GE Smart C 2-amp Multi-Location White Wi-Fi Compatibility Touchless Illuminated Residential Light Switch with Wall

I originally had a 3-wire switch that seemed to work just fine, except in my application. Let me explain. I replaced my ceiling fan which is deemed to be "smart". Nowadays that means some form of app control, but really only mean there is no wall switch and only a remote. It does have an LED light kit and that's where the 3-wire Cync switch ran into problems. Namely, it seems to condition the power on the load wire in a way that disabled (permanently off) the light kit. And you have to use it in line with the load wire in order to power the unit, which it draws from the difference created by the load. Bypassing the switch solved that problem, but not my needs of using the wall switch position for a switch to turn the Cync light strips (indirect lighting) on/off. Sure a solution would have been to go with a wireless switch, just that this version doesn't support Alexa and most importantly doesn't feature the glow ring which I quickly grew attached to. In my situation, the wall switch previously powered outlets until I repurposed it to power my old fan. Hence, I had a neutral wire to work with and that enables the use of the 4-wire version. My inquiries about that application returned generally that the load wire still is needed and therefore it's unlikely that the 4-wire version is the solution. However, when reviewing the specs it turns out that the neutral wire (in addition to the line) provides a closed circuit and it's a bit unclear what the load wire does (other than providing to a light fixture albeit not controlling it). For my needs, I tried to simply connect the wires to the available line and neutral, but not use the load wire as that was already bypassed (to mentioned fan). According to Cync, the Load wire is mandatory, even in the 4-wire design. Then again, unlike the 3-wire version, there is no minimum load requirement, which technically means it could be 0W or even open. It sure confirmed to be true and once I wired neutral and line to the switch, it booted up even with the load wire (red) disconnected. Problem solved! The switch is recognized by the app, and controls my CYNC full color light strips as intended. The brightness control works well, too. And of course the soft glow ring around the switch is there, too. A positive side effect is that apparently the 4-wire dimmer switch is currently on sale for $29 whereas the 3-wire version costs more. The latter is theoretically more versatile, but may affect devices on the load wire more than desired. Hence, if there is a white (neutral) wire, the 4-wire switch works better for me.

I use this product with the Google Home eco system. Was looking for a switch that did not need a negative wire and no additional piece to plug into a near by outlet. This met the those requirements. Almost didn't purchase after reading reviews stating product randomly activates/deactivates and intermittentoperation. I have 2 of them now and planning to purchase more. Never had issue with intermittent operation. Works every time. Light did turn off "randomly"... noted the switch was located where there is low activity. Looked in the cync app and found a set of options for motion control. Turned it off and never had that issue again. One switch controls six lights on one circuit a d another 3 lights on one circuit. Works great. Put the adapter that comes with the switch on only one light. No issues. Love the way they look, ease of installation, and google home automation.

April 2024 update: Dropped to 1 ⭐️ I have had to replace almost half back to conventional switches because of leakage that makes some lights flicker - even after 30 minutes of attempting to reset the switch. Tech support is ABSOLUTELY USLESS. Again, they are not electricians and have no idea of how their own switches work. They read the same info that you will find on the website - right up to the point where it says call support. So, who does support call when it needs support. The only guess I have is that the switch temperature tolerance is WAY more restrictive than published. Every switch on an exterior wall (even insulated) has had this problem and it seems to be the only answer. Or, quality control is that bad. If you have a house with wiring before 1975: I recommend you AVOID this product. Has potential, but not quite ready for prime time - unless GE issues a lot of disclosures. 1. If your house/flat was built prior to 1975, consult a handyman, or an electrician. (GE does not have an electrician on their support lines and read the exact same thing you will read online). 2. If your house was upgraded from a fuse box prior to circuit breakers, consult an electrician (GE tech support is way out of their depth in this situation). 3. If you wiring looks like the included pictures, you have metal boxes holding switches, or Rag-Wire (cloth covered wire); get an electrician and don’t bother calling GE tech support. Don’t get me wrong, I have 12 switches and four are setup as three-ways. My house is 90 years old and can make these switches work (mostly - will explain below). In general, I give the mechanics of the switch four stars. If you have an older house, or wring, this may be the only viable option to integrate smart switches (without the expenditure of re-wiring an entire house). Where the big hassles come from is more app related and tech support. The switches seems to be very sensitive to any surge, flux, or spike with current. When it happens, it randomly closes the circuit, or leaks energy to where the light will not completely turn off. Sometimes this can be fixed with resetting the switch - other times, I have had to detach it and wire it back in. It also does not play nice with certain brands of LED bulbs (they flicker). I have one that is a motion sensor - very, very sensitive (to the point where I had to turn it off). It seemed that shadows would trigger it. GE says this will not work unless it is grounded (wiring the green wire). This is so they can avoid liability and warranty issues. Their tech support tried to tell me that I am missing a wire. Again, age of house and wire. Grounding wires were not mainstream until mid 60’s. That being said, if you are going to wire it as a three way, get coloured electrical tape. It will help identify the common and travellers. Now the app issues. Setup is simple enough. Navigating through the app is a little clumsy; so I just use Alexa as much as possible. When setting up as a three-way, unlike other brands, these wire as a three-way, but do not operate quite as a three-way. You can not name the two switches the same. That means if you press on button for power and then use a verbal command later - you have to use the exact name of the switch that you originally pressed for power. You are forced to assign a switch to a room. When multiple switches were in the same room/group, turn one switch on, all would turn on. The work around on that is to create a separate room for each switch. Again, you can sorta work around that with Alexa and groupings. The last problem with the three-way setup; if one switch goes off line for what other reason, the other will not operate through Alexa, or the app. That leaves you with an expensive physical switch with a pretty light. The ring led light. It is on, or off, only. It is brighter than expected and I had to turn it off in some rooms because it was too bright for sleeping. It would be nice if they could program to where you can dim it, or at least put it on a schedule to turn off when sleeping. Tech support., ugh. They are not electricians. When running into the initial difficulty of the setup, they were telling me that I was missing a wire in the box (i.e. not having a ground wire). Then the second call it was that my wires were the wrong colour for being the common, or traveler - not understanding that the box was wired after (not before) the light. Again, if not inclined with wiring (or have a family full of master electricians), think about using a handyman or electrician.

NOTE: the latest version of the C BY GE app for iOS requires iOS 12 or higher. Even though the FAQ says they are supporting the older app for older iOS versions, you have to ALREADY have the app as it is NOT AVAILABLE FOR DOWNLOAD. I had to wait until I could get to an android device to do the installation. I used both chat and phone support. Chat gave me the wrong wiring instructions and phone support went through 4 iterations until we got it right. I will say that phone support was fantastic overall as they stepped me through the entire process until we had the 4 switches working. Once we got the first pair working, the second was very easy. There are some things to be aware of before you start. First, use these switches if you don't have access to neutral wires in both boxes. For the dimmer I had access to a neutral in the LINE box, but the neutral just passed through the LOAD box and wasn't accessible. In the Toggle switches I had no neutrals at all. Second, your old wires may be curled around a screw terminal. In this case you either need to straighten the ends out or clip and strip the wires. You may or may not have room for the additional wire nuts in the box. I used WAGO clamping connectors (3 and 5 connection) and these provided tight connections where needed. The push-in WAGOs were not secure enough on the stranded wire but do work great on solid wire. Third, be ready to trim the ends of the wires in the box to the proper length as they may be a bit too long, mine were. Fourth, look at the youtubes on how to do this safely, including using a power tester, to determine LINE vs LOAD wires and to ensure that there is no power in the box. If you have 2 or more switches in the box it is possible that power can be coming into the box from multiple breakers, so there can be live wires even if the switch you are working on has the breaker tripped. Fifth, I had to remove all the switches in the box to replace the one I wanted to change because I had to rearrange the wires to fit the larger CbyGE switches in there, so be careful if you have more than 1 switch in the box. Sixth, you might need a new wall plate depending on the configuration of your switches. These switches come with nice snap on wall plates but of course that won't work with multiple switches in a box, so get the wall switch you need before you start the project. This process worked for me on a pair of the smart 3-way dimmer switches and a pair of the smart toggle switches. This should save you some time and effort. Here are the steps: 1) Determine which 3-way switch is the LINE and which is the LOAD. If you don't know how to do that then google it as there are a lot of video how-to's. This is an important step, apparently, to get things to work. I don't understand why, but I didn't question it. My gut tells me I should be able to replace either switch first and it shouldn't make any difference. 2) With the power off at the breaker, match up the two traveler wires to each other, you need to know which traveler on each side is paired to the one on the other side. I used a long length of landscape wire (any long enough wire should work, like lamp cord, etc.) and connected one end to a traveler in the LINE box. Then I ran the landscape wire over to the LOAD box and used a multi meter to test each of the traveler wires to find the traveler that had continuity. I labelled this TRAVELER #1 on both boxes. The other traveler wires were obviously TRAVELER #2. There are other ways to do this and youtubes show you how, but this is a real quick and dirty way to get it done. 3) Starting with the LINE side, connect 1 black wire on the switch to the LINE wire in the box + connect 1 of the 2 travelers (call it Traveler #1). Then connect the second black wire on the switch to the second traveler (Traveler #2) Now go to the load side and do the same thing except you are now hooking up the LOAD wire, Traveler #1, and a black wire from the switch together. Then connect the second black wire from the switch to Traveler #2. That's it. Now the App is very flaky and fails often when trying to connect the switch to WIFI. The solution is to completely exit the app and restart it. At one point I had to restart my android phone. For one switch, after a half dozen tries I couldn't connect the switch to my wifi, so in my case rebooting the router solved the problem.

Absolutely thrilled with my WiFi dimmer switch! This smart home upgrade has completely transformed my lighting experience. Installation was straightforward—just make sure you have a neutral wire and a 2.4 GHz WiFi connection, as recommended. The ability to control my lights from anywhere using the Cync App (powered by Savant) is a game changer. I love setting schedules so I never come home to a dark house, and the dimming feature lets me create the perfect ambiance for any occasion. Integration with Google Home and Amazon Alexa was seamless—no extra hub needed. Now, I can adjust my lights with simple voice commands, which is incredibly convenient when my hands are full. The energy-saving scheduling feature is a bonus, helping me reduce electricity costs by ensuring lights are off when not needed. Overall, this smart dimmer switch is reliable, easy to use, and has made my home smarter and more efficient. Highly recommended!

Purchased 4 of these switches for my ceiling lights. 3 bedrooms. No neutral wires as advertised, great. But.... I wish the Wi-Fi could stay connected for a lengthier period. After 2 months of operation. Numerous of network setting tweaks and tests. Nothing can keep these switches from disconnecting. They don't usually drop all at once. But sometimes it does. Because of Wi-Fi drops daily, or sometimes every other few days. The longest it stay connected was 6 days. Just shine of a full week. Which prevented the Google Home to communicate with it quite often. When it stays connected then it is great. But the short lived smart home experience fades away rather quickly. It can provides so much convenient to my household. Only if it could stay connected. So far, the result is a mixed bag. Giving it 3 stars because the GE App can still switch on/off over bluetooth the phone app with a button consistently (not over WiFi). Meaning I do have a remote switch on my phone. With this old house. Having any convenience is better than none. I'm considering it a consolation prize. PRO: *Easy installation. *No neutral wires is required. *Dimming works great *Light effect fade away to off. Fancy! *GE App works for the most part over bluetooth. CON: *Constant WiFi drop / disconnect *No Google Home voice control or any button commands due to the unstable connection form these switches. *No new firmware support or update over its WiFi connection issues. Shameful. *2.4hz module cost WiFi interference. *Bulky build. Small size conjunction box will not fit.

TL;DR: excellent product. They have thought of everything. Easy to set up and link with Google Home. Long version: I had bought a WiFi switch from a different manufacturer before this one. It was very frustrating as the app for the switch would insist I pick a 2.4GHz SSID even though I had (but my phone connects on the same SSID on 5GHz.). So before I ordered this one, I decided to talk to GE Customer Support. After talking to them for this product I decided to buy and try it out. And I was ready to do some tricks for the WiFi set up if the app had problems like the other manufacturers product which I will not name here. Anyhow long story short this switch was a breeze to set up. I did not have to do anything special with the WiFi setup. I entered the SSID and the password while my phone was connected to the same SSID on 5GHz. It worked first time. In a couple of minutes I was controlling it with Google Home and had a schedule set up. One of the things I was worrying about was the fact that this switch is a dimmer as well. But the special LED bulbs I have are not dimmable , so I was worried it may cause an issue. But during the set up process the app asked me what type of bulb it was and whether it was dimmable! So my worries were for nothing, they had thought about this detail and app knows to drive the switch so that it only has On/Off and not brightness etc. Product is very appealing and feels really high quality. My only issues was the depth of the switch. It took some work to get it to fit in the box in the wall with all the wires and wire nuts there as well. Packaging detail: I noticed that the box case for the product has a magnetic flap. I thought was kind of neat but excessive. Could have saved some cost there.

As a disabled engineer I bought several of these to make my life easier at home. They work, but have a few snags that I would think GE had solved by now, it's 2025! I chose the version that does not require a neutral wire because my house is older. I got them all working, but had the following problems along the way. 1. These don't work with generic (Walmart) LED bulbs unless you install the bulb adapter they supply. You only need 1 adapter per switch, even if the lamp has multiple bulbs. BUT, what do you do for lights that don't have a traditional bulb - you have to call GE and get a "fixture adapter." Really? 2. If you install these in a multi switch outlet (with 2 or 3 or 4 switches behind 1 cover), the cover will have a gap behind it. Very annoying. These switches are thick and a generic cover won't sit flat against the wall, and GE does not sell 2 or 3 or 4 switch covers, only singles! I had to research "deep switch covers" and buy several online. Or recess the GE switch into the wall a bit. 3. Mine would NOT work with stainless steel switch covers, which I have in my kitchen. It seems a metal cover blocks the WiFi. So, I had to replace the SS covers with plastic. No warning about this in the manual. 4. I use one of the non-dimming versions to switch a ceiling fan that draws well below the 5 amp limit (as stated by GE). They last about 1 year, then burn out. They get hot and smell like burning plastic. Two have failed this way! 5. They never work the first time you add them to the phone app. You must delete the switch and start over in the app. The 2nd time you add them, they work. Confusing. 6. Good luck getting them to work on a 3-way circuit (2 switches on opposite sides of the room controlling 1 light). GE says it will work, but you have to replace both old switches with these WiFi switches. Neither I or my electrician got it to work. Finally I converted the 3-way circuit to a simple 2-way by bypassing 1 switch and installing just 1 of these WiFi switches. Overall, I give these a 2 out of 5 stars. They work, but need much improvement.