. Note from us: We do not support Ring in our product recommendations because of many privacy issues.

(Be sure to click the arrows in the chart below to view each category of our survey results.)

All three brands were about the same across the board, but each stood out in some areas. Blink users appreciate the ease of setup and use, competitive price, and free cloud storage.

Wyze was rated best for price but rated lowest for audio quality and motion detection, so that could be a potential trade-off. Price was definitely an important factor for survey respondents, who commented: “Great products. Reasonably priced,” “The cameras work well and the price was within budget,” and “Wyze security cameras are worth the price.”

Our readers praised Ring for its ease of setup, with two respondents writing, “I've owned multiple generations of cameras for over 20 years, and Ring is the easiest to set up and use,” and “I've owned security cameras before. None of them were as easy to set up and use as Ring.”

Mashable Speed of Light

A common complaint across all three brands was that the cameras don't record enough time before motion is detected.

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The best smart home assistants in 2025

Smart assistants are like the brains of a smart home. They act as a hub to control other devices using voice, schedule, or other triggers. Smart assistant devices can range from small speakers that take up very little space to large screens that can be placed on a tabletop or mounted to a wall. Apple's Siri is perhaps the most popular among smartphones, while Google Assistant and Amazon Alexa – big names in smart home devices.

Google was our winner across the board, although Amazon Alexa was a close second. One survey participant said: “I like Alexa for routine tasks and integration, but Google Assistant [is] better [at] answering questions.”

Some survey participants had similar experiences: They loved the convenience provided by their smart assistant, but they also had frustrating interactions.

One wrote: “I had a pretty good experience with Amazon Alexa. One of the best moments was when I set up my smart home with Alexa and connected everything from lights to thermostats and smart plugs. It was so easy to control everything with just my voice. For example, I could tell Alexa to turn off the lights or set the temperature, which made life much more convenient, especially when my hands were full. However, I ran into some problems. There have been times when Alexa misunderstood my commands, especially if there was background noise or unclear speech. It was a little frustrating when Alexa didn't respond as expected. Sometimes Alexa would also not sync correctly with some smart devices, requiring troubleshooting. Overall, however, I found Alexa useful and a great addition to my home automation.”

And a Google user wrote: “Our entire house is equipped with Google displays, speakers, TVs integrated with Google TV, as well as third party plugs, light bulbs and the like. I just recently upgraded to a Google Mesh router. Sometimes it can be difficult to set up third-party devices, but once everything is up and running, it's nice to be able to control everything right in the Google Home app.”

The best smart lights in 2025

Smart light bulbs and smart plugs are some of the most affordable smart home devices in terms of price and ease of use. Philips Hue, Govee and TP-Link (Kasa) are some of the biggest names in smart lighting. Each offers a small selection of products, from basic dimmable white light bulbs to programmable outdoor string lights or TV backlights.

Philips Hue is a more premium brand with a higher price tag, and this was evident in our survey results. Just a note: TP-Link is under investigation security vulnerabilities with your routers and predatory pricing.

TP-Link won the majority of categories in our survey; although both TP-Link and Philips Hue received the same likelihood of recommendation score.

One reader wrote: “The only reason I would 'extremely' not recommend Philips Hue is because they are relatively expensive compared to other brands.” And we saw this in the comments from TP-Link users: one person wrote: “I used to have another brand and it was very disappointing. I was pleased to find that they suited my tastes and at a lower price.”

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Best Smart Vacuum Cleaner Brands in 2025

Our resident vacuum expertLeah Stodart says: “Of course, the actual cleaning performance plays a huge role in how spotless your floors will be. But if a vacuum is a pain to clean, you won't want to use it—whether it's an upright vacuum that's too clunky to pull out of the toilet or a robot vacuum that gets stuck more often than not.” And these are the types of features that we wanted to ask you all about.

Only two brands made it to our readers' list, but Stodart tests upright and robotic vacuum cleaners in his apartment and has several great recommendations from other brands.

iRobot offers a variety of price points, from basic and inexpensive to high-end and downright expensive. Participants in our survey had both new models and older, simpler models that get the job done without any additional equipment. One wrote: “This is an easy to use and inexpensive smart robot vacuum cleaner with a simple function; however, this makes it desirable to many people like me because it is easier to use than complex systems.”