// THE VERGE — MODA & SOCIETÀ
Tado’s new thermostat is designed as a Nest killer
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When Google ignominiously exited the European thermostat market last year, it pointed its customers to Tado. This week, the German-based smart home company is launching its Smart Thermostat X (2nd gen), and aiming to attract European Nest users who haven’t already jumped ship.
Google shutting down the servers for its 1st- and 2nd-gen thermostats drove “significant sales” for Tado, Christian Deilmann, cofounder and managing director of Tado, told The Verge in an interview. The third-generation Nest has at least 10 times the penetration in Europe, he says. And while Google still supports it, Deilmann sees the writing on the wall. “At some point, I think they will continue their strategy,” he says. “There’s nothing we know for sure … but it doesn’t make too much sense to pull out of some generations and not others.”
Tado’s newest thermostat costs £159.99/€179.99 for a wired starter kit and £169.99/€199.99 for a wireless kit. It has a completely new look, with a white square design and a circular interface that appears only when you touch it.
At 17.8mm thick, it’s significantly slimmer than the first-gen Tado, and the third-gen Nest (Google never launched the fourth-gen in Europe). Deilmann says it’s designed to blend better into your home rather than stand out, as the previous all-black model did. There’s a customizable action button on the top, and the battery version lasts a year on its rechargeable battery.
The Smart Thermostat X is designed to work with boilers, heat pumps, and underfloor heating (not air conditioning), and thanks to Matter-over-Thread connectivity, it can communicate more easily with a receiver sitting in a basement next to your boiler, as well as most smart home platforms. Tado moved to Thread from a proprietary 6LoWPAN with the first-gen Tado X.