We have two Nest thermostats in the house, but Mrs.Goofy finds them too complicated to use (?). Specifically she keeps pestering me to get a thermostat like she grew up with (not in those words) which is either “off” or “on” and you set the temperature with a little slidey-thing and that’s it.
The difference for us is that we can bear cold in the morning but roasting hot in the afternoon (thanks to the entire back wall of the house being glass), so having a setting which will automatically “heat” or “cool” depending is good, at least in my world.
But, for the sake of happy wife happy life, does anyone have a suggestion as to what I might replace our Nests with?
I’m not sure this helps because I haven’t investigated Nest’s features, but I’ve like my Ecobee thermostat. While it can be complicated if you want it to be, you can use it as simply as you want. I use it almost exclusively to change the temperature whenever I want and it does it remotely (from the bedroom or kitchen, etc. – or even from another state).
We have had to replace both of our A/C units within the past ~5 years. In both cases, they came with thermostats. Both of them are compatible with Z-wave (I think). So our Google Home sees them, and we can change the temperature from there. But it also came with an app that allows for a lot more control, including scheduling. We can be overseas, and change the temperature and/or schedule if we choose.
I would bet money that whomever you bought your unit(s) from also sells a thermostat that is “smart”, allows for schedules, and probably a phone app. FWIW, ours is Trane.
Welcome to my world. The day after I retired (7/1/2003) I found I had to replace our A/C unit. In 2017 I had to replace that system. Now here in 2025 we just replaced the whole enchilada again. We got a new thermostat. It’s a Honeywell. It’s not a Yuppie thermostat where you use your iPhone remotely and all that jazz it’s just either on/off/auto and plus or minus.
The installers set the new thermostat at 60 degrees and left. I thought they were coming back when the house cooled off. Stupid me. They were finished. Man we like to froze to death.
Anyway, long story short, I wonder how many more A/Cs we will have to replace before we leave this earth.
I wonder if any smart thermostats have software with an “easy” mode that she could learn to tolerate.
The most Rube Goldberg solution is to hack two thermostats onto your hvac and install his & hers thermostats, she gets the Honeywell and you get smart AI.
That is like the ones I grew up with. If you want to turn on the unit, twist the dial until it comes on. But the modern ones are better in terms of comfort. And, at least ours, you can change the temp on the touchscreen by touching the “up” or “down” arrows. It won’t permanently change the underlying program, but will maintain the temp you set until the next programming period (e.g. “evening”). Then it reverts to program.
I also don’t understand this part. Turn to the right, see the numbers go up, house gets warmer. Turn to the left, see the numbers go down, house gets cooler. That is the basic functionality of the simplest thermostat … “you set the temperature with a little slidey-thing and that’s it”.
Maybe she would like one of those home control things that you can talk to (Alexa, Siri, whatever)? “Turn A/C off”, “Set A/C to 76 degrees”, “Set heat to 68 degrees”, etc. I never connected our Alexa to our Nest, but I’m pretty sure it can be done.
She is flummoxed sometimes when it is in “heat-cool” mode, which is to say it does both, depending on the temperature. There are four modes: heat, cool, heat-cool, and off. If it’s in “heat” and she wants it cooler, she has to “switch modes” (I know, I know, trivially easy). But she doesn’t realize that so she changes the temperature range, but it’s still heating, not cooling, so it doesn’t do anything.
I use cool in summer, heat in winter, and heat-cool in spring and fall as temperatures may be cold in the morning, but with the amount of sun we get in the afternoon it can get maddeningly hot. But this confuses her too, as she has to figure out which it’s doing: heating or cooling.
OK, I’m making this sound really long and dumb (and it is) over a simple thing, but she’s not technologically ept. If it wasn’t for me she’d still be watching a b&w 12” TV and listening to music on a boom box she got as a present in 1983.
As I said, our t-stat (and I’m sure many others) allows you to change the temperature manually. It will then go off-program until the next programming period. So, for example, if I think it’s too cold in the morning, I can hit the little “up” button on the t-stat. It will then heat to the set temperature until noon (when the “afternoon” program period begins).
Since she apparently doesn’t want/need to change it permanently (otherwise, just change the program), will that suffice??