Big Ass Fans’ Haiku ceiling fans have been the most sophisticated fans to reach the consumer market since they began shipping in 2014. Equipped with temperature, humidity, and occupancy sensors, they can turn themselves on and off and automatically adjust their rotational speed as needed. They can also exchange information with Nest thermostats to cool your home even more efficiently.
In early 2016, Big Ass Fans formed a new division—Haiku Home—to focus on the residential market. Now Haiku Home has announced integration with Amazon’s Alexa voice control, so that its fans’ automatic settings can be overridden with voice commands. “Voice control cuts down the number of steps required by the user to get what they need,” said Haiku Home’s Director of Connected Devices Landon Borders, “and in the long run, that will lead to broader adoption of the connected home.”
If you own a Haiku Home H-series, I-series, L-series fan with the wall-control option, or one of the older Haiku fans with SenseMe technology—plus an Amazon Echo, Echo Dot, or Echo Tap—you’ll be able to use voice commands to turn the fan on and off, change its speed, and control the brightness of its integrated LED light ring (an option available on some models) using Alexa voice commands. Haiku Home expects this capability to be available sometime in April, and it will also be available in the new line of LED light fixtures the company will begin shipping in May.
Why this matters : Heating and cooling accounts for a large chunk of most homeowners’ budgets. Ceiling fans are one of the most efficient ways to keep your home at a comfortable temperature, circulating air in the summer and pushing warm air down from the ceiling in the winter (a task Haiku fans handle with particular aplomb).
The sensors in Haiku fans work to ensure the blades spin only when they’re needed, and the addition of voice commands makes them even more convenient. You don’t need to wait for the fan to recognize your presence, reach for a remote control, or walk to a switch on the wall. And with Amazon’s new Echo Dot, it’s a whole lot cheaper to put Amazon’s Alexa connected-home controller in multiple rooms in your home.