We’ve seen plenty of smart water sensors that will monitor how much household water you’re using while checking for leaks, but they’re often wallet-busters that require help from a plumber to install.
Not so with the Smart Home Water Monitor from Pani, a do-it-yourself wireless sensor that attaches to a shower head or the water line connector of a toilet or sink.
Available starting today for $70 or as a $120 two-pack, the Smart Home Water Monitor is a wireless flow meter that connects to most water fixtures that have 1/2- or 3/8-inch fittings.
The battery-powered monitor sends data about your water usage to the Pani mobile app for iOS and Android. After about 7 to 10 days of keeping an eye on your water usage, the Pani app will begin giving you tips and recommendations for conserving water. It will also alert you if it detects any leaks.
Pani
The Pani Smart Home Water Detector can keep tabs on your water usage and send you tips via the free Pani app for iOS and Android.
Pani offers an online tool that will help you estimate how many Smart Home Water Monitors you’ll need in your home for the best “high-level” picture of your water usage, with Pani noting that showers, toilets, and faucets generally account for about 70 percent of household water consumption.
I gave Pani’s estimator tool a spin and it told me that based on the size of my apartment, the number of bathrooms (one and a half) and the number of family members (three), we’d probably need about three Smart Home Water Monitors to properly track our water usage.
While the individual Pani water monitors are relatively inexpensive at $70 each, they do add up if you need more. The three recommended Smart Home Water Monitors for my apartment, for example, would cost a total of about $190.
That’s still not bad compared to the Phyn Smart Water Assistant, a $299 DIY system that connects to your hot and cold water lines to monitor your household water use and detect leaks. Of course, the Alexa- and Google Assistant-compatible Phyn Smart Water Assistant could end up being a bargain depending on how many of Pani’s Smart Home Water Monitors you need.
It’s also worth considering that neither Pani’s Smart Home Water Monitors nor the Phyn Smart Water Assistant can shut off your water lines in the event of a leak. For that, you’ll need to upgrade to a somewhat more substantial system like the $699 Phyn Plus or the Flo by Moen, water monitors that need to be installed on your main water line.
We’ll have a review of the Pani Smart Home Water Monitor once we spend quality time with a few of them.
Author: Ben Patterson, Senior Writer
Ben has been writing about technology and consumer electronics for more than 20 years. A PCWorld contributor since 2014, Ben joined TechHive in 2019, where he covers smart speakers, soundbars, and other smart and home-theater devices. You can follow Ben on Twitter.