For years we here in the UK have been looking on with envy at all of you overseas with your Aqara smart plugs. But no more!
We’ve recently seen the Aqara Wall Outlet H2 launched, and now we have the Power Plug H2 to go with it. I’ve been fortunate enough to have had the Power Plug running in my home for a little while now, so I thought it was a good time to do a quick review for those that are in the market for a new smart plug.
First things first: design. I’ve had plugs from other brands before; IKEA, Meross, that sort of thing. And so often, I’ve found that I can’t fit another plug in beside it easily. With this one, I haven’t had that issue. It’s small size and round edges give it a great footprint when you’ve got other devices plugged in beside it. For example, I have a rechargeable battery dock that sits in a socket ready to replace the dying cells within those few devices that still don’t have rechargeable USB-C power. It’s a little wide at the top, which has made it a problem for any plugs - smart or not - to be connected beside it. But with this, I’ve had no problem.
I could go on about how the UK G-Type plug is the best kind of plug in the world, but that is a little bit of bias on my part. Although I’m sure the other Brits would also agree with that.
Outside of its size, the build quality of the Power Plug is great. Solid, aesthetically pleasing, and the click when you do have to manually press the button… very satisfying. It fits nicely into most UK homes as well, being white it blends in with existing 3-pin sockets since most of them are also white here.
So far so good, but what about the smart part of this smart plug?
Well, let’s start with setup. You’ve got a choice of either Zigbee or Thread when it comes to connecting the Power Plug to your home. By default it’s set to Thread, so if by some chance you don’t have an Aqara hub or another that supports Zigbee, you can still connect this directly to your Thread network via things like HomePod Minis. This is great with iOS 27 bringing energy monitoring to Apple Home in about a month from now.
The energy monitoring feature is something that will be important to a lot of people in the UK, especially with energy prices looking to increase again from October (add in a sarcastic yay). This plug will allow you to turn off devices based on power increases, decreases and levels with automations within the Aqara app. For example, if a device drops down to its standby levels, you could have the power cut completely and stop that wasted power when the device is not in use.
One use case I’ve found is bringing accent lighting into the smart home without needing to use smart bulbs, or replacing the devices completely. Mine is currently connected to a small lamp in the living room, that comes on when the FP300 sensor notices presence / the room being dark, and then turns off the lamp when the room is empty.
Overall, this may not be the first smart plug on the market, but if you’re in the Aqara eco-system already you’re not going to beat it for how it performs with other devices and automations in the Aqara app.
Great product, and I’ve already got 2 in the house!
